First Blog Isaiah 62:1 - 4

It's 6:30 on a Saturday morning and I'm writing a sermon for Sunday.  My title is "I Will Not Be Silent"  I'm focusing on the passage. "For Zion's sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem's sake I will not rest, until her vindication shines out like the dawn, and her salvation like a burning torch." Is 62: 1.

During the Christmas season, we sing the songs, we celebrate the birth of Christ.  But what happens on December 26th and beyond?

Do we quickly forget the birth of the Christ child and the responsibilities that follow?  Do we get caught up in our own world and forget the Good News of the infant child?

Jesus tells us in Luke 19:40 "'I tell you,'" he replied 'if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out."  This occurred during the triumphant entry into Jerusalem when the disciples were proclaiming: 

 "Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!"

 "Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!" Luke 19:38

The Pharisees demanded that the disciples stop, but Jesus told them that if praise didn't come from them, the praise will come from somewhere else.

There are times in our lives where we are told to stop praising God.  But when we place our trust in Christ and share in the joy of our salvation, how can we keep silent.  How can we keep from sharing the good news.

The Psalmist lived a life with enemies crashing down on the community of Israel.  Still the psalmist wrote to "Make a Joyful noise to the Lord."

May you continue to make a joyful noise to the Lord, and share all that Christ has done for you beyond the Christmas season!

Vote for my Daughter

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Go here to vote for Deb's picture!

Purpose Driven Service

As of right now, I have tons of ideas flowing in my mind about Grace's new worship service. We have tons of wonderful questions that have emerged from our last meeting and I will hopefully have those questions up by the end of this week, or by Tuesday of next week.

As we start this new journey, I have a question about evaluation? How will we know if this service is what God is calling it to be? When I was in seminary, our evangelism class was assigned to read the book by Rick Warren, "Purpose Driven Church". I have picked that book up again and am re-reading it in light of our new church service.

In this book Warren talk about the importance of developing a purpose for the church he writes, "Second Corinthians 13:5 says 'Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves.' How does a church evaluate itself? Not by comparing itself to other churches, but by asking, 'Are we doing what God intends for us to do?' and 'How well are we doing it?"...These are the two most critical questions for evaluating your church. Your church's purpose statement must become the standard by which you measure your congregation (or in our situation service) health and growth."

Warren lays out four critical phases that I would like for us to look at over the next few months.

First, we must define our purpose for the service. If we do this service just because we want to have contemporary worship at Grace, it will not succeed. We must have a defined God given purpose in order to know who are are to reach and how God wants us to reach them.

Second, we must communicate those purposes to everyone in our church -- on a regular basis.

Third, we must organize the service around our purposes.

Fourth, we must apply our purpose to every aspect around the service. How we establish worship order, how we pick our musicians and singers, how we publicize the service, etc.

So that leads me to our first group of questions. What is the purpose of the contemporary worship at Grace UMC? Why are we creating this service? What is this service to be? How will this service advance God's kingdom on earth? How are we to do it?

These questions will be posted in our Google group feel free to comment here or there on them. Thank you for participating in this task force and I look forward to working with all of you as we get this service up and running.

I passed P & Q!!! Whoooo hoooo!!!

I passed P & Q today. I'm so excited!
June 8 I will be voted on by the clergy of the North Texas Conference to become a probationary member of the conference and then June 9 I will be commissioned!
Thanks to everyone for their prayers and support.