As
Prayer is the detonator the church lacks.
In Acts 1 the followers of Jesus, 120 strong, gathered in an upper room and
prayed for 10 days. In chapter 2 God released His power upon them, Peter
preached, and 3,000 were baptized. In Acts 4 the apostles, who had been warned
not to preach Christ anymore, gathered the congregation together and prayed for
boldness to speak. God released His power and they became fearless in their
preaching. Acts 2:42 says the believers devoted themselves to the apostles
teaching, the fellowship, the breaking of bread, and prayer. Most
churches give a lot of attention to the first three and leave the fourth to
chance.
Prayer is not a substitute for good
leadership, vision, purpose or effective strategies. But prayer releases God's
power upon these and multiplies their effectiveness. Without a spiritual
passion born of a deep personal relationship with God, the church experiences
serious symptoms of imbalance:
·
Lack of power
·
Frustration
·
Lack of vision
·
Imitators of the past (doing ministry
the way we did 40 years ago)
·
Religion (rules and regulation)
·
Stagnation
· Apathy
George Barna, a
student of today's culture and churches, says that the majority of churches
that are in plateau or decline are 5 to 40 years behind the times, reactive
rather than proactive, and chasing history rather than leading it.
In the January 11, 2004 issue of Christian
Standard Dr. Joe Ellis describes two paradigms at work in the American
church. "The Membership Paradigm creates a church that exists to serve its
members." Their focus is inward. "The Mission Paradigm describes a
congregation that exists to fulfill God's mission in the world: to seek and
save those who do not know Him and His Son." Its focus is outward. Dr.
Ellis estimates that 85% of American churches are Membership churches, with
only 15% being
How would prayer make a difference in your
church? Most of us believe that God has the power to miraculously change
situations and circumstances, but when the church gets serious about praying,
the greatest miracle will be the change in its people. Their hearts will change
and new attitudes will appear. They will:
·
develop a love for prayer, praise, and the word.
·
have a growing sense of God's presence and power.
·
realize that people matter to God.
·
see a new vision and purpose.
·
realize that the church is not about them . . . God has a
greater purpose.
·
develop a whatever it takes attitude.
This
transformation creates a new spiritual momentum and passion that releases God's
power on the ministry efforts. The result is Spirit-empowered ministry. When
the prayers of the church are intentional and focused, balance is restored.
·
Where there was a
lack of power, there is now a growing sense of power.
·
Where there was
frustration, there is now peace.
·
Where there was a
lack of vision, there is now a focused leadership.
·
Where churches were
imitating the past, they are now living out a present passion.
·
Where Christianity
had become religion, it is now a relationship with Christ.
·
Where there was
stagnation, there is now healthy growth.
· Where there was apathy, there is now passion.
Churches
in plateau or decline need a fresh spiritual passion to turn the church around,
and great growing churches need a continued growing spiritual passion among
their members and leaders to help them move to the next level of ministry
effectiveness.
This kind of transformation comes as the
church focuses on personal and corporate prayer. This transformation is a work
of heart not just a work of the mind. That's why increasing your teaching on
doctrine or strategies will not be enough to bring about this spiritual
revival. David Bryant, author and president of Proclaim HOPE!,
wrote in Pray! magazine: "the great hope God
holds out to Christ's body in our nation is a fresh encounter with the living
Christ Himself. Christians must sense undeniably that Christ is alive and
working in their midst as the unchallenged Lord of the church. That's the only
way we can be revitalized, so that churches grow, worship rises, ministry
multiplies, society is transformed, powers of darkness are shaken, and the unreached get reached."
Here are some practical ways to help us get started:
· Spend More Time Seeking to Know the Lord in Prayer, not just coming to Him with shopping lists. On a
purely human level, when we are growing in our love for someone, we want to
spend more and more time with that person. It is the same with the Lord. The
more we know Him, the more we love Him, and the more we will want to be with
Him.
·
Spend Time with
People in Love with God. Wouldn’t it
have been great to spend time with David as he worshiped and prayed? In
addition to learning from him, I think some of his passion would be contagious.
That kind of passion shows in the lives of those, like David of old, who love
the Lord, especially in the way they pray and worship.
· Get to Know Him More in His Word. There’s no better place to begin your walk of intimacy
with the Lord than in the pages of His Word. The Bible is not just intended to
give us facts and doctrine (though it does that very well). Its purpose is to
reveal God. Jesus criticized the Pharisees because they studied the Bible,
which spoke of Jesus, but would not come to Him.
· Use the Bible as a Place of Prayer - We need to allow the Bible to teach us more about our
great God. As the Word of God teaches you something about the nature of God,
stop and praise God for what you just learned about Him. Praying through the
Bible should be one of the greatest experiences of your life.
· Pray John 17:26. This is a prayer request that will change
your life! At the close of His great high priestly prayer, Jesus prays to His
Father on behalf of His disciples: "I have made You
known to them, and will continue to make You known in order that the love You
have for Me may be in them and that I Myself may be in them."
How much does the Father love the Son? We
cannot even begin to imagine, can we? Yet Jesus prayed that the love the Father
has for Him would be in us. Because this is a biblical prayer, from the very
lips of our Lord, we know that it is a prayer according to God’s will. And if
we pray according to God’s will, we know that He will answer that prayer. What
a great prayer for us to pray every day of our lives: "Father, I
pray that You will help me to love Jesus as You love
Him, that Your love for Jesus may be in Me." Imagine how our love
for the Lord will grow as we pray this prayer and as God begins to answer.
Finally, a couple Q & A’s
about prayer:
Q. How serious is our misunderstanding of "In Jesus'
name, amen"?
A. Most of us end our prayers “in Jesus’ name” for one of two reasons:
1) We have been instructed that Jesus tells us to pray in His name, so we think
we need this biblical, “Roger, wilco, over and out”
to sign off our prayer; or, 2) We know that we should approach God through
Christ’s intercession rather than on the basis of our merit. Both of these
concepts have biblical foundations. However, if we do not remember that praying
in Jesus’ name means that we are petitioning God to answer our prayers in a
way that glorifies and honors His Son, then our prayers will be more
selfish than will ultimately satisfy Him or us. When we truly learn how to pray
in Jesus’ name, then we can have great confidence that God will hear and answer
because we know that He delights to honor His Son.
Q. What wisdom can you share about prayer, both personal and
corporate, with pastors who are seeking to lead their members upward and
forward in serious, scriptural, strategic praying?
A. Some say that the most effective prayers are offered when we
pray without any doubt in what we want to happen. This is impossible. It is
something like telling someone not to think about a pink elephant. If you tell
me not to think about it, I cannot help but think about it. Prayer is not a
mental game. When we pray, our faith is not in the object of our prayer (a new
red bicycle or a new church sanctuary) but in the character of our God. He is
the Heavenly Father who knows the end from the beginning, who loves us, who
delights to hear from us, and who will answer our prayers in ways more
beautiful and eternal than we can ask or imaging. My trust should not be in
what my finite mind believes God should do, but in what the Good Shepherd
delights to make heaven and earth the greatest blessing possible for His
people. When we pray without any doubt in the character of our God, then the
outcomes of our prayers may perplex us but they will not disappoint us.
Let us pray:
Heavenly Father, I pray to You today in
Jesus’ name. Focus my heart on the priorities of my Savior, whom You have provided out of Your great love. Please do in me
and through me whatever will bring most glory to Jesus. As You
listen to each petition I offer, please help me to offer it:
·
Claiming Christ’s
merit, not my own,
·
Seeking Christ’s
purposes more than my own,
· Loving Christ’s glory more than my own.
These are the petitions that I offer:
1. (Place your petitions here)
2.
3.
By
the power and wisdom of the Holy Spirit, transform my requests into instruments
for accomplishing Your will to have Jesus honored
everywhere--especially in my heart.
Make my greatest desire, highest joy and
deepest fulfillment Jesus’ glory.
I can attempt all You
require of my life, face all You design for my path, rejoice in all You will
for my eternity, when I know all is for Jesus’ name.
Do what You know is
best for Him, for this most blesses me. Forgive my readiness to forget and my
tendency to doubt that what most glorifies Him, most
satisfies me. When my mind shrinks from these truths, enlarge my heart for
Christ’s purposes. For Christ’s sake and for mine, help me always to pray in
Jesus’ name. Amen.
I dreamed that I went to Heaven and an angel was showing me
around. We walked side-by-side inside a large workroom filled with angels.
My angel guide stopped in front of the first
section and said, "This is the Receiving Section. Here, all petitions to
God said in prayer are received."
I looked around in this area, and it was
terribly busy with so many angels sorting out petitions written on voluminous
paper sheets and scraps from people all over the world.
Then we moved on down a long corridor until
we reached the second section. The angel then said to me, "This is the
Packaging and Delivery Section. Here, the blessings the people asked for are
processed and delivered to the living persons who asked for them."
I noticed again how busy it was there. There
were many angels working hard at that station, since so many blessings had been
requested and were being packaged for delivery to Earth.
Finally at the farthest end of the long
corridor we stopped at the door of a very small station. To my great surprise,
only one angel was seated there, idly doing nothing.
"This is the Acknowledgment
Section," my angel friend quietly admitted to me. He seemed embarrassed.
"How is it that? There's no work going on here?" I asked.
So sad," the angel sighed. "After
people receive the blessings that they asked for, very few send back
acknowledgments.
How does one acknowledge God's blessings?” I
asked. “Simple," the angel answered. “Just say, ‘Thank you, Lord.’”
“What blessings should they
acknowledge?" I asked.
“If you have food in the refrigerator,
clothes on your back, a roof overhead and a place to sleep… you are richer than
75% of this world. If you have money in the bank, in your wallet, and spare
change in a dish, you are among the top 8% of the world's
wealthy. And if you woke up this morning with more health than illness, you are
more blessed than the many who will not even survive this day.
“If you have never experienced the fear in
battle, the loneliness of imprisonment, the agony of torture, or the pangs of
starvation, you are ahead of 700 million people in the world.
“If you can attend a church meeting without
the fear of harassment, arrest, torture or death, you are envied by, and more
blessed than, three billion people in the world.
“If your parents are still alive and still
married, or if they were still married when they died, you are very rare.
“If you can hold your head up and smile, you
are not the norm, you are unique to all those in doubt and despair.”
Attn: Acknowledge Dept.:
Thank You Lord!
This
article first appeared in the May 20, 2005,
In his monumental book, Good to Great--Why Some Companies Make
the Leap ... and Others Don't, author Jim Collins writes about
"confronting the brutal facts." He observes that a "breakout
characteristic" of a "good" company becoming a "great
company" is this watershed capacity to confront the brutal facts that
current conditions are not healthy.
Is it possible a goodly number of American
congregations need to "confront the brutal facts" about evangelism?
Is it true that far too many Lutherans are perfectly content to go to heaven
alone, and that reaching lost people with the good news of Jesus Christ is
simply not a priority?
Frederick Baltz
(from the ELCA) wrote an engaging article in the March 2004 issue of The Lutheran
called “The Evangelism-Resistant Church.” He identifies twelve factors which
"hold back" congregations in evangelism.
1. The Great Omission--The Reformers do not
address evangelism in the confessional documents which formed the church. A society
with hundreds of millions of unbaptized people may
have been incomprehensible.
2. How We Got To Be Us--Baptists and
Methodists moved West (beyond the
3. Lex orandi, lex credendi--This
phrase essentially means that our worship shapes our belief. And when talk of
evangelism is rare in the worship context, worshipers may quietly assume that
it isn't important.
4. Presence of Vagueness--Many people are
unclear about the meaning of evangelism. Evangelism is sharing the gospel of
Christ to bring people to baptism and a life of discipleship. Evangelism is not
a "membership drive" or something to do when it is difficult to pay
our bills. Evangelism is winning souls.
5. Failure to Teach Evangelism - Lutheran
pastors receive little training in evangelism. The
list of our theologians who have written in this field is short.
6. Shortage of Evangelists - Lutheran
offices (national and district) once had evangelists available to
congregations. We have gifted people who are familiar with evangelism programs,
but we need more evangelists.
7. Suspicion - Evangelist (and evangelistic)
concern with numbers can seem unspiritual. But until evangelism is an honored
ministry among us, resistance will continue.
8. Competing Priorities - Evangelism is the
church's primary mission. But that is often NOT where everyone's heart is in
the evangelism-resistant church.
9. Cold Shoulder to Church Growth - The
basic premise is that God wills the growth (spiritual and numerical) of His
church. While those who start new missions benefit from some insights, others
in the church have been neutral to cold.
10. Myth of the Silent Witness - Many
churched Christians believe that they witness silently each day by the way they
live. But unless that witness is specific (and Word-based), many will not have
a clue what they are saying with their lives.
11. Alternative Solutions - Aware of declining
interest, mainline churches have tried appreciating liturgy more, making
language more inclusive, balancing traditional and contemporary worship styles,
being more multicultural, showing more hospitality and offering the secrets of
deeper spirituality ... all so that people will come. They haven't.
12. Spirit Quenching - The Spirit calls the
church to evangelize and moves believers to answer that call. But many churches
are "unexcitable" about evangelism, making choices not to be
enthusiastic about evangelism.
Mike
Ruhl is the Executive Director of the Center for
A junior high music teacher had just organized a band in her
school. The principal was so proud of the music teacher's efforts that without
consulting her he decided that the band should give a concert for the entire
school. The music teacher wasn't so sure her young musicians were ready to give
a concert, so she tried to talk the principal out of holding the concert, to no
avail.
Just before the concert was ready to begin,
as the music teacher stood on the podium, she leaned forward and whispered to
her nervous musicians, "If you're not sure of your part, just pretend to
play."
And with that, she stepped back, lifted her
baton and with a great flourish brought it down. Lo and behold, nothing
happened! The band brought forth a resounding silence.
Sometimes we in the church are like that
junior high band, unsure of our parts, tentative in our roles, reluctant to
trumpet forth the music of faith that God desires of us. And that's because we
have trouble deciding what's most important.
An incident a couple of summers ago in
It had quickly become a life-and-death
situation when Fred Arriola, a tow-truck driver,
arrived on the scene. He grabbed a hammer from his truck and smashed the back
side window of the car to free the baby.
Was he heralded a hero? Not so. According to
an article in the San Antonio Tribune, he is quoted as saying, "The lady
was mad at me because I broke the window. I just thought, 'What's more
important -- a baby or a window?'"
Most of the choices we make in life are not
between what is trivial and what is important. Rather, most of the choices we
make are usually between what is important and what is more important.
An ethics professor at Princeton Seminary asked for volunteers
for an extra assignment. Fifteen students showed up. He divided the group of
fifteen into three groups of five each.
He instructed the first group of five to
proceed immediately across the campus to a certain spot; if they didn’t get
there in fifteen minutes their grade would be affected.
A minute or two later he instructed the
second group to proceed across the campus to the same spot; but they were given
forty-five minutes to get there.
After they left he instructed the last group
to go across the campus to that spot too; but they were given three hours for
the trip.
Now, unknown to any of these students, the
teacher had arranged with three students from the Drama Department to meet them
along the way, acting as people in great need.
The first one they met covered his head with
his hands and moaned out loud as though in great pain; the second, a little bit
further along the way, was on some steps lying face down as if unconscious; the
third, on the very steps of the destination, acted out an epileptic seizure.
You know what the ethics professor
discovered? Not one of the first group stopped, two of
the second group stopped, and all five of the third group stopped.
What the experiment tells us is that when we
are too busy, with tight schedules and impossible deadlines, there is no time
for love.
A number of years ago Henry Drummond wrote a classic sermon titled
"The Greatest Thing in the World." He concluded his sermon by
suggesting that if you put a piece of iron in the presence of an electrified
field, that piece of iron itself will become electrified. And in the presence
of that electrical field, it is changed into a magnet.
As long as it remains in contact with that
field of power, it will continue to attract other pieces to itself.
We are like that piece of iron. In the
presence of Christ, we experience His love and take on His likeness. We are
changed, electrified by the Holy Spirit, to attract others to the same love of
God that we experience.
A teenager came home from choir practice early one evening. His
Dad asked, "What brings you back so soon?"
"We had to call off choir practice this
week," the youngster replied. "The organist and the choir director
got into a terrible argument about how to sing, 'Let there be Peace on Earth,'
so we quit for tonight."
A new command...that you
love one another. Hmmm.
One thing to note - the Lord's command is
not that we LIKE one another. That certainly would be nice, but to like or not
to like is rooted in our emotions, and emotions do not respond to commands.
The love of which Jesus speaks is NOT an
emotion. It is a way of acting toward one another that says, "No matter
what, I want GOOD for you, and I will do whatever I can to insure that you get
it."
Christian love is not something the Lord
wants us to FEEL for one another but rather something He wants us to DO for one
another.
As to how this love should be measured, our
standard comes from the clause, "as I have loved you." That is a
broad and lofty standard indeed!
The love that Jesus had for His disciples
began with a willingness to ignore the limits of society. He did not content
Himself with a little group made up of only His "own kind" - He
reached out to ALL kinds, and especially to those whom the rest of the world
would shun.
The love of Jesus enabled Him to take on
tasks that would have been thought to be beneath Him - servant work like washing
dusty feet, for example. The love of Jesus was able to encompass the hypocrisy
of Peter, the self-serving ambition of James and John, the vicious
self-righteousness of Paul.
It was a love that knew no limit. He loved
them so much that He was willing to die for them.
That became our standard for obedience.
"As I have loved you...so you must love one another."
Now I want to tell you a lie. Hate is an emotion we can't help.
Hate is a feeling we cannot overcome. If we hate someone, it is because we just
can't help ourselves. We're human. We have no choice but to hate.
That is a lie.
Unfortunately, it is a lie many people
believe. They believe this lie in order to excuse their hatred. After all, if
we can't help but hate, if hate is a feeling we simply cannot help, then hatred
is never our fault, is it?
But we can help it. Hatred is a choice. We
choose to hate, just as we choose to love. Oh, I know, there are people out
there who believe love isn't a choice, that love is primarily an emotion, a
feeling, a stirring in the loins. These are the same people who stay married
for six months, then divorce. These are the people who love the idea of love
but seem unable to stay in it. Love is a matter of the will - something we
decide to do.
Love is a choice.
In
The case was brought before a wise judge.
After listening to the long passionate presentation by the lawyer, the Judge
banged his gavel and declare "Case
dismissed!"
The lawyer immediately stood and objected to
the ruling and said; "Your honor, how can you possibly dismiss this case?
The Christians have Christmas, Easter and many other observances. Jews have
Passover, Yom Kippur and Hanukkah, yet my client and all other atheists have no
such holiday!"
The judge leaned forward in his chair and
simply said; "Obviously your client is too confused to know about, or to
celebrate the atheists' holiday!"
The lawyer pompously said; "We're
unaware of any such holiday for atheists. Just when might
that holiday be, your honor?"
The judge said; "Well it comes every
year on exactly the same date---April 1st!" "The fool says in his
heart, 'There is no God."' Psalm 14:1.
WELS President Karl Gurgel
has announced he will decline nomination for re-election at this summer’s synod
convention in New Ulm, Minnesota
After serving 14 years in office, President Gurgel,
65, said he’s not sure he’d have the energy needed for another four-year term.
In a letter mailed to all WELS called workers on May 10, Gurgel
said the office could benefit from someone who has been more recently serving a
congregation—and someone younger with a fresh perspective.
“Despite the challenges of the past months, I’m not discouraged
about the future [of]
Gurgel was elected president at the 1993 synod convention, succeeding
retiring president Carl Mischke. Among the highlights
of the last 14 years, Gurgel pointed to two
milestones in
In retirement, Gurgel said he eagerly
anticipates “whatever new opportunities the Lord may supply for serving him.”
Nominations for Gurgel’s successor
will be submitted by delegates at synod convention, July 30-Aug. 3. The five
candidates receiving the most nominations will form the first ballot.
Watch big decisions as they happen on
Pastor Henkel will be a delegate to synod convention this year.
The WELS Church Extension Fund, Inc. (CEF) is
offering a special 6 percent interest rate on new money invested in an 18-month
certificate. This special offer is available to
Those interesting in investing should read the Offering
Circular, available online at www.wels.net/jump/cef.
For more information, contact WELS Church Extension Fund toll free at
866-511-7793 or cef@sab.wels.net.
WELS CEF provides loans and grants for mission-minded endeavors
and projects under the direction of
Investments are not FDIC or SIPC insured. Not
a bank deposit. No synod guarantee.
On May 27, Sunday School will finish by
leading worship during the 11 o’clock service. Mrs. James and Pastor
Johnston introduced the idea of the program to the teachers in January and we
started practicing with the children by the middle of March. The program
that they put together is very ambitious with 5 songs, a poem, 3 or 4 mimes, a
dance, and a skit. Pastor Johnston will give the Sermon, but the rest of
the service will be done by either the Sunday School
children or the teachers. The service will be televised and broadcast
over the whole
I
teach the 11 and 12 year old students. They are not at an age to enjoy
this sort of program. None of them have rebelled outright, but a number
of them show their discontent by participating with little enthusiasm and a lot
of rolling of the eyes. They have to learn one song and the chorus for
another, but if you can hear them sing when we are practicing, then your ears
are better than mine. I told them to at least mouth the words and look
like they are singing, if they are too embarrassed to actually let a sound
out.
What
is really frustrating, is that a number of them are in
King’s Kids, the school choir, and have even sung solos before. So I know
they can sing really well and are not embarrassed to do so. I think it is
the group mentality – since half the class does not want to do this, the other
half has to copy them so that they can all fit in. As it is, when we
practice together with the other classes, we have the younger students belting
out the songs, looking happy and proud that they know the words, and then we
have five to ten older students slumping around with their mouths either
closed, or worse, talking to their neighbors about unrelated matters.
This is nothing new. During the
lessons, the only time I saw them show any interest in
Sunday School was when Tonya asked me about something in Revelation.
Then, the whole class started talking all at once about symbols, monsters, the
last days and so forth. Since they all talk in dialect when they become
really excited, and Revelation is not the easiest book to grasp anyway, it was
hard to sort out exactly what they wanted to know. As far as I could
tell, they are very fascinated by the visions described in Revelation and have
read the book as it relates to different movies that they have watched.
Many of them integrate what they see in movies with what they read in the Bible
and come up with some very interesting notions. I really didn’t feel up
to the task of studying Revelation with them, so we continue with the ChristLight books. They know many of the answers when
pushed, but it appears as if most of them shut off their brains and just stare
at me blankly from the moment they sit down until the end of class. What
I find amusing, is that outside of the classroom, several of them will greet me
very nicely and look shyly pleased to see me.
The one part of the program that does excite
the girls, at least, is the mime that is our lot. We have about 20
sentences describing “the fall of mankind” to which we have to mime. Mrs.
Brown, the dance instructor, has been teaching us signs for various words
within the passage and so we do what is essentially a line dance while the
words are read by one of the youth group.
While we have been learning and practicing
this for the past 6 weeks, a problem arises because some weeks we have 5
students, other weeks 10. Sometimes, the same students come and so we do
all right. Other weeks, new students come who haven’t learned any of the
mime. While we may start with 2 or 3 students at 9:45, more students will
wander in over the course of the hour, the majority of them arriving about
10:30. However, at least the girls enjoy doing the mime, even if the boys
slouch against the wall and try their hardest to sink into the background.
It is only with great enthusiasm and
cajolery on my part that we make any progress. Telling them that they
only have 2 weeks left and reminding them that the service will be televised
only panics them so their eyes glaze over and they forget the signs. So
we progress by talking about why we are doing this (for God and for the
congregation), by great celebration when someone comes up with a particularly
good move, and by pleading to God for a miracle.
Mrs. Brown asked Mrs. James if we could
schedule an extra practice this week. She agreed, so we will gather on
Saturday at 4pm to polish our mime.
When Mrs. Brown asked the students if any of
them could not make it, several students put up their hands. She asked
one boy what he had scheduled and he said that he had to watch TV at that
time. Another student said he had basketball practice, and the rest
mumbled that they wouldn’t be able to make it. I could tell by the way
they were shifting their eyes that they had no intention of mentioning the
session to their parents and so would not come whether they could or not.
I told them that I would call their parents and tell them about the
practice. You should have seen the open mouths, and the looks of complete
outrage. I just smiled at them a little sardonically and raised my
eyebrow a little. They looked a little sheepish then and I got a few
chuckles out of them.
The teachers had another meeting about the
program last night. We usually have a meeting once a month to which 2-3
of the 12 teachers come. In a way, I can understand why many of the
teachers do not come. All of them have full time jobs and must depend on
rides or the bus to get anywhere. So, if they get home at 5:30 or 6 and
then have to be at church by 7, they have to leave at 6:30 in order to walk or
ride the bus to church. That doesn’t leave much time to eat or relax.
One of the Sunday School
teachers is also a teacher at our school. She used the excuse that she
was tired from taking a night time class on Monday and so could not come to the
meeting. When I told that to Mrs. James, the Sunday School Superintendent,
she blew up. She said, “She is 21, single, with no children. She
doesn’t know the meaning of tired! I work full time as a teacher, have a
husband and 3 children to feed, and I am 7 months pregnant. If I can make
it, walking from my house to church, she surely can.”
We usually start our meetings with a devotion. One of the devotion questions during our
last meeting was, “The Bible makes it clear that faith in Jesus alone is the
only way to stand in God’s presence in heaven. What effect does this have
on the way you will talk to your friends and family?” Immediately, one of
the teachers starts talking about shouting in crowds. She said that we
often feel that loving our family and friends means that we should not tell
them hard truths. She said that she usually holds back when they are in
town or in a crowd, but maybe she should just shout out what she thinks, even
if they are in town or in a crowd. She never participates in the shouting
matches that take place, but now she thinks she will.
Another teacher jumped in to say that he has
reached a point in his life where he tells people the truth, regardless of who
he is talking to, because everyone needs to hear the truth. I wasn’t sure
if they would be telling the truth about Jesus to these people, or just telling
them “the truth” about something else.
Our devotions and meetings almost always go
off on some tangent like this (well, I would say they are tangents, but that
might just be my German heritage talking). I am never sure if our
discussions have a point related to the devotion or not. Every once in a
while, someone does bring the point back to the question asked, if they are not
interrupted by persons wishing to dispute some aspect of their argument or
story. It is usually in a very circuitous manner that gives me no clue as
to where the person is going until the very end. I am totally amazed at how the
heated, 15-minute discussion, or the 10 minute story concludes with a punch
line related to the question.
Sometimes, I try to sum up what someone said
to see if I understand, or I try to give a response based on my understanding
of the argument. Almost always, my comments are met with blank looks and
responses like, “that wasn’t what I was saying at all.”
I leave most devotions totally baffled.
My goal is to be able to sum up what someone said and be right by the end of
our years in
The
Cantabile Singers, a chamber choral ensemble made up of members of
DATE: Tuesday, June
12th
TIME:
11:30 am
WHERE:
610
Minneapolis
MENU: Sloppy Joes
Chips
Carrot Sticks
Fruit
Ice Cream
COST:
Freewill Offering
Entertainment provided by Margie Olson
Come join us for food, friendship and
trivia!
Contact Bonnie at 612-379-4296 for more
information or to sign up.
Everyone from
Christian Life Ministries Fellowship Event
7:00pm, Wednesday, June 13, 2007
St. Paul Saints vs
Lincoln Salt Dogs
Tickets*
$10 reserved grand
$7 reserved bleachers
$4 general admission
*One dollar less for 65+ and 14 & under
Go on line at www.saintsbaseball.com
Order & print your own tickets with
credit card if you prefer reserved grandstand seats
Tailgate Party
West end of parking lot (Look for big red
van)
Begins promptly at 6:00pm!
Bring place setting, a dish to pass &
your own buns & meat for provided grill
Limited # of chairs available
Rain date – Wednesday, July 18
(Phone Saints ASAP after June rainout to
redeem 6/13 tickets)
Questions? Call Pastor Curt Holub at
763-560-5953.
Saturday, June 23, 2007
9:00am – 1:00pm, at
Call Julie Christensen at (612) 558-3687 or
email: singing contest@cantabilesingers.com to schedule an appointment
time.
Judged
on:
• Voice quality
• Stage presence
• Audience appeal
Hey kids—Have you
always wanted to sing in front of an audience or win a singing contest? Now’s
your chance! Prepare a Christian song and perform it for a panel of judges. If
needed, an accompanist will be provided. A winner will be awarded in three age
groups: ages 5-7, 8-11 and 12-14. The winners will also be invited to sing as
guest soloists at an event during the 2007/8 singing season.
The winner in each age category will receive
a $50 gift certificate to Schmitt Music, donated by The Cantabilé
Singers.
Missionary
Terry and Mary Schultz will be here at