ALBUQUERQUE IN AUTUMN

This past weekend (October 9-11), Sandy and I went to New Mexico to visit Mark and Khristi Shores.

We spoke at a Marriage Seminar at their church on Saturday. Here's some of the group:

Sandy and Khristi are doing a little cleaning up.

On Sunday, Mark leads the singing while Khristi plays the keyboard.

The church auditorium and fellowship hall. They have worked hard to make it nice.

From the outside:

The Shores son Josh is in the middle. He is deputy with the county Sheriff's Dept. He is also an eligible bachelor. (Josh, you owe me $10 for putting that in there. ha)

This was also the week of the Balloon Fiesta. It is called the largest ballooning event on earth, the most photographed event on earth, and the largest annual international event held in the United States.

Mark, Sandy, and I got up on Saturday to see the balloons take off. Here's a flying cow:

I counted about 400 balloons in the air at one time.



We had a great weekend with the Shores and the church folks. Pray that they will be able to find a bigger building so they can continue to grow.

Oakland in October

Tim Osborn and the Faith FWB Church in Oakland, Tennessee had an Operation Saturation and participated in a town festival on the same day (October 3). Here's the church's booth.

The Faith Praise Team sings to the early morning crowd

Ken Akers (Masters Men Director) and my wife, Sandy, and I went down for an Operation Saturation. Here is a group from Grace FWB Church in Nashville with Pastor Jamie Lane. We appreciate them driving 3 hours to help.

Tim Osborn was in charge of parking and was riding around in his buggy all day. He does a good job of connecting with people. Between walking around door to door and riding around with him, I got a sunburn.

By the end of the day, Micah Osborn was getting tired. Next to her are Jordan and Emma Osborn.

The church meets in a school. Like a lot of new churches, they have to haul their chairs and equipment and set up and take down each Sunday. Here's Seth Osborn before church.

Free snacks and drinks before church.

The Praise Team leads the morning worship.

Between the two events, a lot of people in Oakland heard about the church.

BATTLE CREEK AND OTHER NEWS

Battle Creek, Michigan (aka Cereal City) is the home of Kellogg and Post. It is also where home missionary Jeff Isaacs is working hard on establishing a new church. The church has just relocated. They bought a former church building that had been unused for 15 years. Jeff and the folks from his church had help from some people from other Free Will Baptist churches in renovating the building. They now have a nice building in a great location.

Ken Akers (Master's Men Director) and I went to Battle Creek on September 25-27 for an Operation Saturation and their first weekend in the new building. A special Dedication Service was held on Friday night with several other pastors attending.

About 80 people were present, including several of the guys who had worked on the church. One man had his thumb 85% severed while working on the church. He had it stitched up and returned to work 2 days later!

On Saturday morning it was raining, but 9 brave souls ventured out to give out literature about the church. We had a great time and some people showed up on Sunday. Here's the 9 and also a picture of Jeff setting out.

Sunday morning was a great service with 138 people present!

Here's pictures of a full parking lot, a full house, and Jeff and Charissa.

Pray for the church as they follow up on the visitors. Pray for Jeff who has back surgery on Thursday, October 1.

Other News:

Dexter Guin and the church in Colorado Springs let us know that they finally got their building permit. Here's how Dexter put it:

Thanks for praying with us! After 3 yrs 9 months we finally pulled our permit today!!!!!!! Thank the Lord!!!!

This from Allen Hall in York, PA:

Hi, Bro. Richard. We baptized 6 all together in the frigid waters of a swimming pool. The first to be baptized was my daughter, Allison. I can't tell you what that did in my heart. Three of those baptized were a dad, mom & son. It was a precious service!

Tim Osborn in Memphis, TN reports that on their 1st anniversary service, the church broke its attendance record with 58!

Howard Gwartney in Arizona had 153 folks present for their 2nd anniversary service!

TRIP TO THE NORTHEAST

My wife, Sandy, and I just got back from visiting 3 church planters in the Northeast. Our daughter, Rachel, went with us and was the official photographer.

The first visit was with Tim and Lori Byers in Conneaut, Ohio. This is right on Lake Erie not too far from the PA line.

On Saturday, the church had a "cookout". Here's a picture of Tim cooking and me trying to look like I'm helping.

People eating in the fellowship hall:

It was Tim's birthday, so he got to wear the birthday hat:

I would have helped clean up, but somebody needed to hold young Joseph Byers.

The beautiful church was built in the late 1800's.

Sunday morning service:

We drove from Ohio to upstate New York to visit Dana and Betty Booth and Jim and Sylvia Martin.

They bought a former Nazarene church building.

Shaking hands on Sunday morning:

Jim Martin is leading the singing:

We stayed with our son, Nathan, and his wife, Rachel (they've been married only 2 months). They work with the youth and children in the church. Here is a picture of them with the Booths and Martins.

Our third visit was with Tom and Pam Jones and Nate and Jenna Altom in Greensburg, Pennsylvania.

We had a short time with them, but a good time with a lot of laughter.

While the Byers and the Booths bought former churches, the Jones bought a former bar and dance hall. Several groups have come up this summer to help them in the renovation. I think it's great that this building will now be used to save souls instead of destroy them.

Still more work to be done.

It's tough everywhere to start churches now and it's really tough in the northeast. I appreciate all these families who are working hard to spread the good news about Christ.

QUOTES THAT I LIKE


Some people collect stamps. Some collect autographs. Others collect antiques. Jay Leno collects cars. I like to collect quotes. (They are a lot cheaper than cars.) A good quote can communicate something important or interesting or funny in just a few words. If you are a preacher or teacher, I hope you use good quotes. They can help get the point across. And they are often memorable.
Here are some quotes that I like. Maybe you can use one or two of them.

Don’t waste time waiting for inspiration. Begin and inspiration will find you.

You can’t build a reputation on what you’re going to do. Henry Ford

I believe in planning ahead, because if you spend enough time planning, you never actually have to do anything. Garfield the cat

CS Lewis on the Christian faith:
If it is false, it is of no importance; if true, it is of infinite importance. The one thing it cannot be is moderately important.

If you are talking to people about Jesus, you are having a 100% success rate in sowing the seed.

"Ninety percent of all those who fail are not actually defeated. They simply quit."
-- Paul J. Meyer

A couple of quotes from Steven Wright:
I almost had a psychic girlfriend but she left me before we met.
I’d kill for a Nobel Peace Prize.
99% of lawyers give the rest a bad name.
All those who believe in psychokinesis, raise my hand.

Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there. Will Rogers

“Smoking is not a sin; but if you like putting dried leaves in your mouth and setting them on fire that’s your business.”


You'll always miss 100% of the shots you don't take. Wayne Gretsky

* If you get to thinkin' you're a person of some influence, try orderin' somebody else's dog around.*

Listen as if someone were about to give you the winning lottery number and you would only hear it once.

People judge you by your actions, not your intentions. You may have a heart of gold, but so does a hard boiled egg.

Never decide to do nothing just because you can only do a little.

God created the world out of nothing, and as long as we are nothing, He can make something out of us. Martin Luther

A little girl had just finished her first week of school. 'I'm just wasting my time,' she said to her mother. 'I can't read, I can't write, and they won't let me talk!'

We don’t need more strength or more ability or greater opportunity. What we need is to use what we have.

I’d be happy to hear from you with some quotes that you like. As I said, I collect quotes.

THERE IS A GOD

This is the title of a recent book by Antony Flew. It is subtitled, “How the world’s most notorious atheist changed his mind.” Even though the father of Mr. Flew was a Methodist minister, he has been an atheist for most of his adult life. He authored several books stating the case for atheism and has debated many theists over the years. In 2004 he announced that he now believed in God. With all of the recent well-publicized books promoting atheism and attacking a belief in God, it is encouraging to read this book.

The main premise of this book is that the author has followed the evidence wherever it led. When Flew announced his change of belief he said,
“What I think the DNA material has done is that it has shown, by the almost unbelievable complexity of the arrangements which are needed to produce life, that intelligence must have been involved in getting these extraordinarily diverse elements to work together. It’s the enormous complexity of the number of elements and the enormous subtlety of the ways they work together. The meeting of these two parts at the right time by chance is simply minute. It … looked to me like the work of intelligence.”

He tells how the British National Council of Arts conducted an experiment by putting 6 monkeys in cage with a computer. “After one month of hammering away at, the monkeys produced 50 typed pages – but not a single word.” So then what’s the chance of the monkeys producing a Shakespearean sonnet of 488 letters? 1 in 10 to the 690th power (1 followed by 690 0s). If instead of monkeys you turned the entire universe into computer chips and had them able to spin out 488 trials a million times a second, the number of trials you would get since the beginning of time would be 10 to the 90th power. “You would never get a sonnet by chance.”
And yet some believe that a human mind got here by chance.

I also liked the chapter, “Did the universe know we were coming?” He imagines entering a hotel room on your vacation and everything is set to your likes – your favorite song is playing; your favorite painting is hanging there; your favorite snacks and beverages are there; all the grooming products that you use are in the bathroom; and even the TV is turned to your favorite channel. With each new discovery you are more inclined to believe that someone knew you were coming.
This illustrates how the laws of physics in our universe and the conditions on Earth are just right for life. If they were changed just a little, then life wouldn’t be possible. Since many atheists understand this, there is now a theory that there are many universes. We just happen to be in the one that is conducive for life. It is interesting that they are more willing to believe in an infinite number of universes than believe in one God.

Antony Flew believes in evolution and hasn’t become a Christian. But I still like seeing my faith confirmed. When I was a pastor, I liked to teach some apologetics. With our faith being assaulted so much by the modern culture; it helps to see that it makes sense to believe in God.

WHAT ARE YOU READING THIS SUMMER?

I love to read. I guess you would call it a hobby of mine. I probably read about 75-100 books each year. (Many of these books I borrow from the library. A good library can be a great resource and great bargain!) I read books about history, science, politics, coins, economics, business, fantasy fiction, and Louis L’Amour westerns. (Unfortunately, Louis is dead and I’ve read all of his books about 3 times) Of course, I read many Christian books and books about church planting.
Here are a couple of books that I’ve just finished reading:

How The Mighty Fall by Jim Collins.
This is a business book written by the author of bestselling Good to Great. I know that we don’t get our principles of ministry from the business world. I think that is a mistake. But I do like to see if there are principles in business that are transferrable to church work. In this book, Collins deals with the question of why big and prosperous companies failed. He lists 5 stages of decline.
1. Hubris Born of Success
This certainly sounds Biblical. Proverbs says that “Pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.”
If you have some success and start thinking, “This community and the Home Missions Dept are lucky to have me,” then maybe danger is lurking.
2. Undisciplined Pursuit of More
3. Denial of Risk and Peril
Under markers for stage 3, he lists Externalizing Blame. “Rather than accept full responsibility for setbacks and failures, leaders point to external factors or other people to affix blame.”
Now that can easily apply to church work. It’s easy to blame the culture, or our location, or those other Christians, or the sorry people in my church. But that way leads to death.
4. Grasping for Salvation
5. Capitulation to Irrelevance or Death

The YBH (Yes, But How) Handbook of Church Planting by Roger McNamara and Ken Davis

This is a pretty thick book (over 650 pages) that deals with just about everything you can think of in starting a church. It is subtitled A Practical Guide to Church Planting. Here are a couple of excerpts:

From the chapter on Dealing with Problems:
“Problems are synonymous with churches and church planting. You cannot have a church without encountering problems because churches are comprised of people and people have problems.
Don’t go around with a ‘persecution complex’ or feeling everyone is against you, but do recognize that trials and problems are a normal part of life and ministry. Even with good people there will be misunderstandings and differences of opinion from time to time.”
Then the chapter talks about the specifics of dealing with problems. I like the parts about teaching people how to forgive and teaching people how to handle gossip. Those two ought to be taught in every church.

From the chapter on Developing Lay Leaders:

Just the Right Person

Great people are ready to help me,
At the right time,
In the right way,
People I don’t even know yet.

I promise I will never give up
Because I don’t have the help,
But I will trust God to provide.

God has the resources to help me
that I have not even considered,
and multiplied thousands of persons
with all sorts of talents, skills, concerns, and contacts.
That God can bring into my life to fulfill His plans.

So I will open my eyes and see the faces
of people around me.
I will open my ears to hear what they are saying.
Today, tomorrow, next week
I’ll meet someone,
someone who is just the person I need.

And that right person will come along
to fulfill just the right place,
at just the right time,
and I will marvel knowing that God
arranged it so beautifully.


What are you reading? I’d be interested in having people who read this blog to post a comment and tell what you have been reading and what it has that is good.