HEADING FOR ONE YEAR….
It’s VERY hard to believe that on the first Sunday in May we will celebrate ONE YEAR as a mission church. Time really flies by! This has been a really adventurous year and a year full of blessings! Already we’ve seen 23 souls saved and average in the high 70′s for our weekly Celebration Worship Service. We are little by little gaining confidence in the local community as a group of believers who are real, steady and who care. We are not some “fly by night” group who comes in, starts up a “church” and then heads out – taking your money, confidence and friendship with them. We are a real group of believers who seek to build a real, strong, evangelistic, scriptural, church that will impact College Hill and Texarkana for years to come. Our way of doing things is rather simple and our heartbeat is souls. We seek to love all people – red, yellow, black, white…rich, poor, middle-income, educated, uneducated,… clean, dirty, folks with homes, folks who are homeless,…people with and without addictions (and there are very few people who don’t have some type of addiction in this day and age – even the “churched” have addictions and are so “holier than thou” that they can’t even see it themselves”). Our heartbeat is to be a church for all people, preaching and teaching a simple message that Jesus can forgive, save, restore, re-build and renew.
One of the biggest “jobs” in mission work is trying to teach the new believers the basics. Faithfulness, service, tithing, prayer, digging in the Word and more. As the pastor of this new mission I pray that somehow our people will grow not just in number but in the Word. Faithfulness is a quality that seems outdated in many people’s lives. Any excuse will keep them from coming to God’s house. It breaks a pastor’s heart to see people who “say” they desire a close walk with the Lord and want to live for Him to use ANY and ALL types of EXCUSES (not reasons – and their is a difference) for simply not being faithful to the Lord. This past Resurrection Sunday reminded me all over again how that JESUS was/is faithful to us — even faithful to love us all the way to the cross. He didn’t use EXCUSES - He willingly gave His all. Pray for me as pastor of this new church as I seek to follow the Lord, lay foundations of faith and establish a strong work that will last until Jesus comes.
We will be having special anniversary services on Sunday, May 3 and we invite you and yours to be a part of them. MORE ON THIS LATER…. Thanks for your prayers, love, support and more for this first year and we hope you will continue even into the next. Thank you Jesus for your work in College Hill. Praise you for all who have been saved! Save more! and MORE! AND MORE!!!!!!! Pastor James