God blessed us with a wonderful new family today. Warren and Judy Frick became members of Vision. They are very godly people with many years in the ministry. Brother Warren has pastored for 22 years. I am sure that they are going to be greatly used in our church.
Today we begin reading the Bible through as a family and a church. This month we will just read Acts. There are 28 days in the month of February and 28 chapters in the book of Acts. Will you go with us on this journey through the book of Acts.
We have a place on Facebook that we have set up to all share together. If you do not use facebook you can post your comments on my personal blog as I will also post my comments there. Just click on the corresponding link and get to work. I really think you are going to enjoy this.
By the way over the next few days you will see different videos that Andrew Pearson has made. These are tremendous and a great blessing to the ministry. I hope to encourage him and you both to continue and to find what you can do that will make a difference.
I am excited about the month of February. I hope you will get involved with me in several things.
First, I hope you will read through the book of Acts with us. There are 28 days in February and 28 chapters in the book of Acts. I want to ask you as a family to sit down together and read the book of Acts with us. I will continue my normal Bible reading plan but be reading the book of Acts with Betty and then having prayer together. Would you make that commitment with me?
Second, I am excited because we are getting very close to our 4th year anniversary as a church. There are many things we need to do to get ready. This is a very special blessing. Will you be praying for me and the leadership of our church as we prepare for this special day. Will you be inviting people to celebrate with us. We want to have a special meal together that day, outside, Lord willing, under some tents. There will be several special activities also. Our Celebration Sunday (the day we celebrate our anniversary) will be March 21, 2010.
Third, on February 14th we will have a special service to encourage another pastor! I have invited Pastor Brian Rhodes and Lakeland Baptist Church to be with us. Pastor Rhodes and I will both preach that evening and then Vision will pray for Lakeland. I want other churches to know that we love them and are praying for them. We are not in competition with other good Bible preaching churches!
Lastly, we will be ordaining Mark Tolson to the gospel ministry on February 18th. This will be a very special evening. We have 3 outside preachers that will be coming to take part in the service. It will be a 2 hour service. I hope you will get it on your schedule and be with us.
Then tonight we will have a special annual business meeting. You see our financial report, meet all the leadership, and hear about our plans for 2010. I look forward to rejoicing with you.
Jonathan and Heather Marks joined Vision Baptist Church tonight. We are so glad to have them as our newest members. They have come to study and prepare in the Our Generation Training Center. They feel that God has called them to go to Japan.
They have two beautiful children, Nathan and Anna. I hope you will get to know them and make them feel welcome.
Bible reading is one of the most exciting and important things that I do everyday. I usually read through my Bible between 1 and 3 times each year. I do not do so out of guilt. I do not read it because I have to. I read it because I want to.
God doesn’t love me more if I read the Bible but I do end up loving and understanding Him more.
I want to invite you to come with me in the month of February and read the book of Acts. February has 28 days. Acts has 28 chapters.
If you are already a strong Bible reader you might not want to join us. I am not trying to get you off of your plan but I think that it would really be great if we could all read the same thing for a month.
I am going to ask each Sunday School teacher to mention the Bible readings in Acts each week. I will give you a minute or two from Acts each service to keep you on the way.
I will post something on the blog each day from the chapter of the day.
I believe that we will all find this very enjoyable. Let me know if you think you would like to participate.
This Sunday Evening we will bring have our annual business meeting. You will get the financial report for the last 3 years and the proposed budget for 2010.
You will hear of the plans for this coming year. You will meet our deacons in training, the world evangelism committee, Sunday School and Children’s workers.
It will be short and sweet but help to bring you totally up to date.
The meeting will happen right after the evening service and a short break so people can leave that wish to.
Thank you to everyone that has done so much over the last couple of months to make our move possible. I have watched wonderful people put in unbelievably long hours. Moving and cleaning everything in the last building was a real chore. It was hard to dedicate the necessary time to getting out because everyone was more interested in getting into our new place.
I want to thank each of you personally. I do not know of a church that would have had so many doing so much for so long. You have been amazing. I want to thank you but really don’t have any way to do so except for something little like this letter.
I want to thank all of you that have worked so hard to get us into the new building. Thank you for cleaning, moving, painting, building, and a thousand other things that I can not think of.
I want to especially thank Micah Rastelli. Though many have worked hard I believe he wins the record for the most. Thank you for working so hard.
Tonight we will take a few minutes and thank all of you. We will pray a prayer of gratitude and blessing for each of you. I hope you will be in the service tonight on time.
Little by little and week by week you will see the building coming together. We will have the auditorium wall up in a few weeks. The heat and air problems will slowly be fixed.
I want to thank you that are giving extra offerings above your regular giving to help. That is so necessary right now. Every extra dollar you give makes a big difference. We even got an offering from a missionary this month to help with the construction.
Thanks for all you do. Please pray for me that God’s hand will rest on me and that He will use me to accomplish His purposes in our church.
