There is nothing I have experienced on the earth that is more powerful, overwhelming, and awesome as the birth of a child. Even though my wife and I have been through it four times now, my amazement has not worn off one bit. Days later, as I hold this little girl in my arms, I find it staggering to think that she is the basketball sized lump that my wife had been carrying around last week.

As I spent the days leading up to Skull Church helping care for our little newborn, both in the hospital and then at home, I found myself thinking a lot about birth and what Jesus had to say about rebirth. Specifically, I couldn’t get this one statement out of my head. One night Jesus said, “Unless one is born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.” (John 3:3) The more I thought and prayed about it the more I sensed God calling me to speak on this verse.

There are so many parallels between physical birth and spiritual birth, and with the miracle of life being so fresh in my mind, the message practically wrote itself. I’m sure it didn’t hurt that I wrote a good deal of it while holding little Clover. It was a very personal and special message to prepare and to give. And it was an absolutely transcendent experience to see Skull Church transform into a Delivery Room as many people responded to the gospel and made public declarations of faith in Christ!

One of the great things about this event is the far-reaching scope of the webcast. Last night we had viewers all over the globe, from Mexico to New Zealand. And we saw commitments to Christ made in: New York, West Virginia, Illinois, Indiana and Utah. It was also a real treat to have a musical performance by Luminate. They are a fantastic band, you should give them a listen.

Here is the lookbook from last night to give you a sense of what went down.

I can’t think of a better way to start out the new year than by seeing people walk into forgiveness and grace through Jesus, and that’s exactly what we saw happen at the first Skull Church event of 2012! The Mayan calendar may be signaling the end of days, but for those touched whose hearts were touched by the gospel last night, this year is the beginning of a brand new life. It was also nice to expose Montana to some hip hop; living sixty miles from Canada we don’t get a whole lot of that.

I am sitting here by the Christmas tree, with a fire lit and a hot cup of coffee, reflecting on what I saw God do at skull church yesterday and I am making absolutely no attempt to wipe the grin off my face. I could never “get used” to taking part in something like that.

As always, singing all original songs that have been birthed in our church is always a joy and a treasure. And Gungor, the guest band, was out of control. We have been wanting to get them out for a long time and I have been hearing nothing but great things about their live performances. (if you don’t have any of their music go buy it here) They lived up to the hype and then some. Their music created an atmosphere of worship and expectation that was thick with beauty and texture. The only way I can describe the after party is to use a quotation from the Psalms, “deep calls unto deep at the roar of your waterfalls…” (Psalm 42:7)

The text we focused on was the verse that describes the only Christmas tree in the Bible. Galatians 3:13 says that Christ hung on the tree to redeem us from the curse of the law. Christmas is all about the tree that Jesus came to die on and we played “where’s waldo” finding clues about the cross scattered through out the scriptures. At the invitation we saw many respond to the gospel and commit their lives to Christ. And not just in person, we saw people register commitments to Christ online from 5 states and 3 countries!

Here is the December skull church lookbook.

Fast facts: Tonight at 7pm (MST) in downtown Kalispell, live everywhere on the web at skullchurch.com and broadcasting on fresh life radio (91.3 FM in the Flathead Valley and 107.1 & 88.9 FM in Billings).

Did you know? We have taken aggressive steps to improve our webcast so that MANY more people can stream it on computers and mobile devices without glitches or skipping. Invite someone to watch with you or post about it online! If you have sketchy internet or are still having trouble watching you can always listen to the audio-only feed on fresh life radio by pointing your iPhone or iPod touch’s browser to freshliferadio.com

I walk away from skull church events each month feeling a mixture of extreme elation and a sense of shock that I was able to be there. Any setting where Christ is preached and people are moved to repentance has that feeling to it. The gospel should blow your mind every single time you think about it. It’s way out of control. Christ dying in our place, resurrection power being freely offered, hell overcome by the kingdom of heaven–just typing those words fills my heart with worship and awe. I can’t believe that God was willing to save me. I also think it’s pretty insane that we get to be His ambassadors and be a part of Him saving other people.

As though all that weren’t enough, what further lights me up about skull church is seeing our team all perform at such a high level, and with such passion as we unite behind the proclamation of the gospel. It was also an honor to have my good friend and fellow evangelist Pedro Garcia preach last night. He pastors at an amazing church in Miami that is making Jesus famous in South Florida and beyond and has a passion for Christ that is infectious. We have become gangsters for life and share a common DNA in our approach to ministry.

If you weren’t able to be there or join us online, here is the lookbook from last night to give you a glimpse of what we saw go down.