Run with God

C28 Staff MTG

Had a C28 Staff MTG last night. In recent months there's been a lot of turnover, and I wanted to get everybody face to face to talk through some things. I think the last time I attended a staff mtg for C28 was back in January 2007? We have a lot of new staff, and I wanted to meet them...

We talked about the vision of C28: how C28 exists not to make crazy sales, but to reach a generation for Christ... ministry is our greatest priority, but if it's our only priority we will have to shut down... how we need to celebrate our successes, how God does things through the store... how having a clean store is nice, but it's horrible if customers don't feel welcome when they come in... how C28's Ministry is not owned my Amy or I, or by C28 corporate, but by the employees that work there.

2 Corinthians 4:1
Therefore, since through God's mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart.

I am continually encouraged that for some reason God wants C28 to exist in Wellington/West Palm. I cannot wait to see what He has in store for us...

Andrew Allard, 1 Year Later

A year ago I blogged the story of Andrew Allard. Andrew, in short, was a young teen who was on fire for God who passed away suddenly about a year ago. Check out the revisits here and here.

Suffering is inevitable.
Stupid Garden of Eden.
But I am still amazed at how people can find God in the midst of the pain.

Kevin Twombly is the Generations Pastor at Grace Capital Church, Andrew's church in New Hampshire. In honor of Andrew, Kevin asked Andrew's Mom and Sister to guest blog. Great posts, sharing insight into how a family copes with loss, finding God even when God doesn't make sense. Check the quote from Andrew's sister, Abbie.

When Andrew passed away, I could have easily blamed God, hated God, or even turn my back on God altogether. Too many questions existed without a trace of answers that could be found by human insight alone. I searched for answers in places beyond myself and my own thoughts, and could not find any there as well. And yes, that was a fancy way of saying I could not find the answers in even God, the only place I knew to look. Yet in the midst of all the confusion and lonesomeness, God wrapped his arms around me and gave me a peace, a tranquility, that was unlike anything I had ever felt before. My heart was not overwhelmed with the sorrow this world expected me to feel. At times I felt guilty because I was not as broken as the people around me that were affected by the loss as well. Instead of pointing the finger at God and blaming him for taking Andrew away from me, I chose to ’sing hallelujah’ and ‘see the good in broken things’; and to my surprise, there were more good things than I expected.

God, thank you for the continued lessons to be learned from Andrew's life. May his life continue to impact people for Your kingdom.

Gaithers @ C28? Uh, NO!

Below is a series of emails between Ryan (my manager @ C28), several EMI CMG Reps, and myself. Try to keep up.

Subject: Gaithers @ C28
------------------------

From: Ryan Eloe
To: "Wachsmann, Jodie" , "Allen, John"
Cc: Jeff Reed
Date: Wed, Jan 30, 2008 at 3:31 PM

Jodie/John

There is a slight problem with the order we recently received Order #029496. In it we were missing the 10 copies of Time Is Fiction (Edison Glass), and instead we received 10 copies of Homecoming Picnic (Bill and Gloria Gaither 617884272425).

How would you like us to handle this?

Ryan Eloe
Manager c28
Mall at Wellington Green

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From: Jeff Reed
Date: Wed, Jan 30, 2008 at 3:34 PM

HAHAHA! Um, yeah. C28 nor The Living Word wants 10 copies of Homecoming Picnic.

I could only imagine...

Thanks for a great laugh. jreed

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From: Allen, John
Date: Wed, Jan 30, 2008 at 3:46 PM

Jodie-

You got this one. Must have been a key stroke mistake on my part. I would never send your guys Gaither stuff…unless it was Gaither Presents A Tooth & Nail Homecoming. Demon Hunter & Ernie Haase! There’s a visual! See you guys next week!

John Allen

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From: Wachsmann, Jodie
Date: Wed, Jan 30, 2008 at 4:56 PM

Didn’t think those CDs exactly fit your demographic of customers J

Did Living Word receive any of the wrong CDs as well? Just want to make sure I cover all of the bases.

Thanks!

Jodie Wachsmann

Guest Blogger: Ultimate Customer Service

I've asked Ryan Eloe to step in as a guest blogger. Ryan is the General Manager @ C28 in West Palm... an old college friend who I convinced to move to Florida and help me start C28's ministry in Florida. He's married to Kim, and they are expecting their first kid in June.

I asked Ryan to share his thoughts on C28's ministry...

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"Therefore, since through God's mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart." 2 Corinthians 4:1

Because of the adventures, trials, and experiences at c28 this past year 2 Corinthians 4 speaks to me in amazing ways. One of the most important messages to me in this chapter is that it speaks on the topic of the ministry that we have through God's mercy.

The word 'ministry' in Greek is diakoniva (dee-ak-on-ee'-ah), which simply means service. It's a similar word to that which the word deacon comes from.

If we are truly interested in doing or taking part in ministry (diakoniva), we need to serve.

I believe, if we want to minister to the glory of God, then we should provide the most excellent service. Service that would represent that God who has saved us, loves us, and has mercy for us day in and day out.

Fortunately for us who minister at c28, we are in a unique place because we are expected as a mall-based retail store to provide customer service. Every store has customer service, some stores have horrible customer service, some stores elite customer service, some have good customer service.

But because we want to do ministry in the name of Christ we strive to provide ultimate customer service.

For us, this means a lot of things. It means that we'll try to do everything we can to help people find what the clothes/music they're looking for. Similarly we'll help people when they are searching for a certain size, the perfect gift, or the the latest CD.

But sometimes more than a nice button up shirt, or an amazing CD...people are looking for something different. In these cases we help people find the truth about Jesus Christ, the savior of the world. Or sometimes we help people when they are searching for faith, hope, truth, and grace in this world. We'll offer to pray with people, share with people, encourage people, because more than a new purse, belt, or rockin' t-shirt these needs are greater.

For God, who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,' made his light shine in our hearts...and it is our prayer that Jesus' ultimate service to us in his death, will allow us to serve our customers in a way that will help them see and experience the grace, truth and love of Christ.

"For God, who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,' made his light shine in our hearts..." 2 Corinthians 4:6a

C28: 20% off entire store

C28 West Palm is having an in-store sale. 20% off everything in the store. No questions asked. Print the coupon above and take it to C28 at the Mall in Wellington Green. Sale good Friday, December 14th from 4-10pm.

Don't miss it. Don't forget to buy something for you, too!

C28 Florida's Anniversary

Under the chaos of everything else in my life, C28 Florida just celebrated it's first anniversary. If you got some time, I suggest you go back and read the story of C28 as told by my blog, OR just read that opening day post here.

It's been a great year, and through the turmoil that has been C28 Year One, I still know that God is behind it. I also know that God has a purpose for us here, and what we are doing now is just a small part of what C28 can do in the state of Florida.

And so we push. We scramble. We fight. We survive.
We pray for the day when we accomplish mighty things for our Lord.

First year is tough in business.
Building customer base.
Creating a demand.
Proving you're stable.
After talking to the staff, as well as people in the area I know we're headed in the right direction.

We've experienced opposition over the years.
People questioning our validity.
People questioning our motives.
People questioning our spirituality.
But a year later, I know we're exactly where we need to be.

God, thank you for C28's first year.
Thank you for being with us during the ups and downs.
When times are strong, remind us of your grace.
When times are weak, remind us of your strength.
Thank you for what you've brought us through, and we look forward to what you have for us very soon.

Storyside B @ C28

Here's a photo from Saturday's Storyside B doing an instore performance @ C28 West Palm. We had 80 people packed in the back of the store enjoying their acoustic show (and the standup comedy routine).

The band stuck around after the show signing CDs (we were selling them for $7.99 - take that iTunes!)

Awesome. Thanks for everyone who showed up, and we'll see you again soon.

Storyside B and Seventh Day Slumber this WKND

Looking for a good excuse to go to C28 this weekend?

Storyside B & Seventh Day Slumber are doing an acoustic set @ C28 West Palm Beach this weekend. Promise you, it's worth the trip.

Come hang out with the band. Get some CDs signed. Buy some C28 stuff. What else are you going to do this weekend! Remember, you probably got Monday off (Veterans Day, right?) so you can sleep in then!

OR, if you are going to WayFest at the Sound Advice Ampitheater, come check out the C28 booth.

See you this weekend!

Storyside B & Seventh Day Slumber @ C28 WPB

Saturday, November 10th is going to be an awesome day for C28 West Palm. First off, C28 is a major sponsor of WayFest, an all day music festival at the Sound Advice Ampitheater. Before WayFest goes full swing, though, we are hosting an intimate in-store with Seventh Day Slumber and StorySide B. Pretty cool, eh?

StorySide B will be performing an acoustic set in the store as well, so come out to C28 to get a free music performance, get some CDs signed by to really awesome groups, AND THEN be sure to check out all the cool stuff coming out at C28 for the Christmas season.

Oh, and to welcome SSB and SDS into West Palm, C28 is selling their newest release CD for $7.99. Yes, we're sticking it to iTunes. Take that, APPLE! Seriously, come out and support C28 as well as Christian Music in South Florida.

Housecleaning Top 10

Been a busy couple weeks. I've had some people ask why I'm not blogging much lately. Honestly, I'm so busy "living" my life that I really don't have time to write about it. I actually had some "Me time" today to think, process, and overall defunk what's been going on lately.

Let me catch you up:

1) CF Downtown is going great. The Worship Center conversion will be a monumentous (is that a word?) task. Good news is we're developing a multi-phase plan, and what felt like an insurmountable task is slowly starting to come together.

2) C28's is a Key Sponsor for Wayfest happening Saturday, November 10th at the Sound Advice Ampitheater in West Palm Beach. Also as part of Wayfest, C28 West Palm is hosting an intimate artist signing with Seventh Day Slumber and Storyside B... SSB will also be performing an acoustic set in the store. How cool is that!

3) Pray for C28 in general. Most of the stores reside in Southern California, which is currently being ravaged by fire. I was calling one of my reps earlier this week, who told me "Uh, I gotta go. My backyard's on fire and we gotta get out of the house." Crazy. Absolutely crazy.

4) There are some new CF Bloggers, and I can personally recommend both of these guys. Carlos Lollett is the worship leader for CF West Kendall, and Berchman Paul is the worship leader for CF Homestead. Thanks to E for the reminder.

5) Wanna make God laugh, make plans! The old adage has really rung true in my life over the past month. It seems as if God is content keeping me running. So we'll keep running. God, I trust that you know what You are doing in my life. Keep opening doors and I'll keep running through them.

6) Anyone see Joel Osteen bench 300lbs on TV recently? I've had multiple people tell me they saw him do it. I can't find the video on YouTube, and I'm going to pull a doubting Thomas until I see him do it. The man is a beanpole (albeit an extremely rich beanpole) and I do not see how he could throw that weight up. 300lbs on his chest would break him like a twig.

7) I'm mentally working through a blog redesign for the site. Not like I got time to do the work, but maybe I'll get a day off in December and can have fun with it then.

8) There's a good chance I will be at four different church locations this Sunday. No, not kidding. I'll be sure to blog my day. I think it may be a 200 mile day. WooHoo!

9) Are you celebrating Halloween this year? If the secular world has taken Christ out of Christmas, is it possible that we have commercialized Satan's holiday as well to the point that children getting free candy is no longer glorifying to Satan either? (Don't know the answer, just thinking...)

10) God-sized news this weekend @ CF. Eric's teasing the info again. Come celebrate with us and see how God is moving across Miami.