Prayer
Father God, we struggle for the words to describe Your holiness, Your awesomeness. We thank You for how powerfully You’re moving in Your church. We see hearts changing. We see light and salt. We see doers of the Word. As Your house is nearly restored, we pray You restore our hearts. We lift up the unsaved in our congregation and ask Your Holy Spirit to move powerfully upon them. We love You, Jesus! And in Your Great Name we pray. Amen.
The Ekklesia
Yesterday in week 5 of our series The Ekklesia, we looked at the body of Christ. If you missed yesterday’s service, you can catch up on Facebook at facebook.com/cometothecreek/live.
As I preached yesterday, it is my greatest desire that you would know that you are not at Shoal Creek Baptist Church by accident. God has uniquely created you, gifted you, and called you to serve Him in advancing the Kingdom of Christ. Since I first surrendered my life to Jesus at the age of 25, I have always felt a deep desire to serve Jesus. I can still remember a moment about seven years ago sitting at a church our family had only recently started visiting. Before the service began that day, someone came before the church and expressed the need for volunteers to support the church’s chair ministry. The church was meeting in a gym at the time and had to set up and break down about 400 chairs every Sunday. As the call went out for volunteers, I immediately knew what I needed to do.
My late wife Cassie asked me after I told her that I needed to volunteer to serve in the chair ministry: “can’t we just come to church?” The answer for me now is exactly the same as the one I told her then, no. Jesus Christ said it this way: “It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Matthew 20:26-28 ESV) In the life, ministry, and teaching of Jesus, we see the life we are called to as disciples. We are called to a life of sacrificial, others focused, selfless service. Question, are you serving Jesus the way that He has called you to?
I want to challenge you today to get plugged in and engaged with the mission of Jesus here at our church. At the end of the day when you serve in the church, remember these things:
Remember Who you serve
Remember why you serve
Remember where He called you to serve
Remember how He called you to serve
The Sanctuary Moving Day
As your pastor, my heart is so thankful, grateful, and full. Yesterday over 20 of us gathered together for a momentous moment: moving back into the repaired Sanctuary. Between moving chairs, running cables, hanging TVs and speakers, cleaning, cooking, and other activities, it was an incredibly busy but fruitful day. Each of you who volunteered, prayed, and served, thank you! What a beautiful picture of the body of Christ… men, women, and children, all ages and stories, working together to accomplish God’s plan in this church.
We need to stop and give credit where credit is due. Everything that has been accomplished and completed has been done so by God’s grace. Please continue to pray that God would bless the last few days of activities that are needed to host our first church service in over four years in the Sanctuary. Please be praying that the Holy Spirit would make His presence known in and among us. Pray that many lives and hearts would be transformed by what God is and will do here at Shoal Creek Baptist church.
The list of people I would like to thank is long. At the risk of missing someone, let me simply say thank you to everyone. To those who have prayed, God has moved in a mighty way through your petitions. To those who have volunteered, God has done incredible things through your willing heart. To those who have given, your gifts will echo across the years to come. To everyone who has given their time, thank you for the way you’ve invested yourself here. My deepest hope is that the Gospel of Jesus Christ will continue to be proclaimed fearlessly, graciously, and urgently here at this church for decades to come.
I’ve said it often, but it seems worth repeating now: we don’t know what tomorrow holds but we are trusting the One who is holding tomorrow. Although I don’t know what’s next here at our church, I am excited and expectant at what God is going to do next. Thank you for being a part of our journey
MARK YOUR CALENDAR:
Wednesday, August 31, 6:30pm – Bible study
Saturday, September 3, 9:00am – CHURCH WORK DAY
Saturday, September 3, 1:00pm – Rededication review meeting
Sunday, September 4, 9:45am – Adult Sunday School
Sunday, September 4. after church – Deacons meeting
Sunday, September 4, 6:00pm – Sunday night discipleship service
Rededication Ceremony and Moving Preparation:
September 3 at 9am – Church Work Day. We will be pressure washing, putting out mulch, planting flowers, moving chairs, etc. in preparation for the rededication ceremony. We need everyone who can be there to be there…men and women!
September 3 at 1PM – Meet at the church fellowship hall for a review and moving updates.
September 10 at 1PM – Meet at the church sanctuary for a final meeting to discuss the order of service, responsibilities, final details, etc.
Sanctuary Rededication. Join us September 11th, 2022 at 11am as we remember the history of Shoal Creek Baptist Church and celebrate where God is taking us.
You can now view upcoming events and important dates on our website at https://cometothecreek.com/events/. For a quick list of dates, you can access the Events List at https://cometothecreek.com/events/list/.
NOTE: If you have an announcement, please send it to cometothecreek@gmail.com by 12 noon on Monday. Thank you.
Community Outreach
Thank you to everyone who volunteered this past Saturday at Never Alone as we shared the love of Jesus, food, prayers and Bibles with families from the surrounding communities in North Georgia. We continue to lift up the needs of all who were there, including the cars with families we didn’t get to pray with.
Don’t miss the special Operation Christmas Child collection bin that’s available to drop off your items for the shoeboxes we are packing for this wonderful, global ministry. Please be sure to bring items each week as you collect them so we can begin tracking the items we need for the 300 shoeboxes we will be packing as a church.
For the month of September, we are collecting:
Men’s and women’s stick deodorant (50 each men’s and women’s)
Full size bars of soap (300)
Washcloths (300)
Did you know that since 2014 God has blessed us to share the hope of Jesus by sending over 2000 boxes to over a dozen different countries? Boxes have reached countries like:
Zimbabwe
Burkina Faso
Democratic Republic of Congo
Senegal
Cameron
Mali
The Central African Republic
Ukraine
Chad
The Philippines
Angola
South Sudan
How Can We Pray for You?
Please visit https://cometothecreek.com/contact/ to submit your prayer request. You can also submit your request to prayer@cometothecreek.com.
In His Service,
Michele Olson
And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. (Colossians 3:15 NKJV)
