950 Newsletters

Sunday afternoon we had about 30 of our church people come to help us begin distributing our evangelistic newsletters. This was a great group, including kids from toddlers to college. We are able to distribute about 950 newsletters in an hour and a half. We estimate that there are about 10,000-12,000 homes in the Menifee area, so if we can do this once a month we should be able to cover Menifee in a year. It was very exciting to see the level of participation.
On Sunday we also announced some of the details about our church family mission trip this summer. Lord willing we will be going to Bakersfield to help out Mark & Charity Brock at Crossway Baptist Church, which was planted in October of ‘06. Again, everyone seems very excited about this.

Laying the Groundwork; Evening Groups

We are teaching through our definition of personal ministry, seeking to lay the foundation for ministry that pleases the Lord. The last two Sundays we’ve talked about the goal (God’s glory / fame) and the motive (compelled by Christ’s love). I think this is a very important foundation.

Our Sunday night attendance has been great – yesterday we had approximately 60 in the morning and more than 40 at night.

The evangelistic newsletters are in, and next Sunday we’ll start going out to distribute those.

The Joy of Equipping

We’re two weeks into our “personal ministry theme,” and it is exciting! We don’t want there to be any manipulation, force, or any gimmicks – our desire is for this church family to see the greatness of God in fresh ways and love it and then be equipped to go love for His glory. The last two Sundays I preached on being “Workers Together With Him” (II Corinthians 6:1) and “Witnesses for God’s Fame”. Sunday night we started our small group study through Don’t Waste Your Life; when that finishes we will start right into an evangelism training course. We’ve also developed an evangelistic newsletter that we will be distributing in our community. I’ll try to attach a couple of pictures of it for you to see.

What a Year

Well, 2006 was quite a year around here! I haven’t really had a chance to think about it, but it certainly was a good year to grow and see God work. First funerals, wedding, baptisms, marriage counseling, elders, etc. Also went self-supporting. Praise the Lord for all of it. This Sunday we introduce Personal Ministry Theme for 2007. Can’t wait! Better get busy …