VBS Meeting Sunday

We want to have a meeting after services Sunday morning to explore the possibility of having a Vacation Bible School this summer. If we have enough interest (i.e., people willing to teach and help in other needed areas), we will definitely have one. We need teachers, helpers, puppet workers, and people to help with activities and refreshments. We will also discuss the best time to have VBS and whether it should be five nights or a shorter weekend format. Plan to stay for a few minutes Sunday morning. If you can't be at the meeting but want to be involved, please comment to this message or contact John Gaines by phone or email.

Truth About Origins Audio

If you would like to listen online to a series of seven lessons on The Truth About Origins, you can follow the link below to a page on the website of the Jacksonville Church of Christ in Alabama. The messsages are by Dr. Brad Harrub. The availability of more and more good material like this really demonstrates the value of the Internet. Click here to go to the site, then choose which lesson you want to hear.

Leadership Link

As we continue to encourage the development of new leadership in the church, we should read whatever good material we can find about how we can be the best possible leaders in the most important work in the world.

My friend Ron Thomas (who preaches in Illinois) has a brief article on his blog which is worth reading. Here's the link.

Monday Musings --

Our Youth Afternoon went great yesterday. John Williamson, Mike & Millissa Macomber, and Eric Percival were all involved in chaperoning and organizing the activities. I played the Alex Trebek role and hosted a Bible Jeopardy! tournament in which Jacob Hill edged out Sandra Todd in a very close match for the over-all victory in the Game of Champions! We had a sizable group from Ferndale participate with us. A Bible Bowl is being planned for late June at Ferndale where Skagit Valley and Ferndale youth and adults can compete. More details about that will be upcoming.

I had a phone call from a dear friend in Florida, an older sister in the church there named Aleathia Lackey. Aleathia was so proud several years ago to learn that her name is the Greek word for truth. She had reached the point that walking had become very difficult because of her knees. She recently had knee replacement surgery and has had some setbacks in her recovery so she called and asked for our prayers. She specifically asked me to pass on her request to the church here.

Sunday Update - April 27, 2008

Today's Record

Attendance this morning - 90

Prayer Requests Submitted Today:

Please pray for my dad as he has 3 CAT scans Tuesday. Pray all will be well. -- Karla Williamson

Shawn's sister-in-law has been in the hospital for a couple of weeks now. She was admitted to ICU and put on a ventilator and a semi drug-induced coma. She was given a 50/50 chance of survival. She had the most severe case of pancreatitis the doctor had ever seen, complicated by a severe staph infection in her blood. She was taken off the ventilator this week and moved to a regular room. She has heart, liver, and kidney damage. The doctor has told us to keep praying as she "should have died in ICU." The doctor admitted that she is in God's hands and her recovery is up to Him. -- Aleicia Boomer

Please continue to pray for my niece, Chelsea Eby. She came thru her surgery on Wednesday very well and will now be at home recovering for several weeks. Please pray for a quick recovery and that her cancer will not return. -- Rodney Blunt

Please pray for our daughter Brandy and her family. They're all having many struggles and difficult times right now. -- Judy Hill

Please pray for the family of Julia Smith, who passed away from cancer last week in Pensacola, FL. Especially pray for Katie Lindsey, who is Julia's ninety-something year-old-aunt who has lived with Julia for several years. I talked with "Aunt Katie" by phone yesterday and she is very upset. -- John Gaines

Praises and Thanksgiving

Thank you to Millissa M. for putting the teen songbook together.

Thank you to Rodney Blunt for repairing the drywall hole in the nursery.

Announcements:


Head for the Hills! Archery competition next Saturday. Potluck and your choice of main dish. Eat 12:00-1:30. Competition starts at 1:30 sharp.

Picture Board: We're working to get a picture board put up in the hall showing all our Skagit Valley church family. The easiest way is to let Trish Gaines take your picture any time over the next three weeks. If you already have a picture you would like to use: (1) If it's digital, email trishgaines@gmail.com -- (2) If it's a print you can donate it to be used or a non-studio picture can be scanned and your original returned to you. Contact Trish if you have any questions. We encourage everyone to participate.

Check Back Frequently:

We intend to share this information every Sunday, plus update the blog frequently during the week with news and tidbits of commentary and links to other interesting web sites. Please bookmark this site and check it as often as you can.

Are you a Blogger?

If you have a personal blog you would like listed on our links bar, just let me know.

John Gaines

Jeopardy and the Expelled Movie

Thanks to Millissa and Mike for their help in getting the Jeopardy game set up for our Youth Afternoon Sunday. I wrote the questions, but Millissa figured out a way to use the Power Point program to show the questions. Excuse me -- answers -- this is Jeopardy after all. I hope Sunday afternoon will be both a fun and educational time for our kids.

The movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed has attracted considerable attention since it premiered a week ago. Produced by and starring TV personality Ben Stein, it challenges the sacred cow of science and its closed mind against the possibility of Intelligent Design. The movie is not religious, per se, but by all accounts it does a good job of challenging the thinking of those who think that evolution provides all the answers.

Here is a review of the movie written by my friend Terry Frizzell: http://brotherhoodnews.com/2008/04/26/expelled-movie-review This originally appeared on the Gospel Preachers email discussion group. Here is another account of seeing this movie written by Chris Gallagher: http://preacherspen.org/?p=99

If any of you see the movie, make a comment here and let us know what you thought about it.

Where Do Preachers Get Sermon Ideas?

There are many possible answers to that question. Most often, my ideas come from simply studying the Bible and thinking about what I perceive to be the needs of the congregation. Sometimes, I pick up good useful ideas from books, articles, and online writings that I read. I don't think I've ever just taken somebody else's material and preached it verbatim, but just about all preachers borrow material and ideas from others. For example, Sunday night's sermon will talk about things we need to know about the Lord taken from the letters to the seven churches of Asia (in Revelation chapters 2 & 3). I'll be taking a class on Revelation in June taught by Dr. Stafford North from Oklahoma Christian University. Brother North has written a study book on Revelation (Unlocking Revelation. Nashville: 21st Century Christian, 2003). I've developed a sermon based on these seven "lessons" from his chapter on the seven churches:

1. Jesus knows His churches.
2. Christ wants churches to guard their teaching.
3. Christ wants Christians to live in purity.
4. Christ wants Christians to grow in service.
5. Christ wants Christians to be ready for persecution.
6. Christ wants Christians to know they can be lost.
7. Christ will richly reward those who overcome.

Come Sunday night April 27 at 6 p.m. and see how I develop these points . . . some of the ideas come from Dr. North; some of them are my own -- hopefully, all of them will be biblical and helpful to you as you seek to live each day for Jesus.

Ken and Tami

The Skagit Valley church is going to have to say goodbye to Ken and Tami Beach in the near future. When Trish and I made a three-day exploratory visit to Burlington for us to evaluate the possibility of working together in January 2007, we spent one night each with the Beaches, the Blunts, and the Wilkisons. Each family impressed us, but I'd have to say that Tami probably made the strongest impression of all (Ken was working at the hospital much of that weekend so we didn't get to spend as much time with him). Tami came across to us as a very compassionate and loving Christian lady, but one who wanted to get things going in a higher gear in the Lord's work here in the Skagit Valley. She was candid about problems the church had experienced in the past, but was also very positive in her outlook about what could come to pass in the future. She made us want to come here and be a part of the good things to come.

After we moved here in June, we quickly learned that Ken and Tami were good people to be around. Whether it was sitting with Ken in elders-preacher meetings and praying together for the needs of people in the congregation or sitting around a dining room table playing cards, there was a special bond of cammaderie and friendship with them. Obviously we aren't the only ones who have that kind of feeling about the Beaches. They will be missed by the whole church.

For quite a while, Ken had been aware of the danger of having his job (nurse anesthetist) replaced by anesthesiologists at Skagit Valley Hospital. When that came to pass, Ken first hoped to find employment at another hospital in commuting distance so he and Tami could still live in Mount Vernon. Ken is blessed/cursed with an occupation that is in great demand in some areas of the country while few jobs are available in other areas where the supply of physician anesthesiologists is greater. Eventually they concluded that would have to seek employment in some other part of the country. They visited hospitals in several places including Montana, Missouri, Virginia, but ended up accepting a job in northeastern Iowa. Ken will begin his work there in the near future, but they may be back here from time to time until their house sells.

Ken served as an elder of the Skagit Valley church. During that time, he served well in shepherding the church in the direction of greater service and commitment to doing the Lord's work and following carefully the teachings of Scripture. There is no doubt in my mind that I'm speaking for the whole church in saying that both Ken and Tami will be missed. We really and truly wish you didn't have to go, but we know that our loss will be a blessing to the kingdom of Christ in Iowa.

Back to Blogging

After almost a year, I'm starting again with good intentions in the world of blogging. This time I am undertaking to keep not one -- but two -- blogs current. This blog -- now titled Heavenly Ambition will be intended as a communication tool for the Skagit Valley Church of Christ. As God's people, it surely must be our ambition to get to heaven. All of us need all the encouragement and support we can get in that journey . . . so here we'll try to do just a small part of the job of building one another up in a sustaining faith that can see us through all the troubles and trials as well as sharing with one another's joys and triumphs. In other words, rejoicing with those who rejoice and weeping with those who weep. Share your comments and news . . . and make a habit of checking Heavenly Ambition frequently. I commit to do my best to keep it current.

The other blog is more personal. Some of it will be biblical in content. Other posts may deal with politics, sports, or anything else that interests me at the moment. It is titled Seeking the Light and its URL is http://lightseeking.blogspot.com/ Keep an eye on that one, too . . . and feel free to respond to anything I say.