My Weight Loss Testimonial

Below is a testimonial I wrote for our gym. It explains where I was at with my health last year and how far I have come with the help of our trainer. I still have 20-30 pounds to lose, but I am sure not where I was last year. Praise God!

Before:

After:

My name is Ross Wiseman and I was severely over weight. I am 35 years old and for the majority of my life very athletic. Five years ago I destroyed my shoulder in a dirt bike accident. I ballooned from 175 pounds to 230 pounds in a short period of time. When I finally started to get back into shape I tore my ACL in a soccer match. I began to gain weight again and quickly reached 230 pounds again.

If you don’t take control of life, life will take control of you. That is exactly what happened. Three years ago my family moved to Woodstock, GA to begin Embassy Metro Church. As lead pastor of a new and growing church I put the family and church before my own needs and quickly got into a routine of work and “low impact” family time. I didn’t do anything physical for two years. Oh, I bought a gym membership to another place, but I did not have the motivation or guidance to even reach the smallest goals.

This brings us to the part of the story where my life was given back to me. Last fall I met Debbie Roness. She is a personal trainer at Body Plex in Woodstock, GA. Our boys were on the same soccer team. As we made friends with Debbie and her husband Phil they began to attend our church. Debbie says she remembers seeing me perspire and get winded so easily as I preached and moved around on stage. As much as I hate to hear that…she’s probably right.

I had blown up to 270 pounds and at 5’8” felt miserable. My family means everything to me, but I was in a cycle where I had no energy. I would fall asleep within minutes of sitting in my recliner. I would avoid putting my girls to sleep at night because frankly my chest hurt when I walked up the stairs to their room. I always prayed for an all American boy and God gave me just that. Now I was wasting that gift by being so out of shape I didn’t even want to kick a ball around with him or wrestle on the living room floor. Ridiculous! An athlete who was on his way to diabetes, hypertension, destroyed joints, and the stress that comes to a marriage when a man wont be a man. Not only was there a strain on my personal life, it was affecting me as a leader as well. I had lost my confidence, and leadership edge. You can’t lead people if you don’t lead yourself.
It still hurts to even think about that because that wasn’t me. Deep inside I was the confident and disciplined leader with an athletic edge who owned the respect and admiration of his family. I needed someone to help reach in and pull that back out of me.

Debbie Roness was that someone. She put me on a healthy eating plan, trained me for three days a week, and got me doing cardio 5 days a week. Debbie has been a source of encouragement, education, and discipline. With out her help I would not have lost 60lbs in five months (from 270 to 210). I would not have developed the strength and stamina I now have. I am mountain biking with 20 year olds and holding my own. I would not see the pride my wife and children have when they look at me and we do “high impact” family activities. I would not be the leader that my staff and church need me to be. And I would not be the man that I knew I was, but needed someone to help me find again.

Debbie you helped me find me and for that I will forever be grateful!

Thank you!
-The Wiseman’s (Ross, Amie, Adalee, Aubrynn, & Grant)

Tragedy hits our Cherokee County Outdoor YMCA

One of our emc-ers works at the outdoor YMCA. On Sunday afternoon I received the call that one of his fellow employees had been tragically killed in a parachuting accident. Olen Reid Ashe, just 23, died instantly attempting his 299th jump. Reid had made a huge impact at the Y teaching climbing skills for the past two years.

Today I was called in to speak to and pray with some of the staffers. Next Tuesday night I get the honor to be a part of a memorial service for Reid at the YMCA climbing wall.

Please keep this family in prayer. Without the strength of God bearing this burden would be impossible.

250

What is in a number? I think every church planter if he is honest with himself has numeric goals in mind as he set's out to start the church. I know when I set to out to begin the embassy I didn't have too many numeric targets, but I did have a few.

I knew we needed at least 40 people to launch at the theater. So that was the first goal to go from 8 (Wiseman/Hager's) to a launch team of 40. After we had our public launch, I looked forward to the huge benchmark of averaging 100 people in weekly attendance. That was big because the average church plant in America after 5 years averages 90 people.

It is hard to look at numbers in the summer because attendance drops off considerably. We experienced the same the past two summers and attendance bounced back to pre-summer numbers by September. If that is the case we should be approaching a solid 175 people weekly by September/October.

Numbers are not the goal, but numbers represent people. I am excited to see what God is doing in people's lives. I do believe that we could be reaching 250 people weekly in the next 6-9 months. Is that the goal? No not really. Reaching people for Christ is the goal. The number 250 is just a benchmark as we begin to make inroads into the lives of the unchurched of Cherokee/North Cobb Counties.

Let's dream together, pray together, work together, and look forward together to the great days ahead as God gives us the momentum necessary to do what He is calling us to do!

Sunday Remix 7-27-08

-After last Sunday's technical debacle I was pleased to see the team pulled off a great day! Thanks goes out to the load control team, sound & lighting team, the band, hospitality team, and all our incredible kids workers. Even in the middle of the summer you guys left it all on the court yesterday. Great job.

-When I think about what it takes to be a portable church it blows my mind. It is definitely the extreme sport of ministry. Truth be told if it is about us it's not worth stacking it up week after week. Knowing that we serve because of Christ and to give Him an opportunity to change lives, makes every bit of it worth it all. I thank God for all of you at the Embassy that get that. I appreciate all you do for God and this city.

-I have reeled the length of my teaching time back in following vacation. I really enjoyed speaking about the Judas' in our lives that God uses to release His best in us. If you missed yesterday check out the podcast.

-This week it seemed like everybody was on vacation. I am looking forward to summer being over. Can't wait to have everybody back in the house again. Also looking forward to our finances bumping back up. Summer is always difficult financially. Our July was nearly 40% below budget. That's crazy. So pray, tithe, and if you feel led to give sacrificially it would come at a good time :)

-Had a great time last night with a group of our leaders. The past 9 months have been great as we have seen the leadership base broaden at emc. I'm looking forward to seeing these leaders using their abilities and gifts for God's purposes.

Free Tickets

We had given to the Embassy 28 tickets for tomorrow night's Tony Hawk's Boom Boom Huck Jam. 19 have been claimed by echo teens and leaders. There are nine tickets left. 1st come first serve. If interested email: ross@embassymetro.org. We will leave from the Target parking lot on 92 at 5:00pm. If you need to come later that's fine we'll give you the tickets at the event.

Inspiring Story of Courage

Great Staff Meeting

Last night we had a landmark staff meeting. You know a meeting when you look back upon and realize, it was right in that moment everything took a leap forward. Things were set in motion last night that will change embassy metro church forever. Things were set in motion that will move our staff forward into new levels of effectiveness.

Amie, my wife said it so clearly after the meeting. She said that "in spite of a Sunday where everything technically went wrong. And in spite of summer finances (funds get so low in the summer) we are looking ahead and dreaming about what's next and how are we going to get there".

That's what leadership is about. Yes, we will fix what went wrong Sunday. Yes, the finances will improve as family vacations end and people return to their usual schedules (or if some one feels led to give mad money to the cause...ha ha just kidding...sort of) When things get tough you can't stop looking ahead.

God answered the heart of this leader when last night as we looked ahead He brought a lot into focus. Some of the things we discussed won't even come into completion until 2020. That's crazy, but that's what leadership is about. Deal with your current situations, but never stop looking and leading forward. If you do that, it will play into you finding the momentum necessary to get you to the vision God has given you for your life, family, and ministry/business.

Crazy Sunday at the Embassy

Yesterday was quite a wreck, but we didn't allow technical difficulties to derail the essence of the day.

It literally was the weirdest day since we launched. Nothing was working and somehow I missed the memo that the kids were going to be in the service. It wasn't all our kid's team leader's fault. He told me two months ago, but somehow It slipped my mind.

So the day was a little crazy which is frustrating anytime, but when you have a bunch of guests and 2nd timers at the church you hate to have anything go wrong.

Apart from all that went wrong we had a lot that went right. Jared stepped up and led worship acoustic style because the band was not coming through the speakers. Jared rolled with it. I preached the first few minutes with no amplification, but we rolled with it. Our amazing "rock band" intro didn't even get off the ground, but that isn't what the day was all about anyway.

When the day was over God's Word was spoken clearly, and Christ touched us significantly as we sought after Him during worship. Simple....church at it's best. Let's never forget the essence of what we do week to week is more important than the extras.

Still Learning

This past Sunday I frustrated myself. I hadn't preached at the embassy in 4 weeks so I wanted to bring it and bring it I did. I think I preached two of the finest sermons ever preached in the HISTORY OF MAN.

Ha! No really. Check out the podcast. There is a spot around 24 minutes where I should have said something like..."Next week we'll look at the Disciple Peter"...Let's pray, but Nooo! I rolled into another 23 minute sermon on Peter. Both great sermons but stuck together it lessened the impact of both sermons.

What lesson did I learn. I learned that you need to allow your content to shape the series, not the length of the series shape the content. I knew that I wanted to teach on Peter, Thomas, Judas Iscariot, and Andrew. This means a four week series. I really wanted it to be 4 weeks, but while preparing for last Sunday God really gave me some great stuff to teach on in the intro of the series. I should have preached the first half. Slowed down a little bit and enjoyed covering the material at a slower rate. Then next week cover Peter and what it looks like to embrace the call of a true disciple. Well I didn't want to make the series stretch five weeks so I pushed the intro and Peter together which left a 47 minute sermon that to me felt rushed. I guess I'm still learning :)

Summer of Rock Intro: Name that Artist

On Sunday I led into our Summer of Rock series with a creative intro. It included a fictional story of a life changed as a person became a disciple of Christ.

Take a look at the next paragraph and see if you can name the artist connected to the songs put your list in a comment. Let's see who is the first to get them all.

I know there is some of you in here…you have been through a Hard Day’s Night…. Felt like you were Free fallin’ you couldn’t get any Respect and you felt like you were about to bite the dust You found yourself saying “I can’t get no Satisfaction. I feel like a Voodoo Child.
"On the outside you were a sharp dressed man, or maybe a beautifulBrown eyed girl but the truth is you were Bad to the Bone.

You knew you needed help you were Dazed and Confused thinking you could find Nirvana trying everything to find peace, but you were on a Highway to Hell then you heard it through the grape vine that there is Stairway to Heaven
His name is Jesus Tell me What I Say…

Some people said you were just Superstitious you were having a breakdown, but others were telling you if you could just get to the Father that… Papa’s Got a Brand new bag.

Some of you might think that Jesus is Just alright with me, but that’s not you. When Jesus got a hold of your life you were like,
"Good Golly Miss Molly" You said, "Jesus showed up and I did a roundabout. And I knew right then that I was going to turn turn turn my life over to Him."

At that moment Jesus sent the Holy Spirit. The Bible symbolizes the Spirit as a dove. And right then this Free Bird came to live on the inside of you and He made you fly like an Eagle.

You got so excited you went and told your friend Laya then you got on a phone and called a neighbor you said, "Hey Jude I use to be Like a Rolling Stone. But now I’m rock solid. I found out that Jesus came for everyday people."

With or without You I’m going to follow Him I’m going to be His disciple. Because every breath you take he gave you. And every breath He gave me so now...I don’t fear the reaper.

I once felt like Alice in Chains all bound up, but now I am Rockin in the Free World. He is doing so much in my life that I want to make a difference in My Generation.

Guys that makes me want to shout.

New series begins this Sunday

Jesus, along with a band of a dozen men rocked the world with their message of love and hope. For the next four weeks let's go back to 30 A.D. to look into the lives of a few of the men Jesus called closest to himself. You will be surprised by their humanity and encouraged by their flaws. Come see for yourself just how similar you are to those Jesus chose to use to change the world.

I can't wait to see the backdrop Jared has been working on and to hear the band bust out a Don Henley song. More importantly I can't wait to preach God's life changing Word to our EMC family and their guests. I am so itchin' to preach. I loved the "One Prayer" series and our vacation, but I am ready to be back in the groove.

A Thought Regarding Anonymous Comments, Letters, and etc

This week I received another anonymous comment. Below is my follow up comment and a good word to those who choose to live life sending their thoughts under the cloak of anonymity:


Thanks for the comment. I do wish you would have included your name. Anonymity robs any chance of dialogue and at best weakens the arguments of well meaning people. At worse without dialogue all one is left with is diatribe.

Your failure to name yourself may have been an oversight. If not...don't go through life anonymous. Be bold and enter into the world of discussion.