Plan to attend our Good Friday Service at 7:00 PM on March 29.

I love Sundays; seeing one another, greeting one another, encouraging one another, worshipping our Lord together through song and the preached word...already can't wait for next Sunday! But it's certainly easy to forget the gospel throughout the week isn't it? It only takes a brief amount of time before our memory of what we were so encouraged and challenged by begins to drift. One of the purposes of this blog, beyond announcements and such, is the desire to spur the church on in Godward thoughts throughout the week. Lord willing, as this blog continues to become used by our body it will serve to be an encouragement and reminder of our hope in Christ throughout the days of our week.

Below you'll find a post from my wife, Joy. I've asked her to share regularly on the blog specifically for the ladies of our church family. It's my desire that you get to know both Joy and I very well through the years the Lord has us together, and this blog can serve as a kind of "window" into Joy's heart. I love this woman and am jealous for you to get to know her better. So read on. Through this post as well as others to come may you be encouraged, challenged, and reminded of the hope we have in Christ Jesus.

Grace and Peace to you,

Pastor Steve 

 

Last month as I was reading through Luke, chapter 11:1-13 my heart was stirred up to pray in a particular way. Over the last year I have been praying the Lord's prayer more often as it addresses so many areas of life. It reminds me to pray for God's glory and purposes, for provision of needs, forgiveness of sins, power to forgive others, and protection from temptation. However, my recent reading of this chapter had a different focus. After the Lord's prayer Jesus goes on to give examples of asking for something from a friend and from a father. Mingled in these examples is the exhortation to "ask, and it will be given to you, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened to you." As I read those verses my mind automatically went to the material things in life that we need or even spiritual and emotional needs and yet, Jesus concludes this portion with a little twist. "If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him."

What need is greater in my life than the presence of the Holy God himself? To have Him is to have all. When the Spirit fills me I change, bear fruit, have a more godly perspective on life, have faith in God's work and ability to work along with a conviction of sin where needed, and power to repent and believe the gospel.

I realized that Jesus' promise to pour out the Holy Spirit on those who ask should affect me greatly. I want to take this to heart, to ask the Father to give me the Holy Spirit as often as it pops into my mind. I pray for him to remind me often because I am prone to forget. He has been faithful to do just that.

This morning, as my eyes opened, before I even got out of bed, I was met with negative, anxious thoughts entering my mind. In the midst of those thoughts came a whisper, "ask for the Spirit." By God's grace alone I did ask and I did receive. It was not something mystical or dramatic but rather I was flooded with the assurance of who is in charge of this world and our lives and I became aware of the grace to trust Him in that moment.

This goes along so well with the sermon from Sunday on Colossians 1:9-11. Being filled with the knowledge of God's will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding is a work of the Spirit in his people and he empowers us to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. According to Paul's example we can pray this for each other.

May we grow in knowing that our greatest need, as children of God, is for the Spirit to work in us to bear fruit and increase in the knowledge of God whether you're a single woman, a wife, a mom of young ones, or an "empty nester."And...let's grow in praying this for each other as well.

~ Joy