Susan, Kristy, Jordan and I travelled over an hour today to visiy a church in Vista. North Coast Church is an Ev Free Church that meets in 27 venues, mostly by video. The pastor records a service on Saturday evening and then copies and distributes the DVD to be played in the various campuses at different times.

We visite the main campus, which is simply a row of warehouse storefronts. One is called north Coast Live with the pastor speaking live. Then there are the various age groupings of children in other storefronts.

Each setting has a host pastor, a worship team (which might be Country Gospel, Rock, Traditional hymns or cafe style-unplugged). Then the pre-recorded video plays at a set time. These services are repeated on Sat evening, two on Sun a.m. and one on Sunday Evening.

We parked in the visitors lot and were picked up and delivered to the venue of our choice via golfcart. Coffee was available for free at several locations. I found the one camera video easy to listen to. Worshippers used their Bibles, listened attentively and laughed out loud when the pastor said something funny. About 7000 people worship in venues that run between 100 and 600 each.

There was nothing pretentious about the services I attended. We sat in plastic lawn chairs, the setting was very casual, but all in all very enjoyable. I was inspired and challenged by what we saw in action today. This has been a worthwhile learning experience.