Saturday night wrapped up Day 2 of Ignite 2010 in Asheville.  Once again the powerful service was beyond words.  I have not heard the latest numbers, but know for sure that Saturday night exceeded the roughly 3000 in attendance on Friday night.  So many people came last night that the Civic center had to open up the upper balcony!

Leap of Faith came on stage at 6:45 and warmed up the crowd with an energy filled performance.  Dave and Adam, two members of the trio came down into the audience singing and dancing.  They had everyone jumping up and down and clapping to the beat.

Clayton King kicked things off at 7pm summarizing the night before and reading a portion of the article from The Citizen Times that made the front page.  He encouraged us all as Christians to thank the paper for such a wonderful article.

Carl Cartee and 3D performed next followed again by Clayton.  Just prior to Clayton preaching, my wife saw on Facebook that some teenagers had arrived from their Prom with Bibles in hand to attend Ignite!  I looked around, and sure enough there they were in the balcony.  What a wonderful testimony and statement of faith!  These teens put God first and took time out from one of the most special nights of their high schools lives to praise and worship God.  What a blessing!  I snapped a picture of them…not the greatest, but still wonderful to see.

Clayton King was next and shared with attendees that he was adopted.  He said he had known this from as far back as he could remember.  During show and tell one time, he shared with his classmates that he was adopted.  Unfortunately, Michael, the bully of the class laughed at him and said “your so bad even your own mother didn’t want you”.  He said it really hurt him, but when he told his mother later she replied by saying “You tell Michael tomorrow that you’re so special that his parents got stuck with him, but you were hand picked from lots of other kids by your Mom and Dad”.

His most powerful message last night was the story of the Samaritan women found in John 4.  Clayton shared a story of flying on a plane.  He boarded, sat down and immediately tried to go to sleep, praying that a “talker” wouldn’t sit next to him.  A lady arrived, and talked to him constantly for an hour.  Clayton shared that he was a minister, and quickly found out the women wasn’t what she seemed.  She was a “Samaritan women” broken, lost, and looking for help.  She asked Clayton if he could help her, he replied: “No, I cannot, but Jesus can.”  He led her to Christ right there on the plane as she sobbed.  She followed up with him later via email telling him that she had found a church and was being discipled by the pastor’s wife.  I was moved to tears by this powerful story as were many others.

Like the previous night, hundreds listened to the invitation and came forward confessing their salvation openly.  What a night!  Again, the spirit of God was present int the Asheville Civic Center as thousands of people came together to praise Jesus.

I would encourage you to attend this evening, the last night of Ignite 2010 Asheville!  If you haven’t been yet, you are missing out on a real blessing in your life.  Thousands laughed together, sang together, cried together, and prayed together.  Matthew 18:20 – “For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.“  Wow, was He ever!

Doors open at 6:00, and things kick off at 7pm!  Get there early as a large attendance is expected this evening as many churches plan to not have evening services and attend Ignite instead!

Citizen Times reporter Barbara Blake shares her experience at Ignite 2010 Asheville: Jesus rocks Asheville.

The first night of Ignite 2010 Asheville was amazing and the spirit of God was working in the Asheville Civic Center.  Our church bus arrived around 6:00 and we made our way along with hundreds of others to our seats.  The stage set-up looked incredible, with 5 large screens, tons of lights and speakers taller than I am.  Our church, First Baptist of Maggie Valley brought around 60 adults, teens and kids.  We were just one of many churches bringing bus loads of kids for the event.  I could tell early on the attendance was going to be big.

I was fortunate enough to be able to go back stage and meet some of the performers and staff.  The highlight of that was being able to pray with Clayton King, Carl Cartee, Leap of Faith, 3D and many others that helped make the night such a wonderful event.  It was truly a blessing to see such talented and frankly well known people be so humble and pray so earnestly for God’s will to be done and for people to come to know Christ.  The awesome presence of God was felt by all in the stillness prior to Ignite 2010 kicking off.

About 6:45pm Leap of Faith came roaring on stage to the excitement and screams of the thousands of teens and children now in the Asheville Civic Center.  Leap of Faith brought everyone to their feet.  Hands were raised, people were dancing, singing, and praising the Lord.  The air crackled with excitement.   Clearly, it was going to be a very very special evening.  As they sang, more and more people poured into Civic center.

Clayton King came on stage at 7:00pm to get things going.  Clayton started off by welcoming everyone and announced that they would be delaying for just a few minutes.  It would seem there was a problem: Traffic was backed up all the way to I-40 with people trying to get into the Civic Center!  What a wonderful problem to have!  Clayton asked everyone to introduce themselves to 3 others from a different church.  Everyone was laughing, talking and having a great time together.

Clayton then introduced the Mayor of Asheville, Terry Bellamy.  I’ll be honest, Terry surprised me.  She was very open about her faith and shared how important her Faith and the Lord almighty was in her life.  She was not ashamed and it was wonderful to hear.  She shared with us how difficult it was to be a politician and how they aren’t all corrupt or without integrity.  She asked everyone to pray for her.  She is a powerful speaker and I felt did a wonderful job kicking off the evening!

Carl Cartee was next and they opened up with bang.  The music was powerful and the sound system amazing.  I can still feel the bass from the drums vibrating my chest!  3D followed them.  This was the first time I had seen 3D perform, and it was truly a blessing.  Their selected music was beautiful and dramatizations were powerful.  They moved the crowd and everyone enjoyed their performance.

Clayton came next.  His message was about sin and the power it has over the unsaved.  He started off by telling a story of him at 10 trying to water ski.  He managed to get himself pulled along under water by the boat, almost to the point of drowning.  His initial mistake?  He didn’t let go of the rope.  Fortunately he finally did and floated to the top of the water where he could breath.  Clayton then looked at the crowed and said if we would just let go of our sin like the rope, we could be saved.  Wow. His message was pointed, powerful, and full of genuine concern and love.  During the invitation literally hundreds of adults, teens and children walked to the stage to accept Christ.  Seeing that many young people dedicate their lives to Jesus was a moment I’ll never forgot.  You could literally feel the spirit of God moving through the air in the Civic Center.

Ignite 2010 wrapped up with more performances by 3D and Carl Cartee as the hundreds of saved worked with counselors downstairs.  At the end of the evening, everyone reluctantly got up from their seats to head home.  We weren’t ready for it to end.

If you missed the first night of Ignite 2010 in Asheville, don’t make the mistake of missing night #2!   I promise, it will be a night you won’t forgot.  Doors open at 6:00pm and Ignite begins at 7pm.  Get there early!  The earlier you arrive the better chance you’ll have of finding a parking place!

Praise God for the hundreds of volunteers and praise God for his work last night.  How great is our God!

The Ignite staff is proud to announce that the budget goal of $51, 144.00 was not only met,  but exceeded!  The total amount raised is $53,651.19!  God is so good! It’s a wonderful feeling to look at the budget graph at the bottom left of this website and see 105%.

See you Friday night!

Ignite Asheville and MANNA are teaming up for the MANNAfest: Measure of Faith food drive in the work of ending hunger in WNC.   Read more here.

Youth Prayer Walk at the Asheville Civic Center April 25th at 5PM. Meet out in front of the Civic Center with your youth group to pray for Ignite 2010.
Contact Andy Tuttle at atuttle@gbcavl.org or 254-0841 for more information.

We’ve received several inquiries about providing the Ignite 2010 Asheville video and logo files as downloads.  We heard you and we delivered!  Download versions of the Ignite 2010 logo, video, and poster are now available on the new downloads page.   Hopefully using these, you’ll be able to help us spread the word about Ignite 2010 Asheville to your friends, family and church congregation.

If you find you need something not provided, please feel free to contact us and we’ll see what we can do!

Just a quick update to let you know that now is the time to get your T-shirt order in (we need to run an order soon!).  It’s also time to sign-up your church to bring counselors to one of the Ignite meetings!

We fully believe that through God all things are possible and as a result we’ve been able to raise about $20,000 for Ignite 2010!  There is still work to do!  Our budget for Ignite 2010 is $50,000, leaving $30,000 remaining.  We need your help!  Please get your donations in as quickly as you can !

To give to Ignite 2010, send your donation to:

Ignite 2010
227 Hazel Mill Road.
Asheville, NC 28806

OR

Ignite 2010
C/o Country Rose Florist
PO Box 278
Mars Hill, NC 28754

We’ve received input from people visiting the site that a few things about Ignite 2010 are a little confusing.  Well, that’s the last thing we want!  Below are some questions we’ve received and associated clarifications!

What’s the cost and where do I buy tickets?

Ignite 2010 is a free event and no tickets are required.  All you have to do is show up!  Now is that simple or what?

Who are the two guys next to the video on the main page?

On the left is Clayton King. Clayton is Christian speaker who speaks at numerous Christian youth events around the country.  You can read more about Clayton on his website.

On the right is Carl Cartee, a Christian musician.  You can read more about Carl on his website.

Are the meetings in the bottom right under Important Meetings for everyone?

Absolutely!  The only exception is the leadership meeting on 2/11.  Other than that one, the meetings are open to the public and we encourage you to attend and bring a friend!

In addition to posting the answers here, we’ve also made a few adjustments to the site to answer these questions as well.

Have a question about the site or think somethings a little unclear?  PLEASE let us know.  You can contact the Ignite Staff on the Contact page.  Drop us a line, we would love to hear from you.

We are expecting Christ to do some great things at Ignite Asheville this year.   We are trusting Christ for 2000 souls! When He shows up and when those souls come, we need to be ready with counselors!

We will need 700 counselors each night!   We need you and your church to say yes to being a counselor. Pastors, youth Pastors, Christians, we need all of you to make this happen. How can you get involved?

Head over to the counselor training page and either 1) Register as a counselor and mark your calendar to attend one of the training sessions or 2) Show up for a training session and sign-up to be a counselor then.

We need you, so make sure you sign-up!