FAMILY NEWS AND NOTES
Volume 10 14 September 2008 Issue No. 29
If you have something that needs to be included in the announcements...please make certain you get it to the person making the announcements...in legible written form …prior to announcement time.
COMMUNION FOR SEPTEMBER 2008
SOUTH SIDE NORTH SIDE
AM
Weldon Miller
Wayne Pickrel
Ronnie Stewart Jody Sparks
Cody Sparks Royce Armstrong
PM
Ron Traughber Tim Jones
ANNOUNCEMENTS …………..… Rance Robison
(Sunday and Wednesday)
SONG LEADER (AM……..........… Randy Eubanks
(PM) …….........…Randy Eubanks
Wednesday Nite …….....…. Ben McCain
PRAYERS —– Sunday.
AM First Prayer ……..............… Gene Campbell
AM Closing…………................… Glenn Parham
PM First Prayer……….…............... Jody Sparks
PM Closing…………..................…..Cody Sparks
PRAYERS — Wednesday Nite
First Prayer…………….................. Rodney Cook
Closing………….................… Rhodney Freeman
PRAYER LIST
Justin Barker, Rachel Barker, Doris Bell, Louis & Nona Bell, Billye Campbell, Irene Duncan, Jerry Freeman, Vernon Garrett, Mary Jane Joyner, Joyce Lee, Georgia Lide, Wade Miller, Ben McCain, Thelma Reed, Rebecca Tippitt
ALSO: Wesley DuBose, Michael Gilbert, Mary Jo Lee, Wayne Lineberger, Cammy Jo McCain, Betty Newman, Johnine Phillips, Don Shuette, J. D. Smith, Paul Unger, Shirley Wright
And now for … FAMILY NEWS AND NOTES
MEN … We need you here for the Men’s Business Meeting this evening following services. Your attendance and input are important.
As LADIES DAY on Saturday, September 20th draws nearer, there is much to be done. (This will be here at North Jefferson.) There are sign-up sheets for salads. We need as many ladies as possible to help. Brochures are on the round table in the foyer. If you can help in a monetary manner, give your to Amy Jones or Janice McCain. Cindy Armstrong will be the featured speaker. See you there! (We’ll be posting additional reminders, so don’t Grow weary of reading about it, please.)
Please remember that our “Bible Bowl” will begin again for its second season on Monday nite, October 13. We will host this first meeting. Jason Rollo, from Lovelady, Texas, will be our guest speaker that evening. He is a renowned youth speaker and you will want to hear him. If you can help with refreshments for that evening, volunteer to Bob Hedges or Veleta McFerrin. Bible Bowl study this Sunday afternoon with Royce and Cindy Armstrong. Participants are encourage to study Chapters 1 and 2 of Judges.
All of the competitions will be held here, but with different congregations hosting each month. Our study material will be the Old Testament book of Judges, out of the NKJV. The first test will cover Judges 1—3. Our coaches this year will consist of the Armstrong(s), the Robison(s), and the McCary(s).
We had a great service last Wednesday evening … well over 100 in attendance … best Wednesday nite attendance in months.
Keep the following in your prayers:
Vernon Garrett, Jerry Freeman, Billy Campbell (who has knee surgery coming up soon), Justin and Rachel (& Angie, Miguel and Michael), and others on our prayer list.
We received word that Bro. J. D. Smith, of the Sheppard Street congregation, suffered a stroke last Wednesday night. He is in Good Shepherd Hospital in Longview and will be there for a while. We have been requested to remember him in our prayers.
THANK YOU …. “Dear Brothers and Sisters:
Thank you so much for the cards, phone calls, and, most especially, your prayers on my behalf as I went thru my surgery. Alice and I are so thankful to have such a caring and loving church family.
—In Christian Love
Jerry & Alice”
Will God Bless America?
This Thursday, just past, 9/11/08, undoubtedly found our collective thoughts and emotions going back seven years to that terrible Tuesday, September 11, 2001, when an awful tragedy was treacherously perpetrated against our nation by a handful of blood-thirsty terrorists. On that day, America was left reeling in shock, grief, fear, and anger, as it felt for awhile as if our whole world was coming apart at the seams. Probably not since the attack of the Japanese naval air forces against Pearl Harbor, on December 7, 1941, had the collective conscience of the nation been so deeply stirred, and so quickly unified in a response of calling out to the God of heaven to help us, and to please bless the homeland we love.
In the days and weeks that followed that awful day of infamy, it looked for awhile as if the terrorists might have done us a favor, in bringing us to our knees before Almighty God. For awhile it seemed as if the nation was of one heart and one soul. We weren’t Democrats, or Republicans, blacks or whites, rich or poor, educated or uneducated, conservatives or liberals, we were just “Americans,” reaching out to one another in a time of need and crisis. Most importantly, it seemed for a short while as if the whole nation had been made to realize how desperately our nation depends upon the blessings of the true and living God for our daily peace and prosperity. Church attendance went through the roof for a few weeks. Bibles were purchased by the thousands. Prayer services became so much a part of the landscape that we even saw both houses of Congress gathered on the steps of the Capitol Building, in Washington, D.C., as they got down on their knees and prayed for God to please bless America.
However, seven years later the critical question still remains, can we really expect God to bless America, unless America is willing to repent of its gross immorality. In years sadly gone by, America was often called a “Christian” nation, but the name “Christian” means: “a follower of Christ,” or “Christ-like.” Considering our nation’s current moral climate, or lack thereof, how can we possibly invoke the name of God’s Son, as an adjective describing our national character, when our national conduct so blatantly blasphemes His Holy name? As pornography, homosexuality, pedophilia, abortion, drug abuse, drunkenness, murder, thievery, lying, fornication, adultery, divorce, and child abuse run rampant in our society, we dare not for a moment deceive ourselves into thinking that God will wink at our national iniquity, to bless us while we continue in our impenitent sin. If we disregard God’s law at every turn, how can we possibly hope to be blessed by God in the midst of our rebellion? Remember, it is “righteousness that exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people” (Prov. 14:34).
As we wring our hands over the heart-rending tragedies of school shootings, teen suicide, the AIDS epidemic, divorce, homosexuality, abortion, violent crime, and now even the threat of international terrorism, what we need, as a nation, is “wholesale repentance.” As we affix blame to the right terrorist group/s, is it possible we have no one to blame but ourselves? As a nation, are we merely reaping what we have sown, just as God’s Word said we would (Gal. 6:7-8)? Is it, perhaps, the case that, “we have sown the wind and reaped the whirlwind” (Hos. 8:7)?
Time and again the Old Testament prophets warned Israel to live righteously, if they wanted God to bless them (Hag. 1:1-11, Micah 6:1-16). That principle of sowing and reaping is still true today (Gal. 6:7). If we truly want God to “bless the USA,” as Lee Greenwood so beautifully sang, then our nation must return to its religious foundations, and once again proclaim God’s moral law as the absolute authority and the only correct standard for human conduct. What our nation urgently needs is a grass roots revival of interest in Biblical morality and righteous Christian living. Whether or not our nation will survive long in this new millennium, may well depend on whether or not we learn to go back to the Bible, to learn the difference between right and wrong.
Once again, the time for us to hit our knees in soul-searching, penitent prayer is upon us. A moment of silence is not what our nation needs. We need humble Christian leadership and fervent prayer directed to Almighty God through Jesus Christ, as we confess our sins to seek His mercy and grace. Then, as we rise from our knees, we need humble obedience to all of God’s commands. Then, and only then, can we rightly expect God to bless America! David McCain
