Pastor's Points - January
Dear Church Family,
I am so thankful to God for allowing us to be together this past Sunday as we considered God’s leading for our church! I believe with my whole heart that God is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us!! (Ephesians 3:20). But we must believe and be people of faith. You see belief and faith are interwoven for followers of Jesus. They go together and you cannot separate the two. The act of walking by faith and not by sight is a demonstration of our belief. In Jon Blooms book, “Not by Sight, A Fresh Look at Old Stories of Walking by Faith” he shares in the forward the following words…
“WHAT DOES JESUS REALLY want from you? So much needs to be said. But boiled down to one sentence it’s this: “Believe in God; believe also in me” (John 14:1). That’s why when the apostle John wrote his gospel, he used some form of the word “believe” eighty-five times in twenty-one chapters. What he remembered Jesus emphasizing in his teaching and preaching was believing. Whether or not you believe in Jesus is the most important issue of your life because “whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him” (John 3:36). You see, “without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him” (Heb. 11:6). But believing in Jesus is very difficult. It’s difficult because “the whole world lies in the power of the evil one” (1 John 5:19), and he works with all his might to blind "the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” (2 Cor. 4:4). And he is constantly trying to lead believers astray (Matt. 24:24). Because of this, it is crucial that followers of Jesus learn to “walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Cor. 5:7). In other words, we must learn to trust God’s promises more than we trust our perceptions.”
As a church family we have a wonderful opportunity to believe and live by faith as we trust God to lead us forward into the future that He has prepared for us. We must resist the attempts of Satan to get us to go astray. We must be people who believe and demonstrate that belief by walking by faith and not by sight!!
I do not know all the details along the journey that God has us on, but I know that my God does, and He will be faithful to us as we believe in Him. Let us just make up our mind to trust the promises of God more than we trust in ourselves.
Let’s believe and walk by faith and not by sight!!
I love you and I love being your pastor!