Announcements
Ash
Wednesday—Next Wednesday, Feb. 13. The service will
be at 7 in the Sanctuary.
Mardi
Gras—The young
adult group will gather next Tuesday, Feb. 12, for a Mardi Gras
pancake breakfast. Let me know if you need details.
New
Hope News
Sunday
School—This Sunday, the adult class will study Acts.
At
Work on Purpose—Starting February 21, there will be
an evening seminar about how best to be Christians at work. If you
want to learn more about the organization behind the curriculum,
click
here.
Pray
For:
All
those dealing with the flu
Those
in the midst of uncertainty
Pray
for those who do not know Christ.
Links
Salute
to Senior Service—Nominate a Volunteer
Keith's
Random Thoughts
There are oceans of ink spilled over the problems of the modern
church in America. If we invested the same amount of energy and
money in mission work that we do in studying ourselves, we'd probably
have fed the world several times over.
I believe, at the end of the day, the heart of the problem with
mainstream Christianity in America is that we're simply not working
to fall more deeply in love with Christ each and every day of our
lives. Satan has worked up a gamut of distractions for each and
every one of us, and somehow we fall into these potholes day after
day, and pretty soon we're so caught up with avoiding or escaping the
potholes that we've lost sight of the overall vision for navigating
the road of Christian life.
I'm just as guilty of this as anyone else. It's always easier to do
something else, to chase some distraction or fulfill some duty, than
it is to work on deepening my relationship with Christ. I fail to
see that all of life is an opportunity to serve Christ while I'm
working, while I'm resting or playing or doing whatever. I lose my
focus, and the more often I lose my focus, the easier it is to stay
unfocused.
Discipleship takes work. Faith is a gift of God, but the extent to
which that faith takes hold in every aspect of life is largely
determined by our willingness to let Jesus be Lord of all of life.
It's easy for us to try and be in charge, and it's really difficult
to let Christ be, especially when he might ask things of us that
we're not willing or ready to give.
So I pray. I pray for myself and for the church, that we might focus
our eyes on Christ, that our lives might be caught up in the story
God is telling through us, that we might spend our hours and our days
and our lives falling more deeply in love with God. I pray that this
love might take hold of our hearts and minds, that we might be
passionately in love with Christ, letting him use us in whatever do
for his glory alone.
Text
for this Sunday
John
13:34-35
I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I
have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone
will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one
another.”
New
Hope on iTunes
Keith's
Blog
& Devotionals
for your Kindle
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