From the Senior Pastor...

A few words from my heart. At our last Board of Ministries meeting we received the annual report from the church clerk. The clerk's report indicated that at year's end we have a total membership of 574 persons. That number sounds pretty impressive until we look at the reality of our situation.

Our worship and Sunday church school participation represents significantly less than half of our membership. While we received 14 new members last year only two of those were received by baptism. Financially we ended the year showing a deficit in our general fund. It appears that we are falling short of supporting the ministry of our church in the vital areas of participation and financial commitment.

Perhaps the issue is one of focus. We tend to focus our time and energy on the development and implementation of programs when our emphasis needs to be on the training of disciples.

The clear command of the Lord is to "make disciples", "baptize" and "teach" (Matthew 28:19 - 20). To accomplish this task we are equipped with the awesome authority of Jesus the Christ.

At the outset I stated that these are words from my heart. My heart tells me that I love each and every one of you. My heart tells me that we have a deep desire to reach people with the good news of God's grace and love. My heart tells me that I will not always be here to lead you, thus my heart compels me to call each one of us to take seriously the command to use the all-encompassing authority of Jesus to make disciples. My heart compels me to teach and preach the message of salvation and discipleship. We need to hear it and to live it.

On the 24th of February I am going to begin a small group training series in evangelism from a book titled, Unbinding the Gospel. This book was born from the Mainline Evangelism Project, a four year study of hundreds of mainline congregations. The authors interviewed over 1200 church members, new Christians and pastors. The authors not only studied effective evangelism, but more important, what motivated those congregations to reach out to people with no church background. One of the most important discoveries is that a vivid relationship with God lies at the heart of evangelism.

In my heart I believe that God is directing us to focus our commitments, skills, gifts and resources - including the authority of Jesus - to make disciples. Please take seriously the invitation to join this training event. It will change you, our church and our community. Some of us have been sitting too long on the sidelines expecting others to do ministry on our behalf. No more sitting. No more whining. No more complaining. The requirement is to "make disciples".

Shalom,  

Jim

From the Associate Pastor...

Well, it's "official" our youth, and several adults, will participate in the TEENSERVE mission project scheduled for this coming June. We had such a wonderful experience last year that we simply couldn't pass up another opportunity to work, grow and serve!

Because we have made this decision, we once again look to our church family for help with your prayers and in raising the funds to attend. We have scheduled several fundraising events, the first being a Valentine Childcare, scheduled for Sunday, February 14. Our youth will watch your children, infants through age 10, from 5:00 - 10:00 pm in order for you to enjoy a night out. There is no cost but we will receive donations. There will be a sign-up sheet located in the Narthex beginning January 31st and we ask that you make your reservations before Thursday, Feb. 11th. This will be helpful in ensuring that we have enough youth, adults, food and activities for the children.

I'm excited at this opportunity for our youth and adults with the hope you share this same excitement. Those who participated last year still talk about their experiences and memories of painting, building and, of course, worship! Please remember to pray for those participating and for our fundraising efforts. Our wish is to raise $3,000.00.

Peace,

Pastor Karen