Pastor’s Ponderings

 “Greater Love”

My first glimpse of Arlington Cemetery wasn’t quite as emotional since Betty and I were on a Tourmobile in the open air as we were driven through the national memorial. As the tour guide pointed out graves of famous individuals, I noticed a Bible verse on many of the headstones: “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends”

(John 15:13). While these words of Jesus Christ are so familiar, don’t miss the beginning of the next verse: “Ye are my friends.”

We can speak of love all day long, but until we see that the greatest love of all time was the sacrificial love of Jesus Christ as He hung on the cross, we will never understand true it. True love gives, and the supreme love was God sending His Son into the world to die for the sins of mankind. Thank you, Father, for your love!

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We’ve got some great services coming up in February. On the 9th, all ladies will receive a gift for Heart Sunday. Our monthly Outreach follows on Tuesday the 11th, and the next Sunday Dr. Allen Hatch will be in our evening service singing and preaching. He will also be our special guest for Golden Agers on the 18th. We plan to have a couple of baptism services on the 9th and 23rd in the evening services to follow up on over forty children and teens who were saved at the David Corn rally last month. The month will end on “Leap Day”, the 29th with our monthly Men’s Prayer Breakfast and Bible study.

The next month will begin with a bang as we celebrate Missions Month and have a different missionary every Sunday night of March. Also, on March 1, we will have our annual business meeting at 5:00pm Sunday night.

We will also begin a new Sunday School campaign, “Open Our Eyes”, which begins March 8 and concludes Easter Sunday morning, April 12. We will have a teacher’s meeting the night of February 23 to explain it and motivate our teachers to “bring them in.”

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My wife writes about our upcoming trip to Israel, but I want to express my gratefulness to all who have given and continue to give towards this special gift. I want to return a changed pastor as I walk where Jesus walked.

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The past several weeks have been especially difficult for our church. In just a few weeks we had several church members or family of members go to be with the Lord. I’ve never been in a church that had two funerals on two consecutive days. The sorrow was, at times, overwhelming, but the hope was even stronger. Tears flowed, but we all remembered that “joy comes in the morning” (Psalm 30:5).

As we move through the book of Titus on Sunday morning we are reminded of our great God and Savior who will come for us soon. Paul calls it the “Blessed Hope.” What a great description for that event in which the Lord returns to earth to receive us up to heaven to live with Him forever. I pray that we will all be ready for that glorious day of rapture and reunion!

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I have asked from the beginning for you to pray for me and my family in five areas. Thank you for doing so, and please continue to plead with God that I would have:

1) Courage

2) Wisdom

3) Strength

4) Victory

5) Vision