We are heading into the final stretch of 2024! Let’s gather together Sunday to remember what amazing things God has done for the last three months, share our stories, humble our selves to remember our Lord’s sacrifice at the Lord’s Supper, and rejoice as we encourage each other to FINISH the year strong for Jesus! Don’t miss this special time of worship!
Over 75% of Americans battle loneliness. It doesn’t have to be you! Come find out why “You Belong Here” #BacktoChurch
We’re having a special service specifically designed to welcome people back to church, so now is a good time to start praying about who you will invite.
This year’s Back to Church Sunday theme is “You Belong Here,” based on Romans 15:7. The fact is that 75% of Americans admit to feeling deep loneliness. In addition, the number of Americans with no close friends has tripled since 1985. That’s why we are here – for people to get plugged in, form friendships, and have the chance to serve together in the community.
So join us Sunday September 15th for #BacktoChurch Sunday at 9:30 or 11:00 am. We’re talking about how “You Belong Here”!
This is the perfect opportunity to invite your friends, family, neighbors and coworkers to join you and grow deeper in their faith, or perhaps encounter God for the first time.
You will be taken back to the clear instructions God gives on how to grow up and please Him. This seminar will teach you how important it is to mature in your faith, God’s way, and how to measure your progress.
We will meet on the back porch and start at 11 am. If you have a Next Step notebook from a Meet & Greet, Membership Info Dinner, or a Next Step Class please bring them with you. The pages that I will give you are a manual of great detail to help you in your life long journey with God. I will not cover all of this while we have our six hours together, but I will lay down a clear and concise Bible Study sharing the foundational steps to grow up God’s way.
There are audio recordings and more details on my website Seven Steps to Maturity, thousands have found it useful. The site is at https://7steps.klptv.com/front-page/ and may help you understand what God expects of you to grow spiritually if you want the extra help. This seminar will encourage you to take your growth and walk with God more seriously than your career, hobbies, and personal enjoyments of this life.
SEPTEMBER
08 (Week 1) Introduction – The Four Phases of Spiritual Life/ The Seven Steps / Step 1 Examined
You will learn how to measure your spiritual growth, why you must be determined to advance spiritually, and how to focus on your first step of obedience. When you are convicted of your sin, admit and repent you are born again. Your sins are forgiven but just a spiritual infant! You must be changed.You must fight with every ounce of new faith you have, cling to every promise you find in God’s Word, and rush to other believers to help you.
22 (Week 2) Step 2 – With All Your Diligence Use Your New Virtue to Add Knowledge
Because we talk about knowledge and read the Bible and other books does not mean we KNOW God! You read and get some knowledge, but if you concentrate on building godly character you will begin to experience GOD! We will help you understand how.
29 (Week 3) Step 3 – Exercise Your Knowledge of God to Develop Self-Control.
When you begin Step 3 you enter strength training. Your goal is to combine your faith, your character, and your knowledge of God to become strong in the Lord. Your spiritual life will begin to reflect restraint and self-control. The desire to please God starts to merge with the strength and power to resist the devil.
OCTOBER
13 (Week 4) Step 4 – With Every Bit of Self-Control You MUST Push Forward and Stand Up and Conquer
Use your new self-defense mechanism, the power of self-control, to turn the tide and become a conqueror! Our savior expects us to go and march forward in the spiritual fight for this generation.
20 (Week 5) Step 5 – Use Your Steadfast Strength, Develop Godliness, & Become the Servant of God
Train yourself for godliness. You must learn to have complete dependance upon Him for your life. To be godly is to be like Jesus who loved and served the Father by serving others as your normal and everyday way of life.
27 (Week 6) Steps 6 & 7 As you invest in others by serving them, you will begin to love them
In Step 6 we learn to love our fellow Christians. This is where your spiritual strength and steadfastness are needed and revealed to accomplish whatever assignment your Lord calls you to tackle. The whole concept of this step is clear. It takes a godlike person, relying on the fruit of the Spirit, to love people like God does. Brotherly kindness does not come easily, it takes a lot of forgiveness and patience.
Every step of spiritual maturity leads us to the final step, developing the passion of loving even your enemies with no need of anything in return. Even though we need godliness to love our fellow Christians in the biblical way, we really need godliness plus strong friendship to actually love the world that hates us.
MISSIONS SEPTEMBER 2024 – NORTH AMERICA MISSIONS
A Mission Field in Need of Hope
The North American Mission Board serves a diverse and complex region comprised of: United States, Canada and U.S. territories of Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa
Your prayers and gifts to the Annie Armstrong Easter Offering® provide support for thousands of missionaries. These men and women are planting new churches in unreached communities and meeting needs through compassion ministries. Every day, lives are being impacted and transformed.
371 Million population 281 Million estimated lost
350 Languages 3000+ Missionaries
Because of this, Southern Baptist churches have planted more than 11,000 churches in North America since 2010
100% of your gifts go to the mission field
85% Church Planting
10% Evangelism & Compassion Ministry
03% Sending & Leadership
02% Missions Education
Church Planting – financial funding and benefits for planting missionaries, training, recruitment, ministry assistance for equipment and outreach missionary housing, missionary care.
Evangelism and Compassion Ministries – evangelism resource materials and events, financial funding and benefits for missionaries involved in compassion ministry.
Sending and Leadership – mobilization events, leadership resources and events, funding for short-term student missionaries.
Missions Education – resources and training focused on mission field education for recruitment and mobilization of church planting missionaries.
Gifts are accepted all year. 100% of your Annie Armstrong Easter Offering gifts support thousands of missionaries in church planting and compassion ministry.
Here what is going to happen this weekend. First, Pastor Carl is back and will be teaching us about prayer and God’s amazing responses to His people when we seriously call upon Him. In Acts 12:5-19 we will see how the Lord miraculously responded to the church. Most in our day doubt God will answer, but some of them did also. He answered anyway!
Make sure you make it early too. If you attend the first worship at 9:30 come by 9:15, grab a cup of coffee and a doughnut and get to know your brothers and sisters in Christ. The same goes for the 11 am worship. Come by 10:45 and befriend others.
The song list is: 1/ Plead the Blood 2/ Strength Will Rise 3/ Same God To practice them with lyrics type WORSHIP and text to 844-870-8490.
FRIENDSHIP SUNDAY AN ACTS 2:42 EVENT – Worship and Breaking Bread Together
FRIENDSHIP SUNDAY IS AN ACTS 2:42 EVENT of God’s Word, Worship, Fellowship and Breaking Bread Together!
As Acts 2 states: “And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers… 44 And all who believed were together … 46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God and having favor with all the people.”
09:30 am First Worship/Superhero Kids (9:30-10:45)
10:45 am Games/Fellowship/Food Preparation (outside in the back during second worship gathering)
11:00 am Second Worship Gathering (11:00 am – 11:35 am) Volunteers are welcome to help in this service!
11:40 am All Church Picnic (bring outdoor chairs, and a dish to pass if you want, not required)
42 And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers... 44 And all who believed were together … 46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.
WE ARE BUILDING FELLOWSHIP! = Fellowship is based on the “one another commands” of the New Testament. “Love one another;” “exhort one another;” “comfort one another;” “bearing with one another;” “forgiving one another;” edify one another;” “speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs;” “we are members of one another;” minister your grace gift “to one another;”, and “pray for one another” are examples of at least twenty-three one another commands. *See below for details.
* Fellowship together is defined as koinoônia from the Greek language of the New Testament. It means partnership, close social union, deep communication, and common distribution. Like a piece of plywood, God wants our local church families to be glued together in such a union that the pulling apart of any one Christian will hurt and scar the group. The Holy Spirit formed “original church” exemplifies this for us. This is clearly presented in the language of our text, “All who believed were together;” “all things in common;” “continued daily with one accord;” and “breaking bread from house to house.”
According to Acts 2:42-47 we are partnered together in four ways: membership, mission, ministry, and maturity. Therefore we must understand what fellowship embraces. Fellowship is based on the “one another commands” of the New Testament. “Love one another;” “exhort one another;” “comfort one another;” “bearing with one another;” “forgiving one another;” edify one another;” “speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs;” “we are members of one another;” minister your grace gift “to one another;”, and “pray for one another” are examples of at least twenty-three one another commands. Therefore, as the local church gathers for worship it must follow the teaching and example of how the Bible guides the church to fellowship. We must interweave into our gatherings the opportunity for believers to obey these commands.
The obvious teaching is that when they met on Sunday they came to fellowship with God and their Christian family. The reason we gather, Paul instructs, is for “edification and exhortation and comfort to men.” We can have fun alone with God and worship God in our “closets.” Yes we can have incredible prayer in our “closets.” But, when we gather a partnership unfolds. A common distribution of love and ministry must begin. Everything must happen so that “loving one another” is clearly practiced.
There’s a missing key in Christianity today. It’s a critical one, and its absence has led to weak believers, ineffective churches, and a decaying culture. That missing key is discipleship. Kingdom Disciples calls believers and churches back to our primary responsibility: to be and make disciples. Only when we take this assignment seriously will the world see heaven at work on earth.
Will You Answer the Call of Discipleship?
Discipleship begins when someone’s commitment to God begins to spill into all areas of their lives.
Welcome to your journey to becoming a full-fledged disciple of our King. Kingdom disciples are in short supply these days. The result has been a bevy of powerless Christians who attend powerless churches that embody a powerless presence in the world.
Until we return to lives of discipleship, we’ll continue to fail in our calling to live as heaven’s representatives on earth. This is because the power, authority, abundance, victory, and impact promised in God’s Word to His people is ours only when we align ourselves under Him as His disciples. Until then we can anticipate that chaos and crisis will continue to reign supreme in spite of all the Christian activities we engage in, Christian books we read, Christian songs we sing, and small groups we join.
Discipleship is a very personal decision. It starts when a person commits himself or herself to God as His follower and allows the results of that commitment to overflow into everything else in life.
Surrender to Christ’s lordship and obedience to His rule of love unlock God’s power to bring heaven to bear on earth. A kingdom disciple lives out this divine power and influence. I define kingdom disciple this way: A believer in Christ who takes part in the spiritual-developmental process of progressively learning to live all of life under the lordship of Jesus.
The goal of kingdom disciples is to live transformed lives that transfer the values of the kingdom of God to earth so that they replicate themselves in the lives of others. The result of such replication is God’s exercising His rule and His authority from heaven to history through His kingdom disciples.
“And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,” Matthew 28:18-19.
The word translated as authority in the English version of this verse essentially means “power, right, liberty, jurisdiction, and strength.” Strong’s Concordance reveals that this term denotes “power of choice” or “doing as one pleases,” even “the power of judicial decisions.”1 When Jesus said all authority was His in heaven and on earth, He was saying that He possesses the legal right to use that power.
Power without authority matters little. Take, for example, NFL players. They’re far more powerful than the older referees officiating the game. Yet they exercise that power only under the authority of the referees. If they choose to misuse their power, a referee simply throws out a flag. If the player persists in wrongly using his power, the referee can then eject him from the game altogether.
When Jesus said all authority had been given to Him, that authority encompassed not only power but also the right to use that power as He chose.
“Then the Lord said to Satan, “Behold, all that he has is in your power, only do not put forth your hand on him.” So Satan departed from the presence of the Lord,” Job 1:12.
Power is someone’s ability to influence another person through strength, personality, control, or deception. Authority, on the other hand, is someone’s legitimate, vested, and formal right to wield power. Enormous difference exists between the two realities, but when we fail to discern this difference, we can foolishly choose to fight power with power (rather than authority) or seek to live by our own power (rather than the authority given to us in Christ).
When Jesus was tested in the wilderness (see Matt. 4:1-11), Satan’s power was outmatched by Jesus’ authority. After being offered temptations of power and fulfillment in this world, Jesus appealed to the full, final authority He possessed as the Son of God.
In other words, Satan has been given power only on earth. Unfortunately, far too many believers seek to overcome his tactics or fight his attacks in their own power. But that will never work. That’s why we’ve been instructed never to rebuke Satan on our own and with our own skills (see Eph. 6:12-18) but rather to resist him (see Jas. 4:7) and to rebuke him only in the authority of Jesus’ name (see Zech. 3:2; Jude 9).
When you understand the importance of authority, you’ll grow as a kingdom disciple to the point that you can not only resist the devil but also call on heaven, as Jesus did, to bear in your earthly endeavors.
If you’ve never differentiated between power and authority, let that sink in. Jesus offers you complete authority in Him when you live as His disciple. Many powers are coming against you that are stronger than you could ever be on your own, but He has overcome the world (see John 16:33). Consider the comfort and peace that come from knowing you have access to the authority of the Creator of the universe. Let that reality motivate you to grow as a disciple of the King.
Excerpted from Kingdom Disciples: Heaven’s Representatives on Earth. Published by Lifeway Press®. © 2018 Tony Evans. Used by permission.
1. Strong’s G1849, Blue Letter Bible, accessed December 12, 2017, https://www.blueletterbible.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?Strongs=G1849&t=NASB.