I thought I’d take this opportunity to share who Pastor Steven Furtick is from my vantage point. Actually, what I’d like to do is dispel some myths that other people say about him and give you a real look under the hood; which will be much more fun.

So here we go. This is in no particular order and not in Letterman format. I have been with him for a long time and feel very qualified to write this and if you don’t agree this is my opinion and nobody else’s. In review, below is what I hear about him followed by what I know about him.
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Pastor Steven is…
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1. Inaccessible- He preaches 40-45 times per year (all available online) and blogs 5 days a week. If you need him more than that than you might be needier than he is inaccessible. We’ve also structured the church to allow him to seek God and prepare for Sundays while the rest of the staff does what they are called to do.

1. An overnight success- God called him to plant a large church in a large city 12 years ago. That’s a long night.

1. All about the numbers- Well, this one is true… He is all about the number of lives changed, marriages restored, addictions defeated, and people crossing from darkness into light. And so is God.

1. Too focused on evangelism- Our Sunday mornings will always be the super bowl. It will also always be the public display of what we do as a church. Everything is designed so that people far from God will be filled with life in Christ. Hence the term evangelism. What you don’t see are the hours of meetings planning and strategizing on how to move large numbers of people forward in their faith through small groups, volunteering, and living out their faith.

1. Arrogant- The larger Elevation grows, the more humble he becomes. He knows that he could not accomplish on his own what has happened at Elevation. I think there is a lot more temptation for pride and arrogance in a small church where the Pastor is the expert and knows how to do everything than a fast growing church where the leader is learning from God as he goes.

These are just a few myths that I thought I’d take a minute and bust. Pastor Steven Furtick is a great man of God; poised to impact the kingdom of God like no one else in our generation. It’s an honor to serve him and this church. It’s an honor to call him my Pastor.

Chunks Corbett, Executive Pastor
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One of the most popular topics I get asked questions about as the Executive Pastor of Elevation Church is how we logistically pull off Sundays. Well, it’s not simple but here goes my several paragraph answer.

First of all, we are a multi-site church. We meet in two locations, both public high schools, which are 4.6 miles apart. The reason we do this is not to be cool but because we simply ran out of room at our original campus. We began at Providence High School which has 800 seats and later added Butler High School which seats 680.

Our approach to multi-site is a little unique in that we have tried to create more of a siamese approach to our two locations. We have done this by offering the exact same children’s programming at each campus along with investing the same resource to the sound, video, and other equipment. We rotate through our lead staff both campuses but do have someone who is overseeing each campus. We also have two bands that play at either campus that are also on a rotation schedule.

Now to the preaching… We decided early as a church that our goal is to reach people far from God. We feel that having our Pastor preaching, whether live or by video, was the best way fulfill this call. We currently do three services at Providence (adding a fourth at Easter) and two at Butler.

In spirit with creating a siamese approach, we split live teaching between the campuses. No helicopters or jets, just a car the drives Pastor to each location. Our method of delivery for the taped sermon is very high tech. We simply drive it 4.6 miles down the road to the campus where Pastor is not live.

So let me break this down. We do three services at Providence (8:30, 10, 11:30). We do two services at Butler (9:45, 11:15). We always do our 8:30 service live which we record. From there, Pastor preaches one of the remaining two services at each location live and the second will playback the 8:30 service. Simple.

Our goal is to create five service times that are identical. Three are live and 2 are played back from tape. The catch is that we don’t announce Pastor’s speaking schedule so people simply choose their service time and stick with it and God moves whether the sermon is live or not. It has worked well to this point but we are again running out of room and trying to figure out how to do a third campus.

A few other interesting notes… We record and playback in HD. We use DVCPro tapes and actually record and playback on two decks at each campus for redundancy. We do IMAG (image magnification) in HD at both campuses (2 static cameras- adding a third roaming camera soon) which is not the cheapest way to do multi-site.

So the question is, “Has this worked�? Well, God has continued to bless Elevation Church. Yesterday we saw the capacities of our rooms for the five services at the following (% full in auditoriums – adults). Providence 81%, 102%, 109%. Butler 75%, 77%.

Now as the optimal times fill up its time to figure out what to do next. Because this post sounds like we know what we’re doing. But if we don’t find some more jars soon (seats), the oil will stop flowing and we will stop growing.Â

Chunks Corbett, Executive Pastor

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Monday was a great day for our directional staff at Elevation Church. We were able to attend the churchplanters.com conference and see our Pastor do a breakout and main stage session. It was so encouraging for us to see what a national voice God has given Elevation Church to impact His kingdom.
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Pastor spoke about seeking God for direction on being who God has called you to be in your city. He cautioned church planters to not simply recreate what God has gifted other people to do in other cities. This is a powerful concept that I’ve witnessed in Pastor Furtick’s life firsthand through his preaching and leadership. God has always been his source and everything else has been a resource.
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Today is also a special day. I want to take a minute to honor my Pastor and wish him a happy birthday. He’s 28, that’s right 28 years old. He tells me this all the time and I firmly believe it: the best is yet to come in his life and the life of Elevation Church. Â
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Wednesday we are taking the entire staff to C3 is Dallas, TX. We couldn’t be more excited. The conference is going to be great and the time we have together as a staff to dream, pray, and set goals is often the some of the most valuable time we spend on conference trips.

Chunks Corbett, Executive Pastor

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We are definitely not the model for how to go from portable to permanent at this stage of the game. After all, we still occupy 2 high schools. But I have learned a few things from a finance perspective that I believe will position us for a move if and when God says “Go”. We budget for savings toward future growth. Â

The budgeting process can be simplified if you think in percentages. This doesn’t remove the hard work of knowing the detail of expenses but it does give us an overview of our spending. Our goal is the following: Give away 10%, operate on 20%, allocate 40% to personnel, and use up to 30% for facilities and assets.Â

Most portable churches don’t come close to 30% toward facilities. This is often eaten up by personnel in the early days. But if you can be disciplined enough to include savings toward future expansion as part of the facilities 30%, you can begin to save toward something permanent. This will also teach you to operate on less preparing you for future facilities costs that may be more expensive. Â

I believe this is not only good stewardship but also wise. This is a good practice for any church plant just getting started. This can help put you in a cash position to make a shift. As far as discerning when and where to make that shift, that is not as easy as math and percentages.

Chunks Corbett, Executive Pastor   Â

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