Our Great Saviour

Our Great Saviour

Jesus! What a Friend for sinners! Jesus! Lover of my soul. Friends may fail me, foes assail me; He, my Savior makes me whole.

Jesus! What a strength in weakness! Let me hide myself in Him; tempted, tried, and sometimes failing, He, my strength, my vict'ry wiins.

Jesus! What a help in sorrow! While the billows o'er me roll, even when my heart is breaking, He, my comfort, helps my soul.

Jesus! What a guide and Keeper! While the tempest still is high, storms about me, night o'ver-takes me, He, my Pilot, hears my cry.

Jesus! I do now receive Him; more than all in Him I find; He hath granted me forgiveness; I am His and He is mine.

Chorus: Hallelujah! What a Saviour! Hallelujah! What a Friend! Saving, helping, keeping, loving, He is with me to the end.

It's summer in the neighborhood

It's SUMMER in the neighboord!

Yes, it is now officially summer. Let's take a moment to check out what ministry activities we can do in our neighborhoods this summer.

• Host a backyard picnic/cookout for the entire neighborhood. Mail invitations or deliver them in person. This gives you the chance to meet new neighbors, have a chance to talk with the neighbors that you haven't seen for a while, ect. You could also ask each family to bring a salad or dessert or perhaps an ice cream topping (instead of doing an entire meal you could just opt. for a ice cream party - the ideas are endless).
  
  If you have any talented musicians your family, neighborhood, or church invite them to play a few good old gospel songs. Or perhaps put in a good CD to listen to while you are eating.
  
  Pray that God will give you open doors and that the unsaved will have hearts & minds that are open to the gospel.
  
  


• Host a neighborhood yard carnival. This is something we did years ago when the children in our neighborhood were young. We also were asked to do it in other neighborhoods as well. We would pick a Saturday morning and invite all the children to come to a yard carnival - we would give out balloons - all colors of the wordless book: green, red,black, white, yellow), my dad would do several gospel illusions, we would do a craft (e.g. a little wordless worm magnet). We would also have a puppet show (my sister and I did a puppet show with just the small hand puppets when we were about 8-10yr.). We would sing (and sometimes we would have a tape player sitting outdoors playing children church songs). Of course, we would have all sorts of little games to play in the yard (those can range from three legged races, sack races, and even beanbag toss). For more fun game ideas you can check books out at the library (or if you don't want to do that just search for children games on the Internet) - remember if you plan on having a theme carnival (wordless book, Noah's Ark, etc.) you can try to adapt your games to go along with the theme.
  
  


• If you know of other Christians in your neighborhood you might consider starting a Bible study with them one night a week or perhaps 1-2x's a month.
  
  


• Take a morning or evening stroll through the neighborhood - you never know who God might have you speak with while you are out walking. Usually in the summertime neighbors are out working in their yards or sitting on their porches which gives you a great oppertunity to speak to them about the Lord and perhaps invite them to church.
  
  
  Those are just a few of the many ways you can reach out to those around you during this summer. If you can't witness and talk with your neighbors (which by the way God has given each of us a mission field right were we live) - how can we expect to be great witnesses elsewhere around the world if we cannot reach out to those right where we live?
  
  

Call to the Uncoverted

Here is the link to Baxter's book: Call to the Uncoverted if anyone is interested in reading through it.

http://www.ccel.org/ccel/baxter/unconverted.html

People Need The Lord

Books, books, books. I just came in from being in the warm and sunny outdoors. I enjoyed about 45 minutes of reading while lying on a blanket which was spread next to our fruit trees in the back yard. It was so nice and peaceful - a great place to spend the afternoon reading.

I am in the process of reading a book I checked out from the library: I was Born A Slave - classic slave narratives. It is a 764 page book. So far I have found it quite fascinating to read of the lives of these slaves. The book starts out with a story about a slave named James Albert Ukawsaw Gronnoisaw who was from the Coast of Guinea. I wish I would retype the entire story of his life onto this blog, but I will try to give you a short overview.

James, the youngest of six children and a grandson of the King of Bournou was a mischeivious kind of boy who was always curious and enjoyed asking many questions. One day some merchants came to his village. After talking with them and being invited to journey to another country with them he told his mother goodbye and set sail with the visiting traders. James was about 15years old at the time of his departure. He left his country, his home, his people and his family. Of course, as with the story of slaves goes you are right in assuming the rest of the story.... James was sold several times to various masters in London.

One very nice mistress gave him the book, Holy War by John Bunyan (author of Pilgrim's Progress) to read. James returned the book to her saying that he found the experience in the book similar to his own - it was about a man as bad as himself and didn't like it. His master then gave him Baxter's Call to the Unconverted to read. After reading that book James struggled with things that he had been told and had read- "I thought it was impossible He should recive such a sinner as me". Finally he realized that there was no way to be saved unless he came to Christ. He was gloriously born again and later baptized.

It was such a good story that I wish I could have shared it in its entirety. It was wonderful to read and feel this man's joy in being born again. He struggled saying that he was to bad a sinner to receive salvation. God's desire is that all man might be saved.

I have an uncle that thinks he is too bad for God to save him - why would God care about me. It breaks my heart to think of all the people I have heard say those words. God really loves them and would save them if they would only realize that they must come home by the way of the cross. My heart just about rips when someone says that they don't need God and that they are good and God will allow them to enter into heaven. It isn't true - the Bible says there is none good, no not one. There are others in this world that really don't care one way or the other about their eternity.

Just this week I was out browsing through a bookstore and my heart wept over the people I saw. I wanted to run out of the store, yet I wanted to stay and share the Lord with the people there. There were so many unsaved- so many sad faces, faces that had no idea what they are living for in life. Don't you wish sometimes that your arms were big enough to wrap around tons of people to tell them about the Lord and all He has done for you?!? There are so many hurting people within arms reach. Pray that God will lead you to someone today who is struggling and hurting, and perhaps ready to throw in the towel with their life. Throw out the life line.

People Need The Lord.



Here are the words to the song by Steve Green -
PEOPLE NEED THE LORD


Everyday they pass me by,
I can see it in their eyes.
Empty people filled with care,
Headed who knows where?

On they go through private pain,
Living fear to fear.
Laughter hides their silent cries,
Only Jesus hears.


People need the Lord, people need the Lord.
At the end of broken dreams, He's the open door.

People need the Lord, people need the Lord.
When will we realize, people need the Lord?


We are called to take His light
To a world where wrong seems right.
What could be too great a cost
For sharing Life with one who's lost?


Through His love our hearts can feel
All the grief they bear.
They must hear the Words of Life
Only we can share.

People need the Lord, people need the Lord
At the end of broken dreams, He's the open door.
People need the Lord, people need the Lord.
When will we realize that we must give our lives,
For peo-ple need the Lord.People need the Lord.

Fishing Around the World

"And Jesus said unto them, Come ye after me, and I will make you to become fishers of men."
Mark 1:17

From the brief research I have done recently there are over 20,000 different species of fish in this world and many new ones waiting to be discovered. I am really not a fish person though, I decide that a small aquarium might look nice in our home so I went out and bought a tank, fish food, and couple fish only to wake up the next morning to find dead fish floating on the top of the water in the tank. To tell you the truth the longest living fish I have ever had was a beautiful blue purple colored beta that my cousin gave to me for my birthday one year. That fish survived for one entire year! I was quite amazed! I had a large goldfish live for 3 months, which I thought was quite impressive!

And going fishing, well, that is another story.......
I enjoy fishing, but I never seem to catch any fish so sometimes I think fishing is a waste of time. I don't do it very often and I cannot even remember the last time I tried to catch a fish. It is a lot of fun hooking the worms to the hooks, but the fish always seem to grab my worms and stay off the hook. I think I end up fishing where all the smart fish live!

According the the U.S. and World Population clock (the US Cenus Burea) the number of people alive in the world as of today, June 16, 2008 are as follows:
In the U.S.- 304,354,840
In the World- 6,674,562,991

Now folks, that is a lot of people! As a matter of fact there are at least 3,000 Bibleless nations in the world who number over 380 million people.

8,000 Kumwenu people in Cote D'Ivoire, Africa

402,600 Tibetan Drukpa of Bhutan

300,000 Bella people of Burkina Faso

600 Gbadogo people of Burkina Faso

113,500 Jula (Dioula) people in Burkina Faso, Africa

8,000 Komono People of Burkina Faso

83,000 Malinke people in Burkina Faso

28,000 Tagba Senufo People of Burkina Faso

810,000 Amdo people of China

There are many, many more countries that I will not take the time to list you can read more about those Bibleless countries at: http://www.baptisttranslators.com/ and click on "The Need".

Jesus has called us to be fishers of men. To prepare ourselves for the our fishing experience we must be well supplied with bait and tackle (the Bible, tracts, your own personal testimony). As a Christian we can go out fishing in many different lakes, oceans, and even little creeks that are filled with fish swimming in one direction (the school of fish represents the people in the world and the lakes, oceans, and creeks are being used to represent the many countries of the world). These small little fish joined by the larger school of fish and were swept up in the direction of the current (things of this world). It is hard to swim against the current. Many times those fish are eager for bait and will nibble at the end of your line, but you aren't able to reel them in because they will not latch onto the hook. They will listen politely to what you have to say yet they don't feel strong enough to begin swimming against the current while their fellow fish continue in the other direction.

Sometimes the fish will completely ignore you! It makes you feel that it was a huge waste of your time to sit along side the water waiting for a fish to latch on. Don't give up -keep fishing! There are many people in this world and God is working on hearts and changing lives. And I'm sure everyone would agree that the best part of fishing is when you catch something!!! There will be fish that God will send along for you to reel in. Pray and ask the Lord to show where He wants you to fish - there are so many good fishing holes all over this world.

(I found this clipart art and thought it went so well with this post!)

Missions Games and Activities - Royal Ambassadors

Missions Games and Activities - Royal Ambassadors

Preparing to serve as a missionary...

Preparing to serve as a missionary...

Being a great missionary or man/woman of God is not something that happens overnight. Yes, it would be nice if life was easy and all directions straightforward, but it's not. We must seek the Lord daily and learn from our mistakes.
Do you feel God calling you to serve Him as a missionary?
Here are steps that you might want to consider while you prayerful consider and wait on the Lord to show you exactly His plan for your life.

• Read, read, read......read missionary biographies, read sermons written/preached by Spurgeon, D.L.Moody, and other great preachers. Study your Bible.
  Read about the different countries - find out about their religions, the culture, the languages spoken in that country, their history, their government, etc.
  


• Find a missionary to correspond with and write to them.
  


• If possible take a short - term mission trip to the country you believe God is leading you to serve.
  


• Witness and pass out tracts to those you come in contact with here in the USA and abroad.
  If you can't witness in your own land, city, and street then there is no way that you can go out into the world to share Christ with others. It isn't something that just happens when you reach your "mission country"- to be an effective missionary you must reach out to others.
  


• Pray, pray, pray.
  


• Serve (I'll post soon with more details on finding ways to serve)
  
  
  

Recommended website...

Check out: www.SermonAudio.com
Browse around the site and listen to great sermons & speakers.

Listen to Paul Washer http://www.sermonaudio.com/search.asp?keyword=paul%20washer