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Pastor's Point - April 2022

Dear Church Family,

I simply have three prayer requests to bring to your attention this month.

1. EASTER WEEKEND
Please begin praying for all the different opportunities for ministry that our church will have this Easter.

Friday – April 15^th at 6:30 pm
Good Friday “Night of Worship” – This service at South Campus is a perfect opportunity to invite people to come and hear of the great display of love that God showed by sacrificing His one and only Son for undeserving humanity.

Saturday – April 16^th at 10:00 am 
Family Easter Celebration - This event at North Campus will offer something for everyone. There will be inflatables, food, and one huge Easter egg hunt that kids will not want to miss. This is a great event to invite your friends and family to come be a part of as there is something for everyone.

Sunday - April 17^th at  8:00, 9:30, and 11:00 am
Easter Services – We will offer three worship services on Easter Sunday at South Campus. People are more open at this time of the year than any other to come to a worship service in a church.  I want to encourage you to be praying for who it is that you will invite to come with you to Easter service this year.

2. WORSHIP PASTOR SEARCH 
Please make it a point of your personal prayer time to pray for our worship pastor search. God knows exactly the person that we need to lead us in this key area of our church. I am confident that as we pray and ask God to lead us that He will. Pray specifically that God would lead us to someone who is gifted to lead our church in God-focused, powerful, moving worship. I have all confidence that God will lead us to who He has for us for this season in the life of our church.

3. THE SCOTT FAMILY
I do not make it a habit to come to you and solicit your prayers for my family, but I feel I need to in the season of our lives. Sending Nick, Melissa, and Eliana off to Japan on mission was a great moment for our family!  We are so happy to see them go and serve the Lord in this way.  As I shared on Sunday, for us to feel any other way would not be right.  But it is hard to “lay down your objections” when God moves in ways that you were not expecting.  Please do not misunderstand me, we are glad they are there, but just pray for us because there will be days that we will be tempted to pick up some of those objections that we have laid down.
We know that God will take much better care of them than we ever could.  We trust Him.  But there will be times when we will miss them tremendously. Pray that when those times come that we will remain faithful and focus on His will for their lives and not our own selfish objections that we may be tempted to pick up and hang on to in that moment. Thank you for your prayers.

I love you and I love being your pastor!

Spare Change - April 2022

What is a woman?

It seems like such an easy question to answer but recently this very question stunned Supreme Court nominee, Ketanji Brown Jackson.  She responded that she did not know how to answer the question and alluded to the fact that she was not a biologist.  Before everyone rushes to condemn or defend her we need to understand our culture has made it impossible for anyone that wants to be deemed culturally appropriate to define simple words like "man" or "woman".

It should be a simple question with a simple answer.  We all know that a woman is a female human being.  Biology tells us that almost every species on the planet has a male and female component.  Both flora and fauna operate on this basic level for the sake of reproduction.  We can answer the question, "What is a woman?" by looking at the physical traits of a human woman but also we can look at their DNA and know that they are defined by their XX chromosomes.

I have come to understand this is not an issue of biology, rather it is one of perception.  The reason this is a problem in our culture is because many want to say that transgenderism is right and good.  They would say that a man or woman is not defined by their DNA or even their physical traits; that reproductive organs do not matter. The only thing that matters is what they want to be true.  Now we come to the rub…the real issue is about truth.

If truth is whatever I want it to be then, sure, I can self identify as a purple dinosaur and everyone has to agree with me and treat me as such; however, truth is not whatever I want it to be. Christians should know that God is the definer of truth in all areas of life including our gender identity.  In Genesis 1:27 God defines a man and a woman. He states very clearly they are different genders and thus not interchangeable.

Since God’s Word is the arbiter of truth we must stand on it no matter what culture says.  This will put us at odds with many people.  To say that we know a person is born a certain gender and should remain that gender and even identify as that gender is very controversial.  We must prepare ourselves for this.  

That doesn’t mean we have to be mean or nasty about it.  Jesus never had an attitude of hate or bigotry toward anyone.  We should be as loving and gentle as we can be without backing down from the truth.  If people want to ignore us or call us names we must take it.  On the flip side, if there are people that want our help we should help them; first by sharing the gospel with them but also by being there to help them through their gender identity struggles.  It is not easy being caught up in that cultural machine, as you can see with what happened at the Supreme Court nominee hearing.

Christians should always seek to have a Christ-like attitude in whatever situation they face.  When confronted with the situation of gender identity we must stand on truth and say that God has already defined gender.  We do not question it and it cannot change.  We must never back down from that truth found in God’s Word.  We also need to have tender hearts, understanding that there are many people trapped in a terrible lie propagated by Satan himself.  We must commit ourselves to pray for them and offer to help anyway we can.

So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” John 8:31-32