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June Pastor Points

Dear Church Family,

This month I just want to share with you how much I love you all!  In May, I celebrated my ninth anniversary as your pastor and I can honestly say these have been the most fruitful years of my ministry.  Of course, God is the one who has brought the increase to His church, but you all have had a lot to do with it as well. 

Some of you have been here the whole nine years and to you I say thank you for being willing to follow, love, give, and serve!  From my first Sunday I shared the convictions of ministry that God had placed upon me and you all have been faithful to follow and support each step of the way.  We have seen changes to ministry structure, new leaders, built buildings, raised money together, and have seen lives radically changed by the Gospel of Jesus Christ!  I cannot express to you how thankful I am for your willingness to follow and support.

We have also walked together in the highs of life as we have dedicated our parents and children, attended weddings, graduation parties, and enjoyed church wide fellowships together.  We have also walked through dark valleys together as well.  We have mourned at funerals and prayed together in the middle of crisis in hospital emergency rooms.  In the middle of all of that we have experienced God’s faithfulness to us.  It is in all of these times that my love has grown more and more for this local church.  I just simply want to say that I love you and desire to be the kind of pastor that you all deserve.

My greatest prayer for us is that we fall more passionately in love with Jesus!  I pray that we will continue to worship, grow, serve, and give together for the glory of our great God!  Let’s make every effort to continue to reach out to each other in love and encouragement as we continue to serve our Savior in our church family.

I pray that in the busyness of summer that you will stay plugged in to the many activities that are happening this summer.  The activities that are scheduled this summer are opportunities that you have to reach out to your family, friends, and neighbors and invite them to be a part of what is happening here at Oakhill!!

 I love you and I love being your pastor,

 Pastor Alan

May Pastor Points

Church Family,

We are getting ready to transition into our busy summer church schedule.  We have so much right around the corner and I want to encourage you to make sure that you stay connected to all of the happenings that are coming.

I do pray that God gives you the opportunity this summer to get away and vacation so you can relax and recharge.  I also pray that you stay connected and active in the life of your church family as well.  Make sure to continue to Worship, Grow, Serve, and Give throughout the summer!!  As you transition into the summer time schedule make sure to leave margin in your life as well.  Rick Warren shares the following helpful article about margin.

A lot of people are on overload and headed for a crash.  Consider these statistics among U.S. citizens:   People now sleep 2 1/2 fewer hours each night compared to people from one hundred years ago.  

• The average office worker has 36 hours of work piled up on his or her desk.  It takes three hours a week just to sort through it and find what we need.
• We spend eight months of our lives opening junk mail, two years of our lives
  playing phone tag with people who are too busy to answer, and five years waiting for people who are trying to do too much and are late for meetings.
• We’re a piled-on, stretched-to-the limit society.  Chronically rushed, chronically late, and chronically exhausted. Many of us feel like Job did when he said, “I have no peace! I have no quiet! I have no rest! And trouble keeps coming.” (Job 3:26 GWT).  Overload comes when we have too much activity in our lives, too much change, too many choices, too much work, too much debt, and too much media exposure.

Dr. Richard Swenson says, “The conditions of modern day living devour margin. If you’re homeless we direct you to a shelter. If you’re penniless we offer you food stamps. If you’re breathless we connect you to oxygen. But if you’re marginless we give you one more thing to do. Marginless is being thirty minutes late to the doctor’s office because you were twenty minutes late getting out of the hairdresser because you were ten minutes late dropping the children off at school because the car ran out of gas two blocks from a gas station and you forgot your purse. That’s marginless.” You need margin in your life.  When you’re not hurrying and worrying all the time, you have time to think.  Time to relax.  Time to enjoy life.  Time to be still and know that God is God (Psalm 46:10).

I love you and I love being your pastor,

 Pastor Alan