Wednesday Devotional - 5/5/21
Prayers:
We want to keep our church family in our prayers this week. As we heard in church, there are many prayer requests, many of them urgent in terms of healing. Satan is attacking our church because he knows that we are going to do great things for God! Pray that God will continue to keep his hedge of protection around us, and that the enemy will cease in his attacks.
Pray also for teachers and students as this year is winding down. I know that for many schools, the Milestone testing is occurring. Pray that the kids will be calm, collected, and have the knowledge to do well. Pray that the teachers don’t stress too much about the end of the year, and that it goes smoothly for them!
Announcements:
For those who are interested, Morganton Baptist Church is having a Cars and Coffee from 9 AM to 11 AM on Saturday May 8th. Even if you don’t own anything classic, feel free to come down to our sister church and enjoy some fellowship with them.
Also on May 8th at 6 PM is the Woody Gap School homecoming at Kennedy Creek at 6 PM. Pray for good weather!
May 12th, we have our next VBS meeting at 2 PM. Yes, this is a Wednesday meeting! If you are interested in working with VBS, please make plans to come and join us.
On May 14th, Bennie and Brenda Brookshire will be hosting a birthday party for everyone who missed their party this last year. It’ll be at 6 PM in the barn at their house.
May 17th is this year’s first Suches Brushes meeting at 9 AM. Bring your artist self for a wonderful time of creation and fellowship.
Be planning on inviting kids to VBS! It will be happening from June 21-25. The theme is Concrete and Cranes: Building on the Love of Jesus! It will be a wonderful time to learn more about Jesus Christ and his love for us.
Devotional:
One of my absolute favorite things to do in the Christmas season is to listen to the great Oratorio Messiah by George F. Handel. One of the solos and then in turn one of the choruses is a paraphrase of Malachi 3:2-3 (NKJV):
But who can endure the day of His coming?
And who can stand when He appears?
For He is like a refiner’s fire
And like launderers’ soap.
He will sit as a refiner and a purifier of silver;
He will purify the sons of Levi,
And purge them as gold and silver,
That they may offer to the Lord
An offering in righteousness.
This was a particular favorite of my Dad’s to solo, and since it was his birthday last week, I relistened to it. But I was reminded that Christ does come to us to refine us. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen someone refining metal. It’s hard work, it’s hot work, and it is not something easy to perfect. To get the metal just right, be it gold, silver, or an alloy, the precise amount of time and effort must be taken in to ensure that the metal comes out correct when the refining is done.
Before Christ comes into the life of a person, they are unclean. They have imperfections, and they have rough spots. They might even have imperfections within themselves that are not seen on the outside. But when Christ comes in, he makes them clean. He purges the imperfection of sin from the lives of a person, and they are gone forever. Now, much like a metal that is used in the elements, there can be imperfections and things that cling to a metal to make it dirty again. When we confess those imperfections to God through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we are always made pure again. Christ makes us where we can approach the throne of God to offer ourselves in righteousness.
Memory Verse:
Colossians 3:17 (NIV)
And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
(This is a new feature of our devotional. I hope you will take the time this month to memorize our memory verse.)
Wednesday Devotional - 5/12/21
Prayers:
First of all, though it was this past Sunday, I would like to thank all the mothers of the church for their dedication, loyalty, knowledge, and wisdom that they show in their Christian lives. We would certainly be lost without the mothers of the church, and we should thank God daily that these women serve God. Thank you for our Mothers, Lord!
Continue to remember those who are on the prayer lists at the churches that we all are attending. It seems that God continually adds to our prayer lists, but he allows us to pray for those who are in need. Pray that God will heal those who need healing, and pray for the lost who are seeking the Lord.
Announcements:
At 2 PM today is the VBS Volunteer meeting. Please plan to be there to help support our efforts for this year’s VBS! This is a truly exciting time, planning for this year’s VBS. Our theme is Concrete and Cranes, and the Motto is “Jesus! Our strong foundation!” Also, the VBS Scripture is Philippians 1:6, which reads “I am sure of this, that he who started a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”
On Friday evening, Bennie and Brenda Brookshire will be having their Birthday +1 Party at 7 PM in the barn. Come celebrate the birthdays that we have missed since Covid started.
Suches Brushes will be meeting on May 17th at 9 AM. Come be creative in the Fellowship Hall, and enjoy time making beautiful artwork together.
Vessel Ministry will be having their fundraiser at the church on June 5th. The cost is a minimum donation of $30. They will be smashing things! Also, if you have any old televisions, plates, lamps, or anything you think someone would enjoy smashing, please reply back to this email or Facebook post. Doug Serra will arrange for a pickup for the event.
On June 20th, we will be having our VBS kickoff at 4 PM. We will be having a cake walk, inflatables, and a cookout. Make sure to register your kids or grandkids for VBS on that day!
Finally, at church we are doing a study on the book of Revelation for our Sunday School at Mount Lebanon. If you are interested, we meet at 9:45 in the Fellowship Hall.
Devotional:
I recently found one of my old term papers from when I was working on my Masters of Divinity, and something very specific caught my eye. We live in a society today that is full of time wasters. We have smart phones that we can download video streaming services, information apps, or just plain games that take our time away. And in contrast to that, our society is one that wants us to find ways to squeeze more into the few hours that we have in each day rather than looking at the way that we can maximize our impact for the kingdom of God. We are sold time management solutions, but the reality is that we already have Biblical examples of how to organize our time and our impact for God.
Perhaps the greatest example of time management comes from Moses. In Exodus 18, Moses’ father in law, Jethro, comes to visit with him. Jethro is delighted to hear about the escape from Egypt, and has a great time talking with Moses about the great things that God had done for his people. But on the second day of his visit with his son in law, we see in verse 13 that “Moses took the seat to serve as judge for the people, and they stood around him from morning till evening.” Now, this is not to say that what Moses was doing was wrong: in fact, to him, no one else could do what he was doing at the time! But Jethro saw this, and took Moses aside. In verse 17-18, Jethro reprimands Moses, saying “What you are doing is not good. You and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out. The work is too heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone.” Instead of just pointing out Moses’ mistake, he gives him good advice on how to set up a system of judges, with Moses being the representative before God and bringing the people’s disputes to the Lord Most High. In turn, Moses was to train up men who would be over thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens of people. The hard cases would be brought to Moses, but simple cases would be solved by these trained men. This would lighten the load for Moses over time, but also keep the authority that God had given to him in place.
Why is this important to know about this story in modern times, though? Certainly most of us could say that we aren’t in charge of even a couple of people in our lives. I will say that even though not all of us are in charge of lots of people, we do have responsibilities to learn from this lesson of Moses. It is to understand that we must learn to carry the load with others. A great example of this comes from our Lord, Jesus Christ. Jesus could have done all of his earthly ministry on his own. He had the knowledge, the power, and the ability to do this. But he chose 12 disciples to help work the load with him. He did this as an example for us to follow. When we share the load of the work of the kingdom with others, it not only helps us to have the time to do the work properly, it reminds us that each and every one of us makes up the body of Christ. We are using our spiritual gifts to the best of their abilities, and we make sure that our time is used well.
Memory Verse:
Colossians 3:17 (NIV)
And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
(This is a new feature of our devotional. I hope you will take the time this month to memorize our memory verse.)
Wednesday Devotional - 5/19/21
Prayers:
Please remember those who are ill within our community and our church. There have been numerous prayer requests over the last few weeks. Please continue to pray specifically for those that you know are ill.
Also, remember to pray for the various VBS camps that are happening all over our area. I just saw the other day that our sister church, Corinth, is having theirs next week. Pray that God will cover their workers with health, knowledge, and energy to make it through the week!
Pray for the VBS workers at Mount Lebanon as they prepare for the start of VBS in a few weeks. Pray that the weather will be good, and that we will have a Kingdom-building impact upon our community!
Finally, pray for the graduates of Woody Gap School. We were pleased to present a Bible and a devotional to the three boys graduating. Pray that God will continue to guide their steps as they have made this great accomplishment in their lives!
Announcements:
Suches Brushes will be meeting on Mondays at 9 AM in the Fellowship Hall. Anyone is welcome to participate. Come be creative in the Fellowship Hall, and enjoy time making beautiful artwork together.
Vessel Ministry will be having their fundraiser at the church on June 5th. The cost is a minimum donation of $30. They will be smashing things! Also, if you have any old televisions, plates, lamps, or anything you think someone would enjoy smashing, please reply back to this email or Facebook post. Doug Serra will arrange for a pickup for the event.
June 6th after church is our Mother’s appreciation luncheon. We will be honoring our mothers after church with a meal. Please make plans to come and join us!
On June 20th, we will be having our VBS kickoff at 4 PM. We will be having a cake walk, inflatables, and a cookout. Make sure to register your kids or grandkids for VBS on that day!
On July 4th, we will be having a cookout to celebrate our nation’s independence. Make sure to come that Sunday for a good service and wonderful fellowship afterwards.
Finally, at church we are doing a study on the book of Revelation for our Sunday School at Mount Lebanon. This coming week we will be studying about who wrote the book of Revelation. The answer might surprise you! If you are interested, we meet at 9:45 in the Fellowship Hall.
Devotional:
One of the most interesting things that I like to learn about is leadership. The late Rev. Jerry Falwell had a theory that anyone who was a Christian could be a leader, and furthermore, he believed that being a Christian required you to be one! While I know that there are some of the readers of this devotional that might not believe in all the ways and means that Rev. Falwell committed himself to various causes, I still do believe in that particular axiom of his. Every one of us can be a leader, and we should if we are to carry the Gospel to places that we only have access to thanks to God. Part of how we become better leaders, though, is to study leaders and their style. Something that I did years ago was to look at various leaders of the Bible, and to make up a sort of ‘profile in leadership’ for each one. Over the next few weeks, I want us to look at those leaders of the Bible and to see how the way that they used leadership can apply to our lives as well.
The first of these is Abraham. First known as Abram, he was given a vision in Genesis 15. In the very first verse of Chapter 15, God tells Abram “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward.” This was a reminder to Abram that God was on his side, and would protect him and be his reward for being a faithful servant. As the passage continues, God promises a great covenant between Abram and himself. In chapter 17, God gives Abram a new name, Abraham, promising that he will be the father of many nations. With that new name, he is given a vision. And it is through that vision that we see the leader that Abraham was.
When God gave Abraham the promise to make him the father of nations, Abraham had to understand that vision. Thankfully, God was with Abraham, and spoke with him. We have that opportunity to do so as well, through the Holy Spirit. Abraham would own that vision for himself, too. When we are in a position of leadership, we must personally own what vision God is giving to us to fulfill it. Without personally owning it, we lack the conviction to go and do. Think about a time when you were given a task that you did not want to do. Did you do it well? Or did you get it done as quickly as possible, without giving it much thought or effort? When we personally own a vision from God, we want to do it well, and get others involved into the work!
This is perhaps the most important part of Abraham’s leadership style that we see: he was able to communicate the vision that God had for him to the people that needed to be heavily involved. This is done through, for lack of a better term, ‘selling’ the idea to others. This usually has negative connotations in today’s society, but when we look at it from a kingdom-building viewpoint, we see that we buy into God’s work because of the payoff: God is our great reward! What Abraham did as a leader was to get people behind God’s vision for Abraham’s life, and they brought it to full fruition together. It was built in a way that kept the vision going (quite obviously in the case of Abraham as we know that there are still his descendants on the Earth) after the leader has long since died.
Knowing what we know about Abraham and his leadership style, the particular type of leader he was is known as an entrepreneurial leader. These are the type of leaders that see a problem ahead of its time and come up with a solution for it. They are the inventors, the innovators, the trend-setters. They have the ability to see upcoming issues and attack those issues and mitigate them before any damage can occur. The downside to this type of leadership, though, is that often these leaders face opposition from the established normals, and they can be difficult to understand since they are speaking about potential problems rather than the problems of here and now. This type of leadership can also be known to jump the gun without the help of the Holy Spirit, and thus lead to other problems. They can also lack the proper communication skills to accomplish the vision that God leads to them, or become possessive of the vision and not want to have others help in the building of that.
How do we learn from this leadership style, though? It’s to be open to God’s moving. It’s to be open to God’s vision fully and completely. It is to rely on God to help you to communicate that vision to others so that it will not die on the vine. God will always reward those who follow him, and HE will be the great reward.
Memory Verse:
Colossians 3:17 (NIV)
And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
Wednesday Devotional - 5/26/21
Prayers
Please continue to remember those in prayer from our prayer lists. I truly believe that God is allowing us to do these prayers, and it will continue to bring personal revival when we see the results of HIS work!
Also, please remember to pray for the VBS at Mount Lebanon Baptist. It will be from June 21-25. Pray that we will have great weather, that God will give energy and strength to the workers, and that we will have a great impact upon the community at large for the Kingdom!
Announcements:
Suches Brushes will be meeting on Mondays at 9 AM in the Fellowship Hall. Anyone is welcome to participate. Come be creative in the Fellowship Hall, and enjoy time making beautiful artwork together.
Vessel Ministry will be having their fundraiser at the church on June 5th. The cost is a minimum donation of $30. They will be smashing things! Also, if you have any old televisions, plates, lamps, or anything you think someone would enjoy smashing, please reply back to this email or Facebook post. Doug Serra will arrange for a pickup for the event.
June 6th after church is our Ladies appreciation luncheon. We will be honoring the ladies after church with a meal. Please make plans to come and join us!
On June 20th, we will be having our VBS kickoff at 4 PM. We will be having a cake walk, inflatables, and a cookout. Make sure to register your kids or grandkids for VBS on that day!
From June 21-25, Vacation Bible School will be happening. Come see what God is building with Concrete and Cranes!
On July 4th, we will be having a cookout to celebrate our nation’s independence. Make sure to come that Sunday for a good service and wonderful fellowship afterwards.
Finally, at church we are doing a study on the book of Revelation for our Sunday School at Mount Lebanon. This coming week, we look at the date of when Revelation was likely written. What do you think it is? If you are interested, we meet at 9:45 in the Fellowship Hall.
Devotional:
Today we are going to look at a different kind of leader. He was a pragmatic type of leader, and one that would likely have said ‘the ends justify the means’. This is not to say that he was any more or less sinful than the other leaders that we will cover, but he was pragmatic in his ways of his life, even from an early age. This man was Jacob. He was the grandson of Abraham, and the son of Issac. We are introduced to him through his birth in Genesis 25, when the story of his birth is told. Jacob was a twin, with his brother being Esau. In Genesis 25:26, it reads “after this, his brother came out, with his hand grasping Esau’s heel; so he was named Jacob.” This was to foreshadow the struggle that Jacob and Esau would have with one another, with God saying to their mother, Rebeah “Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you will be separated; one people will be stronger than the other, and the older will serve the younger” (Genesis 25:23).
Perhaps the two greatest examples of Jacob being this type of leader comes from his early life. The first episode, which is recorded later in Genesis 25, reports of when Esau sold his birthright to Jacob for a bowl of soup. This was a bit of trickery, perhaps, and almost not certainly honorable by Jacob to do so this way. Later, in Genesis 27, something that was certainly not honorable nor virtuous, Jacob tricks his father into giving him the birthright blessing that was due his older brother. Fulfilling the prophesy that God had given their mother, in Genesis 27:29, Issac gives the blessing that “May nations serve you and peoples bow down to you. Be lord over your brothers, and may the sons of your mother bow down to you.” Right after the blessing, Esau comes into where his father was, and both realize that they had been tricked.
Now Jacob would have trickery put upon him later in life through others, but he would come up with solutions for the problems that he was faced with. Furthermore, his son, Joseph, would inherit some of the problem-solving skills that his father had (although he would use it more often than not to bless others than himself). This pragmatic way of being able to problem solve is the hallmark of this kind of leadership. One of the greatest opportunities in this style of leadership is that they are able to see a problem and create a solution for it. By doing the right thing, a leader can earn credibility not only with the people around them, but in their community at large. They are able to overcome obstacles. And God blesses the kind of leader that can solve problems. They just must always be mindful that they do not fall into the trap of doing ‘whatever it takes’ to fix that problem. If they do, they will find themselves much more likely to fall into sinfulness when trying to do God’s will.
Memory Verse:
Colossians 3:17 (NIV)
And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
No comments:
Post a Comment