First Baptist Church

Happy March Everyone,

In February, the whole of Church Council met on a Tuesday night to discuss Thom Rainer’s book Welcoming Church. Below I will share with you some highlights from the meeting, but first I want to invite you to borrow a copy of the book and read it for yourself. Copies are available from Cindy in the church office and also in the church library. It is a short and easy read, but many felt it was very beneficial.

We began our council meeting by looking at the facility inventory results. The two items receiving the lowest scores were Interior and Exterior Signage. These two items will be top on the list for the church leadership this year. The next two areas of concern are harder to mend: Bathrooms and Parking Lots. It will take some planning and coordination, but the Diaconate will be discussing them as well.

The round-table discussions that night covered every aspect of Rainer’s book: Greeters, a Welcome Center, Children’s Ministry and Nursery Expectations, and First-Time Visitor Expectations. Diaconate members took notes of the ideas and input, and will compare those notes at their meeting this month.

Our meal (with special thanks to the kitchen helpers: Jim and Kathy Briney, Nelda Love, and Mary Ellen Lowe) included Rosemary Beef Roast, French Onion Chicken, and a few sides. The Brussels Sprouts Gratin were particularly good and several asked me to print the recipe.

Brussels Sprouts Gratin

Prep: 45min – Bake: 10min Servings: 10

2lb Brussels Sprouts, quartered 2 Tbsp Butter, melted
3⁄4 tsp. Salt
1⁄8 tsp. Pepper

CREAM SAUCE
1 Large Onion, chopped
3 Tbsp Butter
3 Tbsp All-Purpose Flour
1 Cup Whole Milk

CREAM SAUCE (cont’d)
1 Cup Whole Milk
1 Cup Heavy Whipping Cream 1⁄8 tsp. White Pepper
Ground Nutmeg

TOPPING
1⁄2 Cup Shredded Gruyere Cheese 1⁄4 Cup Grated Parmesan Cheese

Preheat oven to 425°F. In a large bowl, combine Brussels sprouts, butter, salt, and pepper; toss to coat. Transfer to a greased 13×9 baking dish. Bake, uncovered, for 25-30 minutes or until sprouts are tender, stirring occasionally.

Meanwhile, for the sauce, in a large skillet, saute onion in butter until tender. Stir in flour until blended; gradually add milk and cream. Bring to boil; cook and stir for 2 minutes or until thickened. Stir in pepper and a dash of nutmeg; pour sauce over sprouts. Sprinkle with cheeses. Reduce heat to 350°F. Bake, uncovered, for 10-15 minutes or until heated through and cheeses are melted.

Our meeting went a little long, ending at 9pm, but the input from the Council was so helpful. We will be Establishing a Visitor and Guest Parking area where 10th Street and Main Street converge. This will encourage visitors and guests to use the North Entrance and the Old Main Entry. I am excited to see what other ideas we can implement this year. Please take the time to read the book and let Diaconate Members and Church Staff know of any suggestions you believe would be effective.

Paul gives an instruction to the Church in Rome; Romans 12:13b simp- ly says, “Practice hospitality.” The word here and most of the time in the New Testament is Philoxenia. Philo meaning “love, brotherly/ friendship.” Xenia meaning “stranger, someone different, unknown.” Philoxenia would quite literally read “Love of Strangers.” What a great concept. It is akin to the Love of God for the world and the motive of the Great Commission.

I look forward to your input,

Pastor Dave

A quote I saw recently made me stop and think. “Love is an ocean of emotion in a sea of expense.” I got to thinking about how this is kind of true in a fun- ny way. The love we feel for our marriage partner and even for our kids is an ocean of emotion. It’s a huge swelling of emotions, ups and downs. We have intense feelings about the people that we love. Falling in romantic love with someone brings high emotions. We feel strongly about the person, their qualities, their needs and wants, and about their futures. We often put their own needs above our own and think about the other person, as the common phrase says, as “My Better Half.”

Love for our kids is also intense. Our love compels us to do for them what we would do for no other. We love them intensely, more than any child understands until they have a child of their own. Our concern for them can come across as protective or corrective, but should never hollow.

But love is also a sea of expense. Marriage is hardly a cheap endeavor. And the average cost to bring a child to adulthood has a lot of zeros at the end. Love is definitely not cheap.

But this all brings me back to thinking about God’s love for us. We often forget that God has strong emotions for us. He loves us immensely. His emotions are real and they move him to do incredible things for us.

But God’s love is also a sea of expense. Loving us was not cheap. The cost of his love was the life of his one and only son. Love, in its most pure and excellent form, is truly an ocean of emotion in a sea of expense.

One of my favorite passages of Scripture is 2 Peter 1:5-7. It says, “Make every effort to supplement your faith with praise, praise with knowledge, knowledge with self-control, self-control with endurance, endurance with godliness, godliness with kind- ness, kindness with love.” (I have used the word praise instead of goodness in the translation and the why will need to wait for another day.) These verses indicate that we have some meas- ure of control in the development of our own spiritual lives. The verse begins with the words – make every effort. It means that we should be striving for spiritual growth. It means, at least in some measure, spiritual growth lies within our own hands. (See notes below.)

As we begin 2024, we should take a moment and think about what sort of spiritual growth the Lord would like for us this com- ing year. Billy Graham is quoted as saying, “This new year affords us an opportunity to take spiritual inventory of our lives to see if our spiritual resources are sufficient for the needs and demands of the coming days.” Have you developed the spiritual resources that you need for 2024? Are you prepared for the parenting and marriage hurdles that you will need to face? Do you have the resources for the physical and health challenges that lie ahead? Will the expectations of your work and finances be met with the spiritual abilities at your disposal?

The time for developing these resources is now, and not in the midst of the difficulty. And this is one reason why New Year’s resolutions are important. They give us the opportunity, as Billy Graham says, to make spiritual progress and increase our spiritual resources.

As you think about your spiritual resolutions, here are five wise things that would be SMART to keep in mind…

Specific. A general goal of just being a better person is usually too vague. Like Peter suggests, you may want to set a specific goal about your worship, or your knowledge of God, or in some way develop self control or kindness.

Measurable. You probably should include a way of keeping track of your goal. How many times a year or a month or a week you will do something. How many books of the Bible will you read. What dollar amount or percentage will you contribute to the needs of others?

Achievable. Sometimes our goals can be too high. So it is usually better to start modestly and if we are successful to increase that goal.

Christmas is one of the best times of the year. People are usually filled with joy and generosity and even people who aren’t regulars at church tend to be thinking about Jesus. Images of the nativity are visible at stores and in peoples front yards. Carols about Jesus’s birth fill the air and are entertainment at shopping venues.

People often think of Jesus as a good man or a prophet, but many people do not understand him to be the incarnate Son of God. The apostle John makes the incarnation a centerpiece in his writings.

1 John 4:1-3 says, “Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. This is how you can recognize the spirit of God: every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flash is from God, but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus, as not from God.”

The apostle John was combating the idea in his day, that Jesus was a spirit and not a real human being. They had the idea that Jesus had shown up but not in the flesh, thus they were denying the incarnation. There was a concept, which we call Gnosticism, and they believed flesh (being bad) and spirit (being good) were so divided and different that they could not coexist. In order to make Jesus deity, they had to deny his humanity.

This is the reason why John includes the words “every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh from God, but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God.” The most common error in John’s day about Jesus was a denial of his humanity. By denying Jesus’ humanity, they also denied his birth, death, and resurrection.