Pastor Jay //

 

When I need to be reminded of our primary task… I just pull out this little reminder. Last year, during one of the LabQuest nights in Awana, I couldn’t find paper fast enought to write down the names of the children who came forward to accept Christ. This board (pictured above with Steve holding it) was one of the props we used during the evening, so I grabbed it and wrote down the names. There are twenty-one (21) names on this board. Several of them have now been baptized. On the other side of this board are holes where nails had been hammered in that evening. The nails represented our sin and the holes represent the scars that sin leaves in our lives. The nails were removed and placed on the Cross reminding us that Jesus takes our sin which he bore in his body on the tree (”He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed” 1 Peter 2:24).

As you may know, since that time, our church has had to look evil in the face and stand our ground. We are obviously dangerous to the enemy. Fortunately, although we have different opinions about how to deal with it, we all desire the same thing. We can get to the other side of this together. Let’s make sure we continue to stand together and remember “why we do what we do.” It is a matter of life and death - eternally.

 

This has been an amazing year for leading people to Christ. I just received a report of the statistics for our church this last year. I am thrilled to report to you that we had 45 baptisms since July of last year! In fact, 33 of these baptisms occured as a direct result of our Awana program. There were twenty-six children baptized between the ages of 6-11, and nine between the ages of 12-17. The remaining ten people included four in the 30-59 age category and three in the 60 and up category. God is good. Last year I asked the church to accept a challenge to see 50 people baptized in a year. God is helping us make that a reality. There is still much more work to be done. We have a whole new year ahead.

Please consider being a part of our FAITH evangelism strategy. We will begin sessions on Sunday afternoons starting September 10. We will train you how to talk to people that are ready to receive God’s free gift of salvation.

  This is one of those things you won’t understand unless you were there but I have to share it anyway. I said this statement to James W one Sunday night a few weeks ago and Casey decided to make it into a thing. So, at camp, this phrase really took off. It is one of those phrases that you can say in just about any situation. It basically means (since I created it, I get to decide it’s meaning) - I’m following your lead.  Now it’s a thing on this trip. Today, right in the middle of town (Galati, Romania), there it was - a big boat. So, Casey, here’s to you. I’m skiing behind your boat, man. (in the middle of the pic)

  Another one of our fun phrases has been Can I get refills on that. It works in just about any situation too. Imagine, you are doing God stuff and something great happens - so you say Can I get refills on that??? 

Anyway, I’m skiing behind your boat!

We began to realize that Awana and other church life were parallel universes in our church. This year we have developed a plan to integrate and challenge the world’s of secular and sacred. Many of our children were coming or being dropped off at the church for Awana, but had no real idea of worship except for the opening ceremony. Also, we realized that the children were being told that the world of science was the only reality and worship/spirtuality were distinctly separate and mystical. We decided to purposefully intersect these worlds in Awana with “LabQuest.”

Once a month, we keep the 3d-6th grade after opening ceremony for a further time of worship, drama, etc. The “sermon” portion of the service is a look at Biblical Truth inductively beginning with a science experiment. The truths discovered in the science experiment will then reveal deeper spiritual truths about God. The goals of LabQuest are:

To whet the appetite of the children with worship.
To challenge secular teachings that there is no absolute truth in morality (even though Darwinism is often presented as absolute truth).
To instill a Biblical worldview in the children.
To teach the children to think critically about the world around them from a Biblical perspective.

I would be interested in hearing your ideas/comments.

Jay Raines, pastor, FBC Cameron, MO

In an effort to deal with some of the real issues at the church, we have developed a new approach for church council that is already getting results. We are using the hour meeting format to list current church concerns as a group, but then we divide the issues out according to 5 teams. Last Sunday, We were able to deal with 5 issues all at one time. Each team developed action plans. The team leader is responsible to hold the team accountable in accomplishing their tasks by the next meeting (or some specified time).

I am interested to see the progress of these teams.