Server Rooms, Jungle Churches, Tornadoes and Complimentary Sopapillas

What a day it has been! I am here in OKC for the MinistryTech conference. Let me back track a little bit; all the way back to 4:30 am!
I was sleeping sound, minding my own business when suddenly I am ripped from my peaceful slumber by the screeching beep of the alarm clock. Time to get up and get over to Jim's house so we can leave for OKC. First of all I don't ever want to wake up that early again and secondly, my cat was not too impressed with me turning on lights during "sleep time".
We rolled into OKC at about 8:45 a.m., which is great considering the tour of the "Mega Churches" started at 9. The tour started at Lifechurch.tv . For those that don't know, Lifechurch is a multisite church that reached approximately 25000 each week. The campus of Lifechurch had us walking all over the place. It was a very beautiful campus. Some of the things I liked best there was the graphic design area, the video production, the internet team and the way they had the children's area.
The next stop on the Magical Mystery Tour was Henderson Hills. It is a ginormous church too. It was a really nice church. Jim and I missed most of the tour due to asking a bazillion lighting questions. We did catch up with the group near the end. The things I liked about Henderson Hills was The big open lobby, the setup of the auditorium and the really nice people. (side note: this is where we will be all week.)
After this we went to lunch and then on to Church of the Servant. We were really really late getting to this church. We got caught in a nasty rainstorm. We did get there in time to see the jungle in the sanctuary. Amazing, I have NEVER seen anything like it. There was actually live plants, trees and a waterfall in the sanctuary area. I am not kidding! What I liked about this church was, specifically, their out of the box thinking
Finally the tour wrapped up at Crossings Church. This was another big ol church. They said the weekly attendance was approximately 4500! Wow, can you imagine the traffic jam leaving that church each week. The things I liked most about this church was the focus on checking the children in and out and the children's, middle school and high school areas.
One thing that was a "mandatory" stop at each of the churches was their "server room". To this I say, "Who Cares?" I was not at all interested in this part of the tour. To those that were, (and there were some, I saw the flash of photos), I am glad that you were able to see another server.
When we made it back to the hotel, we stopped at the office to check in. We asked the clerk, "What do we do in case of a tornado?" We had heard there was potential of severe weather. She replied, "Don't worry, it didn't do any damage." We asked again, "We understand that, but what do we do if there is a tornado?" She again said, "Don't worry, it already came through.' By this point, if it wasn't so funny, I might have gotten a wee bit upset. We asked again and then again a fourth time before it clicked for her. By the way, if you want to know, we have to drive a couple of blocks up the street to the hospital. Great! That makes me feel comfortable.
We finally made it up to the room and waited for a friend of Jim's to call with the dinner plans, and waited and waited. Finally 3 hours later at 7 p.m. our stomachs won the fight and we left to get something to eat. We went to Ted's Cafe Escondido. It was pretty good food. They brought us chips and salsa and queso and then brought an extra dip. There should have been a warning label on the bowl. A warning label that simply said, "Liquid Fire: You are not man enough for this". Of course there was no label so I gave it a try. I think it was so hot that my heart stop beating for 5 seconds! I ate 2 flour tortillas to extinguish the flames. They did the trick. After the excitement of a near death experience they brought out our food. I ate half of mine and was so full, I couldn't eat another bite. That is until the waitress asked, "Would you like a complimentary sopapilla?" Well this hit me on two fronts. One, complimentary, after what i just paid for a taco salad, yes I do want something free. The second front was the fact it was a yummy sopapilla. So Jim and I choked down our honey filled sopapillas and headed back here, to the hotel.
Now that I have shared with you how day one went. I need to get to sleep to prepare for another exciting day of MinistryTech. I hope to see you there.