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Before there were buildings, there were people. Before there were gatherings, there were homes. Before the church filled cities, it began with ordinary people whose lives had been transformed by Jesus. In Acts chapter two, we see the very first church begin. Not through extraordinary
people, but through ordinary people who said yes to what God was doing. They opened their homes. They shared meals. They prayed together. They served one another. They made room for more people to experience the hope that they had found in Jesus. Generation after generation,
God has continued building his church the same way. Through ordinary people faithfully making room for whatever God wants to do next. Two thousand years later, God is still writing the same story.
Every generation has had moments where God invited ordinary people to step forward, to make room, and participate in what he was doing. Echoes is just one chapter in that story. In July 2023, God began stirring something through an unexpected conversation
between two pastors who were also friends. Friends. What started as a conversation became our calling. What began as a calling became our commitment. And over the next several months, God continued bringing clarity,
confirmation in people around a vision to plant a church where more people could echo Jesus every day. People began praying. People began serving. People began giving and families began saying yes. Then on 01/26/2025,
Echoes Church opened its doors for the very first time. A church that began with a vision and a group of people saying yes has become a place where thousands of people are encountering Jesus, finding community, and experiencing life change. In the first year alone, almost 2,000 people said yes to following Jesus.
400 people went public with their faith through baptism. More than a thousand new families walked through the doors of Echoes Church. Hundreds of students found community and discovered their identity in Christ. Hundreds of adults found belonging through Cruise.
And nearly a thousand people stepped forward to serve and help build the church. But those numbers, they're not the story. They represent the story. They represent the person who found hope, the family that found belonging, the life that was changed because somebody made room for them.
One thing has become incredibly clear. God keeps sending people. And every time God sends people, the church has a responsibility. We make room. We're not responding to a problem. We are responding to God's faithfulness. For months now, we 've been praying, dreaming, we've been working alongside architects and builders,
trying to understand what it would take to create a permanent home for Echoes.
Not because we're trying to build a bigger church, but because we believe that God is asking us to to faithfully steward what he's already doing. Over the next two years, we believe that God is inviting us to build a permanent home that will serve generations of people that have not even walked through our doors yet. When we think about the home that God is inviting Echoes to build, we don't just see walls and rooms. We see a place where lives are transformed.
A place where people encounter Jesus, discover belonging, and are equipped to live out the purpose that God has placed on their lives. Because a home is much more than a structure. A home is where people are formed. A home is where people are strengthened. A home is where people are sent.
As we look forward to the future of Echoes, we see three ways this home will impact the world around us. First, we are building a permanent spiritual home for the next generation. A place where children will encounter Jesus, where students are formed in resilient faith,
where families will find strength and belonging and community. Every space we create makes room for formation, discipleship, and life together. Not just on Sundays, but throughout the week. We see a home where the next generation discovers who they are in Christ, where families are growing stronger together,
where people find a place that they can truly belong. Secondly, we're building a home for our community because Arizona is hurting. Foster families are overwhelmed. Marriages are strained. Many people are battling hopelessness in silence. And we believe that God has called echoes to respond
by helping people echo the life of Jesus in their everyday lives. This home will allow us to expand the ways that we serve and strengthen people right where they are, supporting vulnerable families, strengthening marriages, creating space for people to find healing, community,
and hope. Because we don't want people to just attend to church. We want people to become the people that God has created them to be. And finally, we are building a home for the nations. Because what God builds here, it won't stay here. This home will be a sending center. A place where leaders are gonna be trained, where pastors will be strengthened,
where church planters are equipped and launched.
We believe that healthy churches plant healthy churches. And we are building a place that deeply forms people and sends them boldly into their calling. A place where the hope of Jesus is carried beyond our walls into cities and communities that we may never personally reach.
So what does this mean for us? It means that we have an incredible opportunity to step into what God is doing. Over the next two years, we're entering into a generosity initiative to build a permanent home for Echoes.
But before we ever talk about what we are building, we have to first recognize where we are standing. Friends, we are standing in the literal middle of a miracle.
When we look back at everything that God has done through Echoes, we don't have to ask the question, is God moving? The evidence is all around us. Lives have been changed. Families transformed. People have found hope. The church is growing. God has already been faithful.
The question in front of us is not, is God on the move? The question is, will you and I step into the unknown
and meet the moment that God has placed in front of us? Because every generation gets moments where God invites them to participate in something that is it's bigger than themselves. And I believe that this is one of those moments for us as Echoes Church. For more than two thousand years, ordinary people have faithfully made room for what God was doing next. And because of them, you and I have a story to step into today.
Now, it's our turn. The question in front of us is simple. Will you and I be the people who build the home that God is inviting Echoes to become?
Because one day, people in this city will walk through doors that have not yet been built. Children will discover Jesus in rooms that don't yet exist. Families are gonna find hope in spaces that we're only dreaming about today.
Leaders will be equipped and churches will be strengthened. The gospel will reach places that we may never personally go. Not because we built a building, but because together,
you and I built a home. In the valley of houses, I'm telling you, God is building a home. It's a home for our family. It's a home for our community. It's a home for the nations. And today, he's inviting us to help build it.
Come on. Can we just take ten seconds and praise the faithfulness of God because he's a good God that is worthy of our praise? Man, I'm telling you, is it is absolutely mind blowing to be here. We put this date on the calendar almost a year ago. We started the process of unfolding
this vision about a year ago, and we had no idea even when we were filming these videos
that we would be at a place that we're at today. That's why we didn't go into all the details in the video of what the building's gonna look like and where we're going because we we had no idea. We started this process with a a belief that we had to do something, but we had no idea what it was going to be. There was a possibility that I was gonna stand up here today and tell you we're we're we're gonna raise a bunch of money to do something, but we don't know what it is yet. It was potentially gonna be some land that we were gonna buy, but we knew that God had told us to move and what we were waiting for was for the clarity and the vision of what it was going to actually look like. Now here's what's mind blowing. This date has been on the calendar for almost a year and what's amazing to me is tomorrow morning, we will sign all the papers to officially close escrow
and buy the Macy's building that will be ours. I mean, come on. There is not there's not a way
in a million years that we could have orchestrated all of that except God who's in the business of still doing the impossible. We were told from everybody, from the mall, from Macy's, from the brokers, from the banks that we were nuts and it was never gonna happen,
here but we are. Friends, if you are if you are in need of a miracle today, can I just tell you that we still serve a God who's in the business of doing the supernatural? What is impossible with man is possible with God. Come on somebody, like that's that's who God is.
And so I am. I'm excited to step forward with you into what's called the home campaign.
The slogan is that in the valley of houses, we believe that God is building a home. As we were as we were praying and seeking the Lord, we just really felt like man, if you look over our valley, you go on a hike, you get up to the top of a mountain, you look out, there's houses everywhere, construction all over the place. We are in the fastest growing city in the world for the last in the country for the last four or five years running. There's houses everywhere,
but I think there's a massive void for homes. Right? There's a difference between a house and a home. A house is a a building that has a roof and some walls and a bed but a home is where a family is is developed, where children are shaped, where spiritual formation takes place. We're gonna talk a lot about a building, but what we believe that God is asking us to do is to build a spiritual home that will continue to impact generations to come in the East Valley, that will be a kingdom outpost
for years and years to come. In this building,
it is not random where we are going. You should have gotten one of these on your way in. K. This is kind of our our field guide if you will for the next five weeks. If you did not get one, just throw your hand in the air like you just don't care and our ushers will make sure you get one. These literally have all the questions that you could you could ask. There's a five week, devotional
guide that we would encourage you to go on with your family. There's, places to take sermon notes, bring this with you to church over the next five weeks. This literally is the field guide over this five week initiative that we've called the home campaign
and my hope and my prayer and my goal is that every single one of us would catch a vision for what God is doing and that we would jump in to be a part of it. I'm gonna use the story of the life of a guy named Abram who eventually becomes renamed Abraham
that's found in the book of Genesis to kind of anchor our time together. I think his story does two things for us. The the first one is it reminds us that what we are in the middle of today in the East Valley of 2026 is unbelievable and it's supernatural yes and amen.
But it really is just the most local expression in the current version of what God has always done throughout history, taking very ordinary normal people and using them for significant kingdom purposes. Secondly, it also reminds us what the invitation of faith always was. We're gonna see a guy who was
kind of just going through the motions, who was comfortable in a city, not running from a bad life but was comfortable in his current life and God called him out of that into a life beyond his wildest dreams. Friends, it is still the offer that is on the table for you and I today.
It's not just Abram that God wants to use. It's not just Echo's church but it's also you. It's your home and it's your family and if you will say yes to God, I'm telling you, you will see him do unbelievable
things in you and through you. Genesis chapter twelve, four verses I want us to look at and then I'll pray and we'll jump in. If you're wondering why I sound like this, yes, I definitely woke up yesterday with a head cold going, that's awesome. I love this, but I was not gonna miss today. They were gonna have to put me on a wheelchair if I was gonna miss today. Right? No head cold is gonna stop me. But Genesis chapter 12 verse one says this, says, the Lord had said to Abram, if I call him Abraham, I'm talking about the same person. Okay? God eventually renames him from Abram to Abraham but same guy. He says, leave your native country, your relatives and your father's family and go to a land that I will show you. I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you and I will make you famous and you will be a blessing to others. I will bless those who bless you and I will curse those who treat you with contempt.
All the families on earth will be blessed through you. So Abram departed as the Lord had instructed
and Lot went with him. Abram was 75 years old when he left Haran. Would you pray with me father? This morning, we take a step closer to the promises that you have for us. Jesus, we lean in this morning. We're asking you to take the word of God, infuse it with the spirit of God to change the people of God. Jesus, would you speak? Would you encourage? Would you convict this morning? It's in the mighty name of Jesus all God's people said. Amen.
The interesting part about the story that we just read in Genesis chapter 12 is obviously it comes right after Genesis chapter 11. Genesis chapter 11 records the stories called the Tower Of Babel. It's where a bunch of people decided because we were pretty accomplished
that we could build this massive tower. If you go read in the beginning of Genesis 11, they literally say, we will build a massive tower. We will get to the heavens. We will get close to God and everybody will look at our accomplishment and they say, we will become famous.
The motivation was if we achieve enough, if we work hard enough, if we build enough, at the end of it, we will become famous. It is the human story on display. It is us trying to earn and work and achieve our way to significance. The Bible says that God looks down on them and he actually comes in and he confuses them. He scatters them. He makes it to where they don't speak the same language and all of a sudden, the unity that they had in building is lost in a moment and God scatters them and he stops their effort
to to achieve significance through their own power. What's amazing is that in Genesis 12, you turn the page and God comes to an unknown person at the time named Abram and his invitation to him is that if you will trust me with your life, I will make you into a great nation.
He goes so far and says that I will make you famous. And what we see here is kind of this this juxtaposition
of a bunch of people trying to earn significance to their own power. God stops it but then God says, you want to achieve significance in this life, it's something that I've got to give to you. It's a sermon for another day but the introduction to Abraham's story,
it reminds us something that is important about the human experience that we are in the middle of today. Friends, in this life, you cannot build your way to significance but there's a God in heaven that can give it to you. See, so much of this world is gonna try to sell you a vision of how to find significance,
how to achieve purpose and meaning and status and the world will tell you it's through education, it's through building the business, it's through climbing the corporate ladder, having the perfect family, getting the right house and the right cars.
You can through your own efforts achieve significance, purpose in meeting on this side of heaven. I'm here this morning to just tell you friends, it is it is all a fleeting lie. You will find moments of temporary satisfaction
but those moments will be short lived and they will be fleeting at best. But there is a God in heaven that has come to give every single one of us the same offer that we see him give to Abram in Genesis 12.
If you will trust me with every single part of who you are, there is a life that is on offer for you that is real, true significance,
but you can't earn it, so you gotta receive by going on an adventure with God. The question that I often ask reading these stories is like, man, who was this guy? You realize that three world religions today all trace their lineage back to this one guy outside of Jesus. This is the most important figure we have in the entire bible. He's the first person to respond to God by faith. He's he's the father of Jews, the Muslims and Christians
and yet when we find him in Genesis 12, we know almost nothing about him. He was ordinary. He was overlooked. He was insignificant.
He had a dad who had a girl's name. Right? He had a rough junior high. His dad's name was Tara. The few things we do know about him, they weren't impressive. We know he had a dad named Terah that God had told him, hey, I want you to leave where you're going and go to the land called Canaan and the Bible tells us in Genesis 11 that his dad got to a different city, not the city that God had told him to go to and he said that he settled there and then it's one verse later says that he lived two hundred and five years in that land and he died there. Tells us if you make a decision to settle, you will eventually die in the land that you've settled into or
you can take an adventure with God and say yes to crazy steps of faith that will lead you to a life beyond your wildest dreams. The other thing we know about Abram is he was married to a woman named Sarai. Eventually, God will rename her Sarah.
She was barren. She was 75 years old. She could not have kids. Mind you, this is a culture that thought being barren was a curse from the gods. This was a guy who who literally you looked at his life and there was nothing about it that screamed
blessed and highly favored. He had a brother who died. We don't know how but he died kind of tragically
at a young age. His nephew Lot was kind of inherited by him and his wife and he goes on this adventure with God not because of pedigree, not because of status. I would also I would argue that God chooses him because nobody would ever look back in history and go, man, that was a guy that made a lot of sense for God to pick. Josh Joshua chapter 24 actually goes even further into some of the crazy details about Abram's life. It says, long ago verse two says, long ago your ancestors including here's his dad with the girl's name, including Terah,
the father of Abraham, he lived beyond the Euphrates River and they worshiped other gods. Who was Abraham when God found him? He was a guy that had no kids. He was a guy that had no education.
He was a guy who came from a family that worshiped the wrong gods. Friend, it tells me if you find yourself here this morning and you feel overlooked and underqualified, might I submit to you that maybe you are uniquely qualified to be used by God specifically because you are overlooked and underqualified?
We serve a God that is in the business of taking what is ordinary and turning it into extraordinary.
But what is incredibly humbling to me is that our story of Echoes Church is is making waves in the church planting world all over the nation. And people call and they ask, man, what what are you guys doing? We're like, we don't know. We're trying to figure it out. We're just a bunch of knuckleheads that are willing to trust God and say yes to this radical life of faith and sometimes God just breathes on him. I I tell you all of that. I give you this setup in the introduction to remind you friends. I'm just convinced that the God that built a nation out of a nobody named Abram
is the same God that is building something out of us today. It's the same God that wants to do something significant with your life today. The Bible says that he has not changed. God is the same yesterday that he is today and he will be tomorrow. The invitation that is on offer to all of us is still
it's still the same. Will you trust God with your life? I'm gonna mess up our team in the back because I totally skipped over stories, the cold medicine, but when I was thinking about this whole crazy journey of like, man, what does a life of faith look like? The story that I kept thinking of was a couple years ago in Jamaica. There's a sweet family in our church. Their grandma serves as one of our greeters. She's usually over on this door at 08:00, but she's a wild lady. She travels all summer, but she was here this morning. And I got permission from her family to tell the story, but she didn't know about it. So I told her in the lobby, I said, Marie, you're the celebrity. I'm telling your story. I'm putting some photos up. And she literally goes, I hope you're not telling them about the cliff jumping story in Jamaica. And I was like, that's the story that I'm sharing, you know?
But I was thinking about this life of faith that Abraham said yes to that God is inviting all of us a part of. And the story that just kept coming to my mind was this story in Jamaica that happened a couple years ago. K. We're out there with a bunch of families and it was awesome. We're we're taking this boat around. They take us to this lunch spot. And at this lunch spot, they take us to a place where you can jump off of cliffs, and these cliffs are like progressive. There's like the easy one that the kids do, and then there's like you step up and there's a little bit higher one, and then you get to the crazy high point, and there's literally a no joke. There's a warning sign. I actually have a photo of I'll show you. There's a warning sign that says, if you jump off of this, like, you're at your own risk and we get up to the very top. That's literally me with Marie, sweet Marie, who's 85 years old and she's like, Daniel, I think I wanna jump off from right here. I was like, I'm not a doctor, but I don't think that's a good idea. Like, don't
I'm not sure you're gonna make it out of this one, Marie. Like, I I love you to death and I wanna see you at the wedding tomorrow. Right? And so we with my my buddy's sister and I, we talk her out of jumping off of the highest ledge, but she's like, alright, I'll I'm gonna go down one ledge but I'm jumping off here. And mind you, it's still a high point where like multiple grown men are walking up to it looking over and they're like, yeah, no shot and walking away. Sweet Marie walks up and she's like, alright, count me down. And we're like, I don't know if this is the best idea but three, two, one, and this lady just runs and she fully jumps. This is a video that I took screenshots of. She just sends it and praise God, she lives. She's still with us today. We weren't we weren't sure if she was gonna make it but man, she just fully sent it. And that was the the picture that I kept thinking about. What are we doing as a church? What is God offering you and I? See, so often I think the reason that we miss the extravagant adventure that life that the life of faith is supposed to be is we've been told that like this faith thing is like a just dip your toes in the water kind of deal. That you can be half in with God and get enough of God to make sure you get into heaven one day but not so much of God that you become like the weird person at work. And I'm here this morning to just remind you that I think the picture of making a decision to jump off of a cliff is probably the most accurate representation
of what the invitation of faith really is. It's in every story that we read. God comes to Abram says, you will leave everything you've ever known, if you will step out in obedience not because of your pedigree, not because you're amazing, but because God doesn't need perfect, he just needs willing,
he just needs obedient.
God can do something with your life. Friends, the reason that I get so excited about this and I get so passionate about it, means I'm praying and I'm believing that over these next five weeks that some of you will get a you'll catch a glimpse of the vision not just that God has for our church but that God has for your life and some of you through this campaign are gonna make a decision to trust God with areas of your life that you have not yet turned over to him and what you are going to get to experience on the other side of it is a life beyond your wildest dreams. It's so much better than just playing it safe, but you gotta see there's two things in the four verses that we just read baked into the call of Abram that I think are baked into the call of every single person that has been asked to follow and trust God with their lives. We already read the verses, but just so I can show you the two points, Genesis chapter 12 verse one says, the Lord
had said to Abram, leave your native country, your relatives, and your father's family, and here it is, and go to a land that I will show you. The audacity of God
to walk up to a guy and say, hey, leave everything you've ever known. He's like, alright. Where am I going? He's like, don't worry about that. I'll tell you later. He's like, no. The detail kinda matters, bro. Like, that's a that's a big part of the decision you're asking me to make.
But notice that God doesn't give him the end destination at the beginning. At this point, all God was asking him to do was let go of what he's known so far. Friends, you gotta realize that faith always starts with obedience, not an address.
God will give you enough to see the first step. He'll never give you the whole picture and this is the problem with our humanity is what we want is we want God to lay out the entirety of what our lives are gonna look like. And part of the reason that he doesn't do it is because if he did, we would all for sure say no to it because it would terrify us.
But what God often does is he makes really clear the next step, the thing that we're supposed to step into. The thing that that God asked Abram to do is the same thing he's gonna ask you and I to do every single time. It starts with a call to leave something.
The first thing that God asked Abram to do is you've got to leave the thing that you're currently holding on to. Friends, I don't know what it is in your life that God is asking you to leave. I don't know if it's a relationship that you've been holding on to that God's been saying, hey, it's time to let this thing go.
For some of you, it's a it's a job that you've been holding on to that God's been calling you out of for a long time but you go, I just don't know what it looks like without this financial security.
God will often give you enough to say, hey, leave and then trust me that I will make clear the next step for you. For some of you, is that you've got to leave being your own your own boss and being in control of everything. There's parts of your life you've got to trust God with. I don't know exactly what it is, but I would venture to guess. If I were to sit down with you and I were to ask, hey, what is it that God is asking you to leave? Maybe it's a toxic friendship. It's something that God is asking you to let go of. It is not until you let go of that thing that God will often show you why he was asking you to make room for what was next in your life. What's interesting to me with what God asked Abram to let go of, it's kind of progressive in nature. Notice how it kind of progresses. God says, want you to leave your native country. I want you to leave the country that you've known and then it gets more more local. He says, I want you to leave your relatives
and I want you to leave your father's family. You've gotta let go of your country. You've gotta let go of your relatives. You gotta let go of all the things that have been up until this point, your source of identity, your source of comfort.
You realize Jesus in the New Testament, he doubles down on the same idea. He says, you're not worthy to be called my disciple unless you're willing to hate your mother and father. He's not saying literally
hate your mom and dad, but what he's saying is you gotta understand the life of faith is one where we turn our backs to everything else and we turn full faith to go, God, wherever you ask me to go, whatever you ask me to do, I'm in. My life is no longer my own. It is now yours. I'll leave whatever you ask me to leave. But the problem is is you and I get so comfortable.
We get so settled into doing these things. We just go, man, we never we never let go of it. Friends, can I just remind you that you're never gonna step into the promise while you're still clinging to the familiar?
You're never gonna grab a hold of the thing that God has for your life until you're willing to let go of your own sense of security, until you let go of your own sense of control.
And maybe once you let go of that thing that God will then be go, man, let's go on this adventure together. I don't if you've seen this photo. It's a kind of a cheesy photo but it illustrates the point well.
This is a picture of a little boy that has this teddy bear and God is sitting there going, would you trust me with it? Would you give it to me? But the boy is hesitant to do it much like we are with our lives. Why? Because all we can see is what we won't have, what we're giving up and sacrifice
for us is always equated with loss except in God's kingdom. I'm here to tell you that's not how it works. Friends, here's the the beauty.
If you find yourself in a season where God is asking you to leave something, to let go of something, God will never ask you to let go of something without having something better already in his hand.
There's something better for your life. And I don't know what it is that he's asking you to leave. I don't know if it's your own sense of security or whatever it is. My encouragement to you to go, let let our story of Echoes be a little bit of a glimpse. Let let Abram's story be a little bit of a glimpse into the faithfulness of God. It's two words that he gives him that he I'm telling you he gives to us as well. The first one is leave,
and the second one is you gotta go. Let go of what you've held on to and go with me into the unknown. We already read it. Again, verse one says, the Lord had said to Abram, country, leave your relatives, leave your father's family,
and go to a land that I will show you. And I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you and make you famous, and you will be a blessing to others. I will bless those who bless you and curse those who treat you with contempt, and all the families on earth will be blessed through you.
Three of the most mind blowing words in the world, Abram said yes. So Abram departed. Abram went. Abram obeyed as the Lord had instructed and Lot went with him. Abram was 75 years old when he left Haran. What's crazy to me is that God was able to convince a 75 year old dude to do anything.
I can't convince my wife's grandfather to change the TV channel. You know what I mean? Have you ever tried to talk an old dude into doing anything? And yet God comes to him in one moment of faith, a 75 year old man says, I'm willing to trust you.
I wonder what we would do if God were to come to us at 35, 45, 55, 65, say, will you leave everything that you've known? Will you empty out your bank accounts? Will you walk away from the businesses? Will you start over completely and trust that I am still in control and that I'm still good and you're not too old,
you have not missed your opportunity to be used by God. Can I just remind you there is no such thing as retirement in the kingdom of God? God wants all of us. And there are some silver haired 75 year old saints. I'm telling you, your best days are still in front of you to the glory of God. God wants to use all of us,
requirement that you leave some things and you step into some things with God that are on the other side of something crazy. But friends, all throughout the narrative, Genesis to Revelation, you gotta understand that obedience never starts. It never it never waits for the full picture.
You just gotta go. You gotta make a decision. God, I believe you. I'm in. If I've learned one thing over the last twenty months, all this journey has been is one step of obedience after the next. And once we're standing on what used to feel impossible,
we then make a decision to go, okay. Here's what's next. And what we know for sure without a shadow of a doubt, what is next for us as a church community is to occupy Macy's Building.
We don't know how. We don't know. The math still does a math to us, but we know that this is the clear next step of faith for us. Let let me just kinda catch you up. Let me just assume that today is your first time being at Echoes. Let me just give you a quick glimpse of what the last twenty months of our history has looked like. K? Our church started in January
of last year. We grand opened in January last year with 2,756
people. And the reason you're not standing to your feet and shouting is because you know nothing about church planting. Alright? That is that is without a doubt the largest church plant in the history of every church planting network that we're a part of. Okay? So it's mind blowing. But we again, when we saw the crowd, we're like, okay. People will realize we have no idea what we're doing and they'll find real churches quickly
Because the rule of church planting is essentially whatever number you grand open with, within four to six weeks, you'll shrink back to half that size.
And if you can grow back over the next year to get to your grand opening number, you're killing it. So we're like, okay. It's fine. We don't have to panic. People are gonna leave. We'll be alright. The problem was is that never happened. K? Easter was just a couple months later, and at our very first Easter service, we had 4,500
people come through at Easter. And that was that was kind of the moment that we looked around and we're like, alright. We're in trouble. We gotta hire more than three people because this thing, it doesn't seem like it's slowing down at any point. We've been trying to hire like crazy. It has been an absolute
wild journey that never stopped. Our first Christmas service last year, we had 5,300
people show up for Christmas. K? We are on pace to beat all of those numbers this year. We're projecting over 7,000 people to join us this Christmas. It's unbelievable and it's amazing. But here's why, again, it's not the crowd that we get excited about, but when you peel back the layer of the numbers, there are some things that we better celebrate as a church. K? In our short time, twenty months as a church, you gotta understand we've had 3,200
people make a decision to follow Jesus at this place. We've also watched right here on this stage, we've watched 650 people go public with their faith through baptisms. Friends, these are these are revival numbers. These are mind blowing numbers.
Churches will see 50 people get baptized in a year. We're seeing hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of them. This is one of those numbers that still blows my mind. We've seen 2,000
new families that have checked kids and that we know who they are, that have walked in the doors of our church looking for hope and looking for community and trying to figure out is there more to this life than just going through the motions. For whatever reason,
God has brought them here and our team has done everything that we can. We've gotten creative. We've we've worked hard. We've leveraged every square inch of this building. We've opened the overflow space. We run four services that are fifty five minutes each with twenty five minute turns. Because we have to be out of this building by 02:00 every single Sunday.
All that to say we've been as creative as we can, but we're out of space. This is our lightest attended service that we have all morning. And look around. It's not like we got a ton of room to grow. So we know there's a little bit more that we can do to maximize our current facility but we've been looking. We've been trying to figure out what is next and God kind of whispered to us, hey, this Macy's building,
I think is the next logical step of faith for us and it it sounded crazy even to us but yet somehow God made a way. And what's amazing is because we've been really good stewards of every dollar that we've brought in, we knew that at some point we were gonna have to buy land or buy a building. We've been saving like crazy and we made an offer to Macy's back in December of last year that we thought we were gonna get laughed at but to our shock, they never counted us. They just one day called us and said, okay, we're gonna meet. It's a yes. Pay for the building. I was like, gosh, you gotta figure out to pay for this building. Right? But the amazing part because we had stewarded our current resources so well, we are in a position where we will be able to buy the building for cash by the end of the year, which is amazing. K? We will pay cash for the building
and we're buying the Macy's for $5,000,000,
which is unbelievable. K? It's on 12 acres. I'll show you some pictures here that will kinda show you what we're talking about. This is the building that God has supernaturally provided for our church family. That's it there on the right. We'll see it closer up here in a second. It comes with 12 acres in a building that's a 150,000
square feet. Again, the realtors in this room will tell you if you try to buy 12 acres of land anywhere in the East Valley, you're gonna pay a minimum of a $500,000 an acre. Yet God provided land that's already paved with parking spots and a building for $5,000,000. And notice where it is.
Notice where it is. K? It's right off of the Sixties. I know some of you are like, there's no way God exists on that side of the 60. Trust me. We've been there. God's there too. Alright. You'll be fine. You'll be alright.
But notice where it is. It's it's located right off of two major freeways that the data tells us you can see the building right off the freeway. 250,000
people drive by that building every single day. And I go, man, isn't that just like God that he would take what used to be a retail center where people would show up looking to buy something to fill a void they were feeling inside of their heart? He would take that, a building that has been dilapidated and not used in three years sitting empty, and God would take it, he would restore it, he would redeem it and plant a kingdom outpost right off the freeway where 250000
people would see it every single day and the East Valley would be reminded that the God of the universe is still around, still doing the impossible and God has plans for their life friends. I'm telling you, it's not it's not coincidental.
The outside of the building, we're not gonna do a ton with. We're just gonna paint it. We're gonna slap our name on it and call it good. Maybe down the road we'll do some stuff to the outside but the bulk of the work we need to do is all on the inside of the building. Kate's three stories, it's massive, it's incredible.
When you walk in on the downstairs level, you'll see this will be like our main area where the church will exist. Courtyards that are inside to the glory of God without all the heat. We'll have kids classrooms and coffee spaces and just tons of space for community gathering.
And if you notice in the back, that is an escalator that we're we're keeping. K? Joel Osteen and me are gonna be the only two pastors in the country that have an escalator in their church. Come at me somebody. Right? Come on.
The truth is we're keeping it because we couldn't afford to replace it but that doesn't really matter. In the back of the building, this is what's really exciting. We're gonna take out the first the 1st Floor ceiling and we're going to put in a worship center that will that will seat about 1,800
people. K. That's a thousand more than currently is in here. It will allow us to facilitate what God is currently doing and will give us more room to reach more people with the greatest news that has ever been told that Jesus is alive, the tomb is empty, and there's hope for humanity. Okay? So we're fired up because we have an opportunity to continue to reach the East Valley to the glory of God. The question is the question is is how do we get there? What is it gonna take? It's gonna take three things from us. The first one is it's gonna take a lot of courage. It's gonna take a group of people that are willing to see the vision of what God is doing and understand
that for whatever reason God has chosen us in the fastest growing city in the country the last five years running that the mission field is no longer out there. It's literally here. It's in our backyard. It's in our neighborhood. It's in our schools. The mission field has come to us.
There is nobody else coming. It is us that God has chosen for such a time as this to be a part of this significant thing that churches all around the country pray for and hope that they see one day friends we're seeing it.
But it's require us to have a bunch of courage to step in to be a part of it. Secondly, it's gonna require us to be people who walk not by sight but by faith. I'm asking us to be a community where we let faith rise again. We say, God, will you increase our faith?
If faith is a gift, we're asking for more of it. Help us not walk by sight but by faith because we're not gonna get into this building by creative
tax strategies and giving out of our leftovers. No. It's gonna require some massive faith. And then the third thing and this is where people get weird and it shouldn't be weird. It's gonna take courage. It's gonna take faith. It's gonna take significant resources.
All throughout the Bible, we see that anytime a move of God is happening, a a building for God is being erected. The people of God come alongside of him. They go, we will sacrificially give towards it. Why? Because we know that you can't out give God. And if God is inviting us to it, he'll do something through it. And whatever he's gave what he's asked us to give, he will more than replace it. Remember in the New Testament
when the disciples went to Jesus and they started to realize the cost of following him? They thought it was gonna just be fun. And they started to realize they were losing businesses. They were losing reputation.
They come to him. They go, man, it's costing us so much more than we thought it was gonna cost us to follow you. What does Jesus say? He doesn't say, oh, man. My bad. Let me make sure that goes away.
No. No. Says, friends, there's nothing in this life that you will give that I won't repay you a thousand times over in the kingdom that's gonna come. He reminds them that all of this is temporary.
The business that you've built, the legacy that you think you're building on your own, I'm telling you, all of it is temporary. You know they say it only takes three generations for your great grandkids to forget your name? They won't even remember who you were. Yet the invitation
of the kingdom of God is that you will invest in the if you will invest in the things that are not temporary but are eternal,
those are the things that we can take with us. Friends, it's gonna require us to have some courage and have some faith and be willing to bring our resources along with it. I'm way over time, but it's 12:00. We got nobody else coming, you're staying with me. Practically practically, what does this look like financially?
This project, our hope, and our goals over the next two years, we're going to bring in $42,000,000. And that's a number when I first saw it. Was like, wait. Are we talking, like, US dollars or these pesos? Like, that's that's a significant number for any church.
It's a ludicrous number for a church that's been around for twenty months. And yet that's the number of what it's gonna take. But baked into that $42,000,000 is a couple things. So stay with me. In here, in that number has a $26,000,000
construction build up. Again, we're paying cash for the building. We're not taking out any any debt to do this building. We're gonna pay it off by the end of the year. 26,000,000 will renovate a retail center into a worship center that will serve generations to come, but also baked into that $42,000,000
number is also our $16,000,000 operating budget. What that means is again, just stay with me for a second. If we do nothing as a church, we make a decision to just keep doing what we've been doing. We are projected based on current growth rates to bring in about $16,000,000 over the next two years,
but we're not gonna not do anything. We're gonna step in and we're gonna sacrificially give towards the vision that God has given us as a church. But the shortfall that we've got to make up is that $26,000,000.
So we've been telling some of our our key families and volunteers in the church, and I wanna tell you that those families, just a handful of families in our church, have already committed $5,000,000 towards this campaign. And I tell you that to remind you, friends, God is on the move. That number 42,000,000,
it does at some points. It has at some points kind of terrified me. But today, I sit here, man, full of faith believing with everything in me. God is going to more than meet our needs. The question is is are you gonna get to be a part of the miracle?
Are you gonna get to be a part of it? We we believe based on all of our projections. It's not crazy that we'll be able to be in that facility for Christmas services in 2028.
Just over two years from now, we will be in that building. We will grand open it. We will walk in. We will see a move of God. And I'm telling you one of the greatest tragedies in the world
will for you to be the person that walks into that building going, man, I wish I had decided to take a leap of faith with God two years ago because God's gonna do it. The question is is will we get to participate in it? Will we be coauthors in the miracle story that God is writing? Two things, two goals that I wanna leave you with today. The first one is I'm hoping for a 100% participation of our church.
That this is the moment. If you've been sitting on the sidelines, if you've been waiting to go, hey, I'm just I don't know about this thing. This is the moment where I'm asking our church to go all in. I I don't care what the number is. I don't care if you give a dollar towards it or you give a million dollars towards it. What I'm asking is that we would all say yes. This is what being a part of a church family is like. This is not our job to figure it out. It is collectively
our responsibility to carry it. The good news is is all throughout scripture, we see the principle is that God doesn't measure the amount. He always measures the sacrifice. That's why the story of the widow's mite is so powerful to us because she gave an immense amount not in dollar value but in amount of sacrifice.
My ask is over the next five weeks that you would sit down and you would ask God. God, what does it look like for us to be a part of this thing?
What does a 100% participation look like? And whatever God tells you, man, go with that. I'm not gonna come back to you and go, man, I saw you put this. Think I the number should be here. No. No. No. Like that's between you and God. But I am hoping that all of us do something. And secondly, the second goal is that we would go beyond just spare change and we would venture into a land called sacrificial generosity.
I am asking for us for a period of time to sacrifice something much like we do when we fast. When we fast, what are we doing? We are withholding physical food from our bodies. Why? For spiritual gain. You can't fast forever because you'll die. Right?
But you fast for a short period of time because you know that the spiritual gain on the other side of it is worth it. What I'm asking us to do as a church is for two years go on a fast together to sacrificially
lean into what God is doing believing it's not just to continue what he's already doing today, but it's gonna pave a way for us to continue to make space for generations to come. Because when a kingdom outpost is planted, then I'm telling you, it changes the landscape of cities
and we are gonna be people that go, we're leaning into sacrificial generosity understanding it's not about equal giving.
It's about equal sacrifice.
Four questions that I want you to process through over these next four weeks that are in that are in your guide. These are again not me being descriptive or prescriptive. These are just me being descriptive. These are things I would encourage you to process with God. These are just things that kinda get the wheel spinning.
What can you over these next two years? What can you delay? What is something that you're like, man, we were gonna do this, But maybe what we'll do is we'll postpone it for a couple years so that we can instead
we can reallocate those resources towards what God is doing. There's an amazing family in our church that already said, man, God spoke to us. We were supposed to do this backyard renovation. We've saved up for it, but we're actually gonna take those funds and we're gonna contribute them to this this advancement of God's kingdom and we'll do the backyard sometime later. We're not saying we're gonna do it ever. We're just saying can we delay it for a little bit? The second question I would ask you, I would challenge you to process through is what could you deny for the next two years? There's a guy in our church. I won't call him out by name, but he said he's not gonna buy any Jordans for the next two years. Okay? So we're holding him to this.
Maybe for you maybe for you I know some of you got sad. That's that's kinda sad.
Maybe for you, man, it's a Starbucks drink. I'm not saying you'd never do it, but for the next two years, what can you deny to go, God, I'm willing to make a sacrifice because I know that you are inviting us to something that is bigger than us. And we will not get there with creative tax strategy and with surplus. We've got to be willing to sacrifice a bit. Here's the third one. What what can I donate? And donate is the wrong word. It should say sell but for all of them to be d's, it had to be donate. Don't judge me. It's a pastor's curse. Okay? What can I sell?
What is something maybe God will speak to you, man. You know that card collection?
That thing has kinda become an idol. May maybe you sell that thing and you move you move those funds towards the kingdom of God. Maybe there's something that you've you've just held on to that this is the time. This is the reason that God had you hold on to it so that you could participate in this thing in a more significant way. The last question is what can I do more of?
Maybe you could pick up an extra shift. You could do one side job a month. And for just these two years, that side money, you will give all of it towards God's kingdom and God's mission. You have my commitment as the leader of this thing. Every dollar that comes in, we will be unbelievably
frugal with. We will stretch them. We will be creative.
We will do everything that we can. We will manage the money that God entrust to us to the best of our abilities. But friends, you gotta hear me. It is one thing for us to cheer, for us to celebrate. That's really easy to do. And am I excited about where God is taking us? Yes and amen. But I also sober mindedly realized
that it's gonna take all of us. Not just some of us. It's gonna take all of us making a decision to be a part of a move of God that comes with sacrifice. But what else are we gonna do? Where else are we gonna go? If eternity is real and it is, it means that lives are on the line. Eternities are in the balance.
And for whatever reason, it's not I wouldn't have chosen us. I definitely wouldn't have chosen me. But for whatever reason, man, God has chosen us for such a time as this. The question this morning for us is will we meet the moment? Will we make a decision to trust God or will we just stay comfortable?
Because comfortable never changed eternities. But I'm telling you a group of people that believe God enough to be willing to sacrificially give towards something, many can alter destinies. Friends, my hope, my prayer, my ask is over these next five weeks, you would lean in and you would ask God.
God, what are you asking me to leave? What are you asking me to go towards?
I'm all in. My life is no longer my own. It is yours and I'm willing to go where you've asked me to go. On your way out here, you're gonna get one of these commitment cards. You don't have to do anything with this today. This is just kind of a guide that will let you have something practical to start to put resources and numbers down on. And what's gonna happen is in five weeks,
after we've sought God, after we've prayed, we're gonna come back in here together and we're going to have what's called commitment Sunday. Kids, on October 11, all the information is in your field guide that we're gonna come together and we're gonna have a powerful service together. That's where you will bring these filled out and we're going to come down to the front of this room and we're gonna drop our offering before the Lord. And we are believing by faith that the collective yes of everybody that is part of this thing called Echoes Church will be more than enough to accomplish what God is asking us to do. Amen? Amen. If there's any questions, you can always email me joshua@echos.church.
I will get back to every one of those. I'll try to be on the lobby. Our team is around. We'd love to answer any questions that you have. But guys, thank you for being here. Let me pray for you and I'll get us out of here. God, we love you. We thank you, God, that you would choose insignificant,
ordinary people like us just like you did with Abram to accomplish what is very significant work on this side of eternity. Father, we thank you for the marriages that are gonna be restored in this building that is not yet built.
We thank you for addictions that will be broken in the Macy's building that will become a church. We thank you for hope that will be found in that space. For students who will walk away from lives of rebellion and say yes to trusting you in that space.
Father, we thank you that we are stepping into holy ground. We thank you for trusting us with something as significant as what you've entrusted to us. Father, would you have your way? Would you speak to your people? It's in Jesus' name all God's people said. Amen and amen.