“I can no other answer make but thanks, and thanks, and ever thanks.” So says Sebastian in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, and these words express my words to you on this Thanksgiving. The last year has seen lots of changes in mine and Amy’s life. We celebrated one year of marriage. We moved to a different state. Instead of teaching high school I entered the classroom again as a student, and instead of teaching high school students Amy began serving as a caretaker for senior citizens in Louisville. Things are certainly not like they were one year ago! Yet with each change in our life God has proven over and again the continued triumph of his grace through his endless mercy at every turn in our pathway. He has provided for us physically, emotionally, and spiritually, and his abundant giving is seen clearly in his gift of you to our lives. We have come to love Henryville as an adopted hometown, and we love all of our friends and family at First Baptist.  God has blessed us through you, and we are privileged to have the opportunity to serve you.  You are ministers to us in the gospel. You are encouragers and comforters to us through his Spirit. We are truly thankful for each of you, and we pray that God will continue to unite our hearts together in the coming months and years as we pray God’s richest blessings in Christ to you now and evermore.

Philippians 1:3-11

Cade

November 21, 2010          John 11:45-57

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November 14, 2010           John 11:28-42

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Do you struggle to pray?  If you are like me, then you go through times of prayerlessness.  That is a very long word that represents the vast time of our lives that have been spent without prayer.  God has taught me much through my 11 years as a Christian.  I’ve not been the best of students either.  He usually has to take extreme measures with me.  For some reason I’m hard headed and think my way is best; so he has to get my attention with his staff.  Shepherds use their staffs for comforting their sheep and correcting them, if you know what I mean.  I have spent much of my Christian life being disciplined with that staff.  Don’t get me wrong; I love his discipline because it assures me of his love for me.  Those he loves he chastens, be zealous therefore and repent.

I say all this to say, that God has taught me much through suffering, pain, and hardships, and I would like to pass one of those lessons on to you.  I was a four-year-old Christian when I took the pastorate of my first church.  Talk about on the job training.  I knew I was doing what God wanted me to do, but I must admit that I was overwhelmed.  I had a full time job as the principal/teacher of a Christian School, and I was responsible to preach 3 sermons a week.  When I would get home from school I would close myself up in my office and start studying to preach.  I was so stressed and pressed about getting my sermons done that I wouldn’t even pray.  I think back now and blush.  What an idiot I was!  Basically I’m saying, “God!  I’m to busy working for you to talk to you.”  I mean I prayed but it wasn’t like it should have been.  It’s only by his grace that he let me live or remain a pastor.

One day I was reading a sermon by Jonathan Edwards, entitled: The preacher before the throne of God, and the Lord rocked me to the core of my being.  I put that sermon down, and fell on my face weeping before a Holy God.  The following Sunday I repented before the church in the sermon I preached.  That’s a hard thing to do right there.  Remember, I’m hard headed, so God has to take extreme measures to get my attention and make me remember.  I’ve had many more lessons since then, and I know that there are many more to come.

My whole point in telling this one story is to show you that I’m not writing to you from a white tower of holiness.  I am a sinner whose walk with God has been anything but perfect.  I want you to see that prayer is so very important to your life, and I want you to see how foolish it is to neglect it.

Adam broke relationship with God in Garden of Eden.  From that point on God doesn’t have a continuous relationship with anyone.  Sure, there are sporadic incidents throughout the Old Testament where God speaks with someone, but it can hardly be called true fellowship.  The people would go to the temple every year on the Day of Atonement to have their sins covered, but only one man went into the presence of God, and he went with fear and trembling.  Nobody was allowed to have a relationship with God because the blood of goats and bulls would not reconcile sinners to a holy God.  It only covered their sins so that God did not crush them under his holy wrath.

One day, over two thousand years ago, God became a man and gave his life to reconcile us to himself.  I like the way Charles Haddon Spurgeon said it, “God himself, gave himself, to save us from himself.”  When Jesus Christ gave his life on Calvary many things happened.  The one thing that I want to emphasize in this blog is that Christ made a relationship with God possible again.  His last cry from the cross was “tetelestia”.  A Greek word that means it is finished.

At that moment the veil in the temple was ripped.  This veil was that barrier that kept men from going into the presence of God.  The only person that could go behind that veil was the high priest on the Day of Atonement.   Why did God rip that veil?  He ripped it to show us that the blood of Christ has made access to God available for anyone who would come covered in Christ’s blood.  That is a pretty amazing thing to think about.  Christ died so that we could once again have continuous fellowship with God.

He was beaten unmercifully.  His beard was ripped from his cheek.  Your spit soaked his face.  He was nailed to a tree.  All of this and more were to take the punishment, guilt, and shame of your sin, and cloth you in his very own righteousness.  No longer must we go into his presence with fear and trembling.  We can approach the throne of grace with boldness because of Christ.  That which the people of the Old Testament could not do, we can because of the blood of Christ.  What folly it would be for those who have been offered a relationship with the creator of the universe not to have time for him.  If an earthly king offered to have you over for dinner, you would fall all over yourself getting there, but the King of Kings has a hard time getting on our schedule.

God wants to have a relationship with you.  He gave his life so you could be his friend.  You spit in his face, you pluck the beard from his cheek, you stripped him naked, you nailed him to a tree, and yet, he still died for you.  I can’t believe he wants us to be his friend and have a relationship with him.  I can’t believe we would neglect having fellowship with a God like that.

In Christ,

Toby

AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2010

“Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb. . . ”                (Rev. 22: 1)

“It’s too dangerous to travel now. The river is too low. Some of our relatives were coming down the river and their canoe hit some rocks and fell apart.” This was the advice that we received from one of our friends as we prepared to travel again. So, we decided to wait. While we waited, we were able to hold two different Storying Training weeks, as well as cooperate with the people in town in a couple of Community Development projects. The river is the life of the people. It provides water for cooking, drinking, washing clothes and taking baths. It provides food in the form of fish, turtles and alligators. The river is used for personal latrine purposes and for recreational purposes—such as swimming. The river is the source of many legends that exist among the people. The river provides water for transportation—it is the only “road” that exists to travel to and from the villages. When the river is low, sandbars and rocks cause accidents and riverbanks dry out and cave in. When the river is high, flooding can occur and manioc crops that are not harvested in time are ruined. Life revolves around the river.

Jesus said, “. . .whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” (John 4: 14) How grateful we are that the river of the water of life is never too low. How grateful we are that Jesus is our Living Water. How grateful we are that through Him we can have eternal life. Please pray for our team as God leads us to take Jesus to those who have never heard.

Many of you know that my mother has been quite ill. She had to have colon surgery due to a problem with severe Diverticulitis. I am thankful that I was able to go home to be with her for a couple of weeks. She is now in a Rehabilitation Center trying to get strong enough to walk again. Please continue to pray for her, as well as my family, as she recuperates.

PLEASE PRAY:

1. Thank the Lord for the Bible Storying Training Classes that were held August 30 – September 4, as well as the Classes that were held October 4 – 9. We had good participation in both training events and we were glad that people sought us out with questions about God and what His Word says about different subjects. We had good participation, as well, in the worship services on the town square at night. . . as friends sang and praised God with scripture. Thank God that our friends have started coming to us during the day asking if we are going to have the worship service at night. Then, they arrive early, wait for the service to begin and stay after the service is over because they don’t want to leave!

2. Thank the Lord also for the donation of clothing that we received from a friend. We were able to meet with the leaders of 20 different villages to decide how to distribute the clothing. God was very present in the meeting as we made sure that we were deciding everything justly and fairly. We were also able to give some of the clothing to friends who live in town or were visiting town due to illness. Please pray that this opportunity will help to open the door for our team to enter some villages in which the leaders have not wanted to work with us.

3. Thank the Lord for another meeting that we were able to hold with some of the leaders, concerning the construction of a house. When our friends come down the river, there is no place for them to stay while they are getting supplies or seeing the doctor. They usually stay for several weeks in their canoes or on a boat-dock that is falling apart. So, our team has decided to cooperate with some of our friends to build a type of half-way house, so they will have a decent place to stay. We will do our part and they are to do their part. Please pray for this project. Pray that God will use this house to bring many people to Him.

4. Please pray for the U people. Most of these semi-nomadic people live in isolation. There are two communities of U people that have become civilized in recent years.  Pray that God will use other peoples who have come to know Him to reach this group. Pray that He will give us the opportunity to begin work with these people.

5. Pray for the members of our church planting team. Pray that different conflicts between team members will be resolved so that God can continue to use us. Pray that God will give us wisdom, strength, health and safety as we work together in what He has called us to do.

6. Please pray for me as I will begin furlough in mid-November. Pray that I will be able to finish my reports and other work here in order to be gone for several months. Pray for the speaking engagements that I will have in the states—that God will use what is said for His Glory.

7. Pray also for a river trip that two pastors of our team are planning for November. They will continue the work of our team in my absence. Ask God to bless their health and their families. Pray that He will use them to continue taking His love to the villages.

Thank you for praying,

Kathy

November 11, 2010          John 11:7-27

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If you have prayer requests for your brothers and sisters in Christ to lift before the Lord during November, Click on Prayer Requests for November 2010  above, then type the prayer request in the comment box below.