OFFLINE

I co-pastor City Community Church alongside my good friend Nathan LaGrange.  We launched in March of 2009 in the Central Library auditorium right in the heart of downtown Indianapolis.  Never thought I'd be in ministry, let alone a church planter, but God led my best friend and I to take a risk, leave a successful ministry (as music pastors), and start something brand new.

When we tell people we meet in a library, they usually think of "shhhh-shing" little old ladies with pencils protruding from buns of hair on the top of their heads.  But the Central Library is really a cultural center in downtown Indy.  A 50 million dollar facility on the north side of a revitalizing downtown.  We think it's the perfect first "home" for CityCom.

As for the co-pastoring thing, I can't tell you how it works.  It just works (for us).  Not something I'd recommend for everyone, but Nathan and I had worked for over a decade as a partnership in music ministry.  We've written over 70 songs together, produced 7 albums (the last one in 2007 with Integrity Music).

We're very different (I'm a former accountant, Nathan a former media/creative specialist), and our complimentary gifts spilled over into a beautiful working relationship AND a beautiful friendship.  Our wives and children couldn't be closer.  So to launch the church any other way except in the same partnership that had proved so life-giving and successful over the previous decade just didn't seem possible.

Starting a church from scratch has been incredibly rewarding...and remarkably challenging.  The beauty of the blank slate (yay, no one telling you what you have to do!) is also the terror of the blank slate (oh crap, no one is telling you what to do!). But the past two years have been so shaping, not just for the growing body of CityCom, but for Nathan and I personally.  The pressure of leadership has driven us both to a beautiful place of maturing, healing, and growing in our own personal lives as well.

Not exactly sure what the future holds, but I'm incredibly excited to continue the journey.