Happy Saturday church family!
Welcome to the month of November. Don’t forget that we set our clocks back tonight. Of course, if you forget to set your clock back maybe you will make it in time for breakfast. I suppose that could be a plus for some. 😄
Today is All Saints Day in the church calendar. Historically, this was sort of like a Christian Memorial Day. It is a day where we pause to remember the martyrs whose blood has been spilled because of their faith, their bold declaration of the gospel, and their unwillingness to turn away from Christ no matter the cost. Often their blood has been the channel The Lord has chosen to carry the gospel into new places. Third century theologian and pastor Tertullian wrote that “the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the gospel.” Today we pause to remember that our God reigns. The worst that Satan can throw at Christ and his church will only result in God’s will ultimately being done. We serve a God who turns the cross into an empty tomb, and he turns the death of the martyrs into the salvation of many. For every single one of us who has trusted in Jesus, we can be certain that even the greatest evil we experience will be made into something good for us one day. Satan may go as far as killing us, but he will only send us into glory. Let us lift up our hearts in praise to Christ! None of our sisters and brothers in the Lord who have fallen have been lost, but they were merely translated into his presence and one day we will rise together. Our lives too, are wrapped up in him. This world cannot take Christ away from us nor can it take away our future glory so long as our hearts remain wrapped up in Christ. I would encourage all of us to allow ourselves to be reminded on All Saints Day, that Jesus is the treasure worth selling everything else in our lives in order to possess. May the testimony of the martyrs encourage us to remain steadfast in our gospel proclamation, to root our lives in the gospel, and to let nothing take that away from us.
Revelation 12:11 CSB — “They conquered him
by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; for they did not love their lives to the point of death.”
Tomorrow is the Lord’s Day, which means we have the joy of gathering together as the congregation of the Lord Jesus! It is a privilege to be together as his church, and I hope that you will make it a priority to join us tomorrow for the good of us all and for the glory of Christ.
Since tomorrow is the first Sunday of the month, we will have the Deacons’ Breakfast in the morning at 8:30am. All are welcome to join us for breakfast in the Fellowship Hall. This is a breakfast provided by the deacons for the church. Is one way they display their service to us. I hope that you will join us.
At 9:30am we will have our normal Sunday School/Prayer Group. This will be followed by our weekly Worship Service at 10:45am. Our focus Bible passage for tomorrow is Psalm 119:9-16 as we prayerfully consider God’s call to reform our hearts around his word.
As many of you are aware, yesterday was the 508th anniversary of Martin Luther posting his 95 theses on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. This year I have reflected much on the good impact of the Protestant Reformation on my life, on the church of Jesus, and on our world. I am reminded that God often sends revival from the most obscure and surprising places. No one would have imagined that a great revival would be sparked at the hands of Martin Luther, but God is sovereign and good. He loves to use those whom the world looks at as unworthy, those who are broken, and those who no one else would choose to do the greatest of works that he has in mind. Martin Luther was merely obeying the Lord, and the Lord used his obedience to revive the faith of many. Many souls have been saved and reformed around the gospel thanks to the life and teaching of Martin Luther and those who followed after him. Let me encourage you with this thought… the Lord can use you to spark revival in hearts around you just as he used Luther. I will take it even further than that. The Lord wants to use you to do this in the lives of others. Perhaps the revival we see sparked through our lives won’t be as big as what Luther saw, but even a tiny revival is still a revival. Every soul saved and every darkened soul rekindled with the flame of the Holy Spirit is a big deal to God. When we choose to leverage our lives for the sake of the gospel, we are investing ourselves into something so much greater than anything else we might put our lives into. If we take nothing else from Martin Luther, let us take up his passion to stand on the Word of God no matter the cost. May this be our theme, and may we join with the likes of Luther and the martyrs of the church in taking our bold stand for Christ. We stand in Christ, and on the shoulders of many Christian giants who came before us and fought the good fight of faith with Christ. May you and I be giants that others will stand on in the future, not because we are great but because we have rooted ourselves in our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.
In closing, I would remind us to continue to pray for one another. There are still many in our church who are sick or recovering from surgery. Hal is doing better by God’s grace. We continue to pray for his complete healing and restoration. We pray for Ann McMillan, for Reuben Stampley, for the Burke family as John prepares to bury his grandmother, for George Leys as his son Josh continues to suffer from the effects of cancer, for our many shut-ins who are not able to come to fellowship, and we pray for many others who are on our prayer list too. Make sure you grab a copy tomorrow morning so that you will be able to pray informed prayers for those connected to our church family who need a touch from the Lord.
May the peace of the Lord rest on you today,
Pastor Nick
P. S. I want to think you for your kindness to me and to the other elders of the church. We were very blessed by your show appreciation last Sunday. The Scriptures specifically command us to especially honor those elders who labor and the work of preaching and teaching, and you do that so very well. I know a lot of pastors who struggle with feeling unappreciated, but you have never allowed that to be my story. I love you and I thank you.
Psalm 119:10 CSB — “I have sought you with all my heart; don’t let me wander from your commands.”
