Summer Youth Group!!!

Summer youth group starts THIS Wednesday!

We will meet EVERY Wednesday this summer from 6:30pm-8:00pm.

We will have lots of great activities and hopefully will spend a LOT of time outside!

Join us this Wednesday as we kick-off the summer.

See you then...

-PT

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

I hope the title of this post caught your eye.  No, it’s not November.  In fact it’s half a year until our next Thanksgiving holiday.  But today I declare – “Happy Thanksgiving!”

In November we take time to remember what we are thankful for.  Many times when doing so we even talk about how we should be thankful all year long – not just during the thanksgiving holiday. 

Today, as I read through our daily Bible reading, God’s word reminded me of this truth. 

Colossians 2:6-7:

⁶ Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, ⁷ rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.

So often I take for granted what I received in Christ Jesus the Lord.  I take for granted my life in Him, my faith in Him and all the things I should be thankful for because of Him.  Paul encourages us to “abound in thanksgiving.”

Have you abounded in thanksgiving lately?  Or has it been six months since you did so?

What are you thankful for today?

-Pastor Tom

No youth group this week

Just a reminder to you all that we will NOT be having youth group this week.  Take some time to catch up on school work or study for the last exams and papers due.

SUMMER youth group will begin June 3.

Have a great week!

-PT

Ashamed?

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes.”  (Romans 1:16)

All of us have been ashamed of something in our lives at one point or another.  Sometimes we are ashamed of our actions.  Sometimes we are ashamed of our words.  Sometimes we are ashamed of our past.

But what about the gospel?  Have you ever been ashamed of the gospel?  Think about it.  In all your interactions and experiences, have you felt ashamed of the gospel?

We know from God’s word that Paul was not!  Throughout the New Testament Paul declares with boldness his identity in the gospel of Jesus Christ.  And never more boldly than in Romans 1:16.  He explains that, because of God’s power and salvation, none of us need to be ashamed. 

None of us that believe. 

If you believe, don’t be ashamed.  For it is the power of God!

-Pastor Tom

Girls Night Out

All girls in 4th-12th grade are invited to join us for GIRLS NIGHT OUT this Friday, May 15th - starting at 6:00pm.

We will have a bonfire, smores, games and so much more!

Hope you can make it!

-PT

This is...JEOPARDY!

This Wednesday we will have a great opportunity to review our Bible study for the year.  As most of you know - we have been studying FAITH in light of Hebrews 11.  We have looked at the definition of faith, we have looked at faith through creation and we have studied the Hall of Fame of Faith from the Bible - looking at many examples of faith from the Old Testament.  This has led us to ask ourselves two important questions:

1)What do I believe in?
2)Why do I believe it?

To review this week we will be playing an awesome game of JEOPARDY!

Hope you can join us!

-PT

Youth Group Wednesday

C'mon out and join us for youth group on Wednesday night.  We will start with FREE dinner at 5:45, worship at 6:30 and Bible study after.

Also, we will have a slideshow of pictures from our 2015 retreat.

Hope you can join us!

-PT

The Greatest of These

Almost everyone has read the Bible’s chapter of love – 1 Corinthians 13.  Undoubtedly we all have been to a wedding where we heard “love is patient and kind.”  My favorite part of this chapter is the ending.  Verse 13:

“So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”

The greatest of these is love.  The greatest of all things that we can hold on to is love.

This got me thinking tonight.  What does love look like in my life?  How am I living out love in the way described in 1 Corinthians 13?  Is it the greatest thing in my life?

Take a moment today to read the love chapter and think through how “the greatest of these” looks in your life.

1 Corinthians 13

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. ² And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. ³ If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

⁴ Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant ⁵ or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; ⁶ it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

⁸ Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. ⁹ For we know in part and we prophesy in part, ¹⁰ but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.¹¹ When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. ¹² For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

¹³ So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

-Pastor Tom