New Beginnings/ Welcome Home: A Foundation for the Future!

Our theme for 2008 at the Orange Grove Church of Christ:

New Beginnings/ Welcome Home: A Foundation for the Future!

New Beginnings/ Welcome Home is more than being in a brand new building (hasn’t happened yet, but we are getting closer!). This is an opportunity.

·         It is an opportunity for long time members who have been absent from family gatherings for a long, long time to be welcomed home—it is an opportunity for them to begin anew their walk of faith with God and His family in this place.

·         It is an opportunity for those of us who are here on any given Sunday but never really involved in the life and work of the church to reengage—maybe for the first time—to be welcomed home to a new life of involvement and ministry.

·         It is an opportunity for those who have been consistently involved in the life and work of the church to explore new ministries—to have a fresh start in something new and exciting.

·         It is an opportunity for us as believers to reach out to those of our friends, family, and community who may be searching for a new beginning—who may be desperately be looking for someone, some place to welcome them home.

New Beginnings/ Welcome Home will be challenging. There is a place of involvement—a place of needed service for every member, no matter how old or how young you might be. If you can pour a cup of coffee or smile and say hello, you will be a valuable part of ministry just on Sunday mornings alone.

New Beginnings/ Welcome Home will be challenging. For a great number of us, it will be an opportunity and an expectation to get out of our comfort zones. Can you imagine a place of worship on Sunday mornings where we ask every member to be here thirty minutes before services start? That’s what we are asking. We are asking for each member to be committed to the work of this church and to take at least the responsibility of being here and serving before services begin.

New Beginnings/ Welcome Home will be challenging. It will challenge everything we have been in the past and everything we hope to be in the future as a beacon of light and life.

Will you begin praying for the future? What we do in the coming New Year of 2008 will effectively lay the foundation for our future for years to come. Pray that we lay the right foundation—designed by God. Pray that we build well!

New Beginnings/ Welcome Home: A Foundation for the Future.

Isn’t it time?

Les, Jr.

Silly Baby Boy

Not the post I planned to bring–couldn’t take the necessary picture–maybe this Saturday morning will allow me to do that…

In the meantime, I hope you’ll enjoy a little bit of the incredible fun and silliness we were blessed to enjoy tonight with our son, Casey!

Blessings to you,

Les, Jr.

Cha Ching!

Got a post planned for sometime in the next day or so. But in the meantime, I’d like to share a triumph…

It seems like I have been in school forever… and truth to tell, when this Master’s program is completed, I plan to start another degree program. At any rate, my coursework for this semester–Acts of the Apostles–is completed and now graded.

Drum roll please…

Notebook of Reading Summaries: 100 A

Acts Paper: 100 A

Final Exam: 100 A

Smiling at ya,

Les

Tis the Season

It’s that time of year again.

At least once a week, we get a revised Christmas wish/want/gotta-have list from Conner. He may no longer believe in Santa Claus but he certainly believes in gifts around the tree.

Tis the season.

I think it safe to say most Americans are scurrying around decorating and shopping. Some are beginning to plan or even start their holiday cooking. (I sure hope chocolate pie is on some agendas-after all, I need to maintain my shape. Round is a shape, right?)

Tis the season.

That guy out in California is once again trying to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance, Lowe’s got in trouble for having Family Trees instead of Christmas Trees, and any day now, we’ll read about some town somewhere embroiled in a controversy over a public display of a Nativity scene.

Tis the season.

Even those of our tribe sometimes bicker and argue over whether it is appropriate to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ at this time of the year. I choose to stay out of the argument. However, it seems to me that Romans 14 and 15 speaks to both sides of that dispute.

Tis the Season.

Regardless of how you celebrate the holidays, I hope you have a personal time of family renewal. I hope you rediscover the love of God in your life. And maybe most of all, I hope you’ll take the time-recognize the opportunity–to speak of Jesus-to tell the old, old story once again.

Tis the season.

Indeed.

Les, Jr.