It's 6PM, the day of Harvest Festival

Wow, it's all over. Our 6th annual Harvest Festival is done, in the can, finished, complete -- and man am I tired!

We don't keep an exact count of the number of guests each year, but here are some facts that I do know:

We had more volunteers than last year

Our construction work was nearly complete by Friday night, giving us lots of time this morning for decoration and atmosphere

Our men did an incredible job handling all the cars, with more volunteers in that area than the last few years

We had lots of new faces among our volunteers, always a healthy sign

We had plenty of veterans return to help, another healthy sign

We ran out of ministry brochures within the first 90 minutes and had to print more, which has never happened before

Our "Celebrate Recovery" and "Fired-Up Ministries" booths got lots of inquiries from people

It rained much of yesterday, but no one got stuck in mud here

We gave away at least 2,000 hot dogs

It's 6PM and I can go home!

This is an incredible event each year because it shows the power of a church coming together, all of its ministries and all of its leaders and all of its team members, focused on the single cause of creating a fun, free event that sends a positive message to our community.

And at the end of the day, isn't that what a church should be doing every week? Focusing on helping others and not fighting petty battles? Working together as a team and not defining territory? Looking out for others and not worrying about the sacrifices that must be made?

An awesome day indeed.