Building strong relationships

Last night, I had the privilege of teaching our elementary age kids during our AWANA program at Southern Calvert Baptist Church. Our theme was “fellowship“. As followers of Jesus Christ, we are called to maintain strong relationships with each other because we are part of the body of Christ. We have to get along with each other because we are all connected to each other through our relationship with Jesus Christ. Our text for the evening was Ephesians 4:1-3. Life is all about relationships. As a pastor, I have the opportunity to help people transition from this life to the next. While on a deathbed, people usually do not regret not making more money or having more stuff. The main regret that I hear is, “I wish I had more time with _____________ person“.

Confrontation and Repentance

In a couple of weeks, our children’s Sunday School classes are going to host a rally to celebrate the fifth Sunday of this month. On fifth Sundays at our church, our adult Sunday School classes all meet up in the sanctuary for a Fifth Sunday Rally. We encourage and challenge all of the classes to reach out to the community before the next fifth Sunday and do some kind of ministry that draws in new people. We discover some creative ideas as each class shares an experience. We are going to launch the same plan among our children. After our Bible lesson, the kids are going to break up into small groups and stuff Trunk or Treat bags with information about our church and Gospel tracts. These bags will be used during our major outreach on October 31. I am so excited to see the children serve in their own capacity. Before we do the service project, we are going to study II Corinthians 7:8-12. I want to share that message with you here in this article.

Wisdom Books of the Bible

I am meeting with our AWANA kiddos tonight to study the Word of God. I love that I get a chance to impact our future leaders on a weekly basis. They have a hunger for the Word of God and because of that hunger, we meet and study the Bible. We do not study about the Bible. We actually open up the Word of God and dig in to the Biblical text.

Mercy and Grace through Judgment?

Is it possible for God to show mercy and grace even in the midst of His judgment? Can judgment/discipline be a positive event in our lives? Is it possible to view judgment in a positive light? Let’s discover the answers to these questions and more as we turn to the book of Hosea. Here at Southern Calvert Baptist Church, we have been walking through the entire Bible over a three year period. Currently, we are in the book of Hosea. Our goal is to examine every book of the Bible and discover how each book points to the person of Jesus Christ, the Savior of mankind.

Rebellion, Revolt, and Rejection

As we have been walking through the Old Testament, tracing the promise of the coming of the Messiah, we have seen that God is always faithful to His promises. In the midst of carrying out His eternal plan, God invites people to join Him in His eternal plan. Some people understand the significance of this calling and submit to it. Others chose to reject the Lord’s invitation. God allows people to make their choices. On the other hand, both choices have consequences.

Church Discipline is needed

Dear friends, this is a difficult subject that is not covered much in our modern church. I have written on the subject of Biblical correction and you can read it here. The way that you handle correction reveals your heart. Discipline is a major part of our Christians life. God disciplines us for our own good and for His glory. His discipline conforms our character to the character of Jesus Christ. God has given us His Holy Spirit that responds to His discipline. God also places spiritual leaders in our lives who are to apply discipline for the good of the individual and the entire local body of Christ, also known as the Church. The Apostle Paul was one of those spiritual leaders whom God called to discipline the individuals in the body of Christ in Corinth, along with the local church. We learn about this subject in II Corinthians. Let’s take a moment to read the following verses and then, we will examine two examples from the Old Testament, two men whose sins were confronted and the two very different responses. You probably have guessed the two people. One was the first King of Israel, Saul. The second is the second King of Israel, David.

Set Apart by God for Good Works

This coming Sunday at Southern Calvert Baptist Church, during our Sunday School hour, we are going to cover how God sets us apart to be a Royal Priesthood so that we can walk in the good works that He prepared from before the foundation of the world was laid. We have been walking through the books of Exodus and Leviticus. Previously, we looked at the daily sacrifices that we offered in Israel on a daily basis. There were 5 sacrifices and 2 of those 5 were dedicated to reminding the children of Israel to be grateful to God and to be grateful to each other. If you do the math, that equates to roughly 40 percent of the sacrifices, dedicated to reminding people to be grateful.

Let us learn to respect our spiritual elders

As a relatively young pastor, I have had to learn and apply this teaching to my own life over and over again. I am not teaching pure theory. This comes from years of practical application. As people, our sin nature does not like authority. Because of this natural state, it is very difficult for us to honor our elders. We have to be taught and reminded over and over again. That is why “Honor your father and mother” is a command. It is a command because it goes against our nature. Showing honor and respect to elders is not natural to anyone. It is a conscious effort that we must make, moment by moment, day by day. The command to honor has no time limit. Even when you are married and have your own kids, you are still to honor your father and mother. The same is true once you receive authority yourself, you must still respect the authority of those who are older than you are.

I. Walk humbly in authority

How do you handle correction?

If you have been a leader for more than 5 minutes, you know that you are constantly faced with having to correct those who are under your leadership. Correction seems to have a negative tone among us in our modern world, especially in the church. We are taught to avoid confrontation at all costs. Encouragement is the king, while confrontation and correction are almost scoffed at.

God has much to teach on the subject of “correction”. He uses words such as “reprove”, “correct”, “discipline”, and “rebuke”. God teaches us that we are corrected for our own good. We need correction because of our sin nature. We make mistakes.

I would like to use this article to explain that all of us are corrected. The difference between a wise and a foolish person is how they respond to correction.