Hi FBC Friends,
Thank you to everyone who donated and helped with the furniture giveaway for the international students at OSU. In this week’s bulletin you will see a brief report from Beth Arends about the impact of that event. One of the great things that came out of it was the desire of a Chinese student to talk with Beth about Christianity, and it seems specifically because she has seen the love in Christians. If you are reading this right away, you can be praying for their meeting, which is at 2pm today. If you are reading this after 2pm, please pray anyway! God is not bound by time as we are, and this student will certainly need continued prayer after her discussion with Beth!
Today in our Bible reading, we started the book of Acts. But since I’ve said A LOT about Acts recently, I will focus on our Old Testament reading here today! One passage that I have loved for a long time is Jeremiah 9:23-24 —
Thus says the LORD: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, 24 but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.”
While humans tend to like to boast in themselves, the truly wise person will only find his/her boast in the Lord! I love how He describes Himself with the words steadfast love, justice, and righteousness. We will be looking at those same words in the message from Hosea this Sunday. It’s wonderful when my personal Bible reading during the week has something that goes hand-in-hand with what I’m preaching on that week! Only God can do that.
Speaking of the message this Sunday, please read Hosea 2:14–3:5 before you come to FBC to worship. I trust this will be an encouraging message to us as we find hope in the love that God has for His people, in spite of the way we often stray!
Tonight is the first club night for AWANA (7-8:30pm)! I’m looking forward to seeing many of you there. If you are a parent (and are not yet serving in AWANA), I want to invite you to check out our class for parents. We will be using a workbook put together by AWANA which explores 5 character traits from the life of the biblical character Joseph, and practical ways we can instill those qualities in our children. I think we’ll have a great time together! If you do not plan to be here tonight, please be in prayer for all of the kids, leaders, and parents. God has been using this ministry tremendously in the lives of many families, and we want to pray for Him to continue to do so!
For members of FBC, and for anyone else interested, we will be having a brief quarterly business meeting following the worship service this Sunday. We are also planning a baptism for Sept. 30, so if you would like to talk to me about that, please do so soon!
Thank you for your prayers for FBC and the people who are touched through our ministry!
Love From Your Pastor,
Michael