Archive for December, 2007
Today, the ladies had a Christmas brunch in the Fellowship Hall with about 50 ladies in attendance. Michelle said that Mrs. Amy Coffey did a wonderful job in her lesson. She likened Christians to Christmas ornaments and made several really good applications. We praise the Lord for Vision Baptist Church and the men and women who attend there and that are on staff. Be praying for the “Our Generation Summit” they will be hosting Dec. 27-30th in Gatlinburg, TN. You can also pray for their “Christmas on the Northside” presentation going on next Sunday. Pray that it will be a tool to reach more people in Alpharetta with the Gospel. Bro. Austin Gardner will be preaching a regular service then they will be having sleigh rides with real horses. You can check out more on their website.
December 15 2007 | General | No Comments »
I’m really looking forward to the services tomorrow. I will be continuing with the “Christmas in the Real Word” series. Please be praying that the presence of God will not be quenched by anything the devil tries to do. We’re praying for some parents of the children who ride our buses to be in attendance. I want to remind you again that we will be having a time at 2:15 PM for anyone who would like to take pictures with Santa Claus. Make sure you bring your own camera and “smile toys.” God has been incredibly good to me and my family this week. We praise the Lord that He is such a good and gracious God! I love you church and look forward to being with you tomorrow!
December 15 2007 | General | No Comments »
The ladies will be having a Christmas lunch tomorow at 11 AM. The tables will be decorated nicely and a wonderful meal is planned. We are pleased to have Amy Coffey, the wife of Mark Coffey from Vision Baptist Church in Alpharetta speaking. She is a young energetic and likeable woman. I’m sure you will enjoy listening to her. Also, David Teems, the son of Mrs. Juanita Teems, will be providing special music during the brunch. Merry Christmas ladies and have a great time. By the way, if you didn’t sign up prior, you can still come tomorrow.
December 14 2007 | General | No Comments »
The response and comments concerning the series I’ve been preaching on Sunday mornings as been overwhelming. I realize now why God placed on my heart to go in the direction we’ve been going in for our Christmas Series. Folks, we must realize that we are living in a Real World, not an imaginary, make-believe, fantasy world. Like I told our church, my family doesn’t always have a “Leave it to Beaver, home for the holidays” ending. We’re Real People, living in a Real World with Real Problems! And that’s been the focus of the messages.
The first week’s message was entitled “Disenchanted Dreams and Changed Circumstances.” You see, Joseph and Mary did not plan on starting off their marriage they way it started off. I’m sure she was dreaming of the perfect wedding, complete with all the bells and whistles. Joseph I’m sure was already building furniture for their new home. They had probably been picking out “house plans” and the like, dreaming of the day they would be wed and start their new life together…and then the Circumstances Changed! She was pregnant! It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. They were supposed to get married and then enjoy each other for a couple of years before they had children. This wasn’t fair! Besides, if they were going to have a child, they were going to at least wait till they got married! But we find them right in the middle of Disenchanted Dreams and Changed Circumstances…much like we find ourselves in. It’s interesting to see how they handled the change of direction in their life and how we can learn from them in dealing with our own life situations.
This past week I continued the series with a message entitled “When You Need a Miracle.” The text verse is found in the Christmas account prior to the birth of Jesus in (Luke 1:37) For with God nothing shall be impossible. Once she accepted (I didn’t say “understood”) the fact that Mary was going to have a child, she knew that it was going to take a miracle, an act of God, for her to accomplish that which she was chosen to do. Looking at her life, we see how she handled the “impossible”. First of all, she came in the Right Position. She was humble before God, not arrogant. She referred to herself as the “handmaid of the Lord” two times, indicating that she Recognized Him as Master. Luke 1:45 then indicates that she learned to Rely on His Methods. Folks, when we need a miracle in our lives, those two things are mandatory. But not only did she come with the Right Position, she came with the Right Praise. Luke 1:46-55 gives us an insight to how Mary responded to God with Praise. She learned in spite of her Circumstances, to praise Him. She also learned in spite of her Challenge, to praise Him. Lastly, not only did she come in the Right Position with the Right Praise, she came to the Right Person! God is the Right Person for all of us to turn to when we need a miracle, but He is the Provider of Mercy (vv. 50, 54) and praise be to His Name, He is still the Performer of Miracles!
I will continue, Lord willing, the series this week with a message entitled, “Regular Men on a Royal Mission.” Please be in prayer that God will once again make His presence very real. I love You Lord and praise Your Holy Name!
December 11 2007 | General | No Comments »
I would like to commend the Choir, orchestra and cast for doing such a wonderful job of presenting “Portrait of a King” this past weekend. Bro. Will Atkinson, our Minister of Music wrote the program and it was wonderful. I praise the Lord for the talented men and women He has given us here at VBC. We had a good number of folks here for the Sunday PM program and I although I did not get a show of hands, I do believe we had several throughout the weekend profess Christ as their Savior. I also praise the Lord for the decisions that were made in the Sunday morning services. God is so good to us, in spite of ourselves.
December 11 2007 | General | No Comments »
I’m looking forward to spending another day with the Senior Adults today. We will be going to the Mall of Georgia for some shopping, some eating, then more shopping! My thoughts of spending the day in front of my laptop with a venti black in the corner of a bookstore trying to catch up and get ahead on some things have been rearranged…my wife decided that this would be a great day for her to “bond” with the Seniors as well. She can’t fool me. When you come with a list of people to buy for longer than Santa Claus’, you aren’t going to do much “bonding”, just “buying”! Ho, Ho, Ho, here we go! Merry Christmas!
December 11 2007 | General | No Comments »
I’m sitting here preparing for the second Christmas challenge today. This afternoon, the Senior Adults had their Christmas party, and let me tell you, they know how to do it. As you entered Delectable Delights, your heard the beautiful sounds of a harp playing Christmas music. Miss Parrish, a young 15 year old girl dazzled us with her music throughout the evening. We were greeted with hot apple cider, punch and crackers with pepper jelly…delicious. Then they brought out the big guns with roast beef medallions, roasted potatoes, green beans, pasta salad and rolls and gravy. If that wasn’t enough, we ended the eating portion with a homemade coconut cake, a coconut pie and peach cobbler with our choice of coffee. Needless to say, we didn’t leave hungry. You would think that you would leave a Christmas party like that feeling all fat and full…and normally you would…that is, if you were dealing with normal people. After we sung a couple of songs and I brought a short challenge about Simeon, it began to get warm in the room, and I’m not talking about the room temperature. You see, the Senior Adults have this long lasting tradition of bringing gifts and then giving out numbers to everyone, so they can, best I can tell, get their own gifts back! You see, when your number is called you can retrieve a gift from under the tree, or you can “steal” a gift from someone who has already opened theirs. And let me tell you, there was some stealing going on. I’ve never been in a room with so many kleptomaniacs in all my life. I was fortunate and ended up being able to leave with my gift……………..which I stole from John Regan! Hey, all is fair in love and war they say! We had a wonderful time and I love our seniors. By the way, we would love to have you come out with us for A Day With Pastor this coming Tuesday. We will be leaving the church at 10 AM and returning sometime around 4 PM.
In just a few minutes, we will be having the first of two Christmas productions by our choir and orchestra, A Portrait of a King. If you weren’t able to make tonight’s program, you can come tomorrow night at 6 PM and enjoy it.
Be praying for the services tomorrow as I will continue with our “Christmas in the Real World” series.
I also wanted to clarify the times and services we’ll be having on Sunday, the 23rd. We will be having the 9:30 AM SS and the 11:00 AM Worship Service only in the morning, (no 8:30 SS), and then we will be having our Evening Service at the regular time, 6 PM. This date is also set aside for our “He’s the Reason for the Season” Christmas offering. Be praying how your family can be a part of giving a special gift this year.
While I’m mentioning dates, let me remind you that we will be having our Bus Ministry Christmas Appreciation Luncheon next Sunday, the 16th following the AM services. If you would like to volunteer or help in any way with that, please see Bro. Patrick Henry tomorrow. (9th)
December 08 2007 | General | No Comments »
It has been a very profitable two days as we are planning for the New Year. I am unbelievably excited about 2008. We are planning and preparing and praying for the greatest year ever in the history of Victory Baptist Church . As many of our church know, we will be having our annual Victory Vision Night where we take a brief look back at the previous year, then look ahead at what we believe God has for our future. This tends to be one of, if not the most exciting service of the year. We take this time to unveil the new theme as well as new ministries that we will begin. Church, make sure you have Jan. 20th marked on your calendar as the day NOT to miss. This is MLK Holiday weekend and the kids will be out of school on the following Monday, allowing for us to have our Annual Chili Cook-off and new this year, the VBC Rook Tournament for all those interested.
I’m telling you folks, it’s going to be great and I can hardly wait. Most every Sunday morning message will gear around this year’s theme and will meet people where they are, and try to help them get to where the Lord wants them to be. I would love to tell you all the details, but you’ll just have to wait till VVN! I do covet your prayers as we continue to finalize plans and publications.
December 07 2007 | General | No Comments »
I received an envelope on Sunday from a young lady and it’s contents made me melt. As she gave it to me, I slipped it into my pocket to read it later. That later did not come till earlier this morning. As I opened the “special offering envelope”, inside was two quarters and a slip of paper with these words written on it… “Get a Drink”. You might say, “What’s the big deal about that?” The big deal is that we often times lose sight of how important people are to us as well as we are to them. You see, this wasn’t a check for $500 or a gift certificate, it was more than that in the fact that she wanted to do something for me, her pastor, in her own way. In those three words she told me much more than to just buy myself a Coke. She was saying, “You’re special to me…I love you…I want to do something for you as a person, not the church, not the ministry, but for you.” Can I tell you something, she got her point across and it spoke very loudly to me. That’s the mindset I need on a continual basis. Thinking of people, loving people and going a step further and acting on it. Young lady, if you’re reading this, please know how much your gift to me means, and though I may not purchase a drink with those two quarters, they will be a keepsake I will cherish for years to come. May God bless you and I love you!
December 04 2007 | General | No Comments »
This morning didn’t start off like my typical Mondays do. Usually Monday mornings are pretty relaxed for me. My wife, Michelle, will usually take the older kids to school and I’ll stay home with the youngest two. I normally don’t think much about the things that I need to do based on what I observed on Sunday till much later in the day. This morning I received a phone call rather early that needed me to make a decision, and before I could finish with that, I received an email which needed immediate attention as well. I could tell pretty quickly this wouldn’t by the most relaxing day off, but hey, that’s ministry, right?
Right in the middle of replying to the earlier stated email, I received another phone call, this time from the church. The front building had been evacuated and the fire department was crawling all over the place due to some smoke coming through the ceiling in the Fellowship Hall. The good news is that nothing serious was damaged. There were actually no flames, just some heat generated by a fan motor that went out on one of our furnace units in the attic. The firemen gave us permission to reenter the building once we had a professional HVAC serviceman come and assess the situation. All that was needed was to replace the motor and we were back in business. We praise the Lord there was no serious damage. God is good all the time, all the time, God is good.
Those things really weren’t what kept me from enjoying my day, it just so happened that this was THE DAY. Now, any dad, husband or male for that matter, must know what THE DAY is. Just in case you don’t, let me give you a hint or two. First of all, THE DAY falls anywhere within a week to 10 days from Thanksgiving. THE DAY also involves lights, ladders and loads of “stuff” being hauled out of the attic or up from the basement. By now, you realize THE DAY refers to the day the tree and decorations go up for the Christmas season. Yes, and now that the kids are getting a little older, the more decorations the better for them! However, it seemed as if THE DAY went rather smooth today. I enjoyed the time with my children and wife and now we have sat down to retire for the night. As I am keying in this blog, my wife and I are sitting by the fire, enjoying a cup of coffee with the smell of Christmas in the air and the twinkle of lights bouncing off the French doors. Life is good! Love is good! It’s all possible because the Lord is good!
December 04 2007 | General | No Comments »
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