A Note from Pastor Roger

It's a great day for a great day, Church Family! I hope you know that you are loved and cared for today.

This Sunday is Commitment Sunday, marking the midpoint of our Deep & Wide Generosity Initiative. I have made a video below helping you know how to fill out the commitment card you'll receive. I hope you have been prayerfully considering one of the three following responses to our invitation to living a generous life:

• Make a first-time, 12-month commitment to Deep & Wide: If you are new and have not made a commitment yet, would you join this vision to go deeper in your walk with the Lord through a giving journey so that collectively we can reach wider?

• Commit to finish strong: Many of you made a commitment last year at this time, and we are asking you to declare your willingness to finish strong.

• Increase your commitment: God has enabled some of you to raise your commitment for the final 12-months because you might have already given your commitment or maybe because God has blessed you in a significant way so that you can increase.

We are asking everyone to bring God your first and best as we seek to lift our city and the world by generously giving the gospel of Jesus Christ. We will have commitment cards on hand on Sunday in our sanctuaries, and you will be given time to fill them out. See this video below on how to prepare your commitment card.

Additionally, many of you have asked about how you can engage with Mortarstone on tax-smart giving and on planned giving. Tim Deatrick with Mortarstone will be with us on Saturday, May 20 and Sunday, May 21 to offer a tax-smart giving seminar. We will finalize the details and publish them in our CityRise Hub Weekly on the app and in this email next Thursday afternoon.

Before we go today, I'd like to quickly introduce you to our Director of Production, Wes Mathew! Wes recently joined our staff to help and provide his expertise when it comes to audio, video, and the overall production of our worship services. He has an incredible twenty-five-plus years of technical and musical experience that he's bringing with him from his leadership in organizations such as PURESOUND, Breakaway Ministries with Texas A&M, other Houston-area churches, popular Christian recording artists (including David Crowder, Chris Tomlin, Shane and Shane, just to name a few), and in places all around our city and state.

Wes have proven to be a very valuable addition to CityRise as we continue to strengthen our digital infrastructure and online reach. If you see him and his family (his wife, Kasey, and their children, Priya, Hope, Joshua, and Daniel) welcome them to CityRise and get to know them! We are excited and thankful to have them here.

If you are interested in serving in our media/production ministry, please email your interest to Wes at wes.mathew@cityrise.org.

Thank you for your continued trust and support, Church Family! See you on Commitment Sunday!

Stay Expectant,
Pastor Roger