Dear Church Family,
“Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We have found him of whom Moses in the law, and also the prophets, wrote–Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph…Come and see” (John 1:45, 46b).
In this month’s Beacon, you will see Bro. Tommy’s article and also in Jennifer’s article, announcements and information about new schedules and ministries for the fall. These changes come after much prayer, as we seek God’s will for His church and the ministries of His church.
Bro. Tommy shares information about changes in our morning services times (they will be moved to 8:15 a.m. and 10:45 a.m. in order to provide Sunday School teachers and classes more time for the 9:30 Sunday School hour).
Jennifer shares the plan for a special rotation on Wednesday nights that will allow our children (K4-5th grades) to rotate to two classes (Worship/Bible class & missions). To accomplish this, our children will go to one activity from 5:30-6:15 p.m. and then rotate to a second activity from 6:15-7 p.m. This will allow us to include both Bible and missions classes. We know that the
5:30 start time may be difficult for some families, and we ask our parents to simply do their best. Without our Sunday evening slot, we are getting creative on Wednesday nights in order to offer more ministries. Next semester, we plan to offer children’s music/choir as the second activity.
Now I am going to ask something of all of our church members and regular attenders. With the various ministry offerings in place (preaching, worship, children’s classes, youth classes, small group/Sunday School, Celebrate Recovery, etc), I want to challenge you to…
Simply invite a friend!! That’s my request. That you are very sensitive to the spiritual needs of the people that God has put into your life, and be open to inviting them personally to come with you and to benefit from one of the ministries of this church. The reason this is on my mind is that I am seeing our youngest attenders, our children, reach out to other kids and invite them–and they are coming! Unless I’m way off on this, I also believe that most of us are doing a lousy job in this simple mission. It’s as if we have some kind of a wall up around our spiritual life like it’s private or something. That’s not healthy Christianity. A healthy walk with Christ leads to a burning desire to bring others to Him and to the truths of His Word.
In the short passage I quoted above, we see Philip seek out his friend, Nathanael, to bring him to Jesus. Simple, loving, effective! I challenge myself, and you, to be engaged in this mission: invite a friend/relative/neighbor/co-worker/acquaintance to church! A simple plan–but it works!
In Christian love,
John