Announcements
$.02/meal—You
collected $210 to feed hungry kids! Thank you!!!!
Sack
Packs—Next Tuesday, 9-11 @ the Food
Bank. Join us if you can.
Community
Kitchen Spot
There are a lot of hungry and homeless children of God
and the community needs some help feeding them. If you would like to
help out, please bring the following items to church this Sunday &
put them in the grocery cart.
8 oz. Styrofoam bowls
New
Hope News
Sunday
School—This Sunday, the adult class will study 1
Thessalonians.
Session
Meeting—Next
Sunday, April 21 @ 12:15.
Pray
For:
Christine
Dyer
Connie
Robinson
The
Meulenbergs
Links
Keith's
Random Thoughts
There
are some pretty major storms moving through Chattanooga tonight. Of
course, we can't think of thunderstorms without thinking about
tornadoes, and we can't think about tornadoes without thinking back
to the last few years and the massive, devastating storms that have
rolled through this region. No storm is just a storm—they come
bringing baggage, unearthing memories we thought we had buried long
ago.
I
think most of us struggle with the same issue in some way, shape or
form. We have things in our past that we thought we had dealt with,
that we thought we had buried, and yet there are events that trigger
memories, often painful or hurtful memories, and we find ourselves
reliving things that we thought were long past.
In
Christ, we read, the old had gone, the new has begun. In our
baptism, we are joined in his life, his death and his resurrection.
Our history, no matter how shameful or painful it may be, no longer
has the power to shape our future, Christ promises us. Our future is
freed from the shackles we have placed upon it, freed to be lived for
God's glory. Our pain is shattered and replaced by hope if we keep
our eyes fixed upon him.
But
this isn't easy. It's not always easy to look forward in hope. It
can be a struggle to let go of the things in our past. The devil can
convince us, if we let him have our ear and our heart long enough,
that we'll never outrun the things in our past.
Look
forward, Christ says, and look to me. Let the devil's lies fall upon
false ears. Don't let your past hold you captive, for Christ has
freed you from it by his death and resurrection. Your future, for
all eternity, is safe in the arms of God.
So
be a captive to hope, and may the joy, love and peace of Christ carry
you forward. In Christ alone we have our victory!
Text
for this Sunday
Mark
1:40-45
A leper came to him begging him, and kneeling he said to him, ‘If
you choose, you can make me clean.’ Moved with pity, Jesus
stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, ‘I do
choose. Be made clean!’ Immediately the leprosy left him, and he
was made clean.
After sternly warning him he sent him away at once, saying to him,
‘See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the
priest, and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, as a
testimony to them.’ But he went out and began to proclaim it
freely, and to spread the word, so that Jesus could no longer go into
a town openly, but stayed out in the country; and people came to him
from every quarter.
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& Devotionals
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