Monthly News Letter from Pastor Bill
Dear Family,
What a blessing each day is in the Lord! I sure hope your relationship with Jesus Christ is progressing in the Spirit and you are daily getting closer to the One who deeply cares for you. Jesus is so amazing!
Welcome to 2012. I would like again this month to welcome our newest members. This month we have six who have joined by letter. On behalf of the church, we are greatly thankful to the Lord for Charley and Paula Simms, Vernie Wilson and her three grandchildren Michael and Brandon Wilson and Shyenne Haynie. Pray with me that the Lord will bless their walk as the seek Christ at our wonderful church.
If you have been with us in services you know that we have started going through the book of Nehemiah verse by verse. This book is a tremendous blessing as it shows how Jesus expects His church to be built and how we can partner with the Spirit of God as He erects and strengthens our faiths. This book has instruction on having vision, fighting spiritual warfare, worship, sanctification, prayer, the Word of God, etc. I have great expectations of our gracious Lord as we seek Him through the study of this book. I pray you will read and reread this book at home in your own personal studies and bring your copy of the Word as we study it together. (Click here to read ESV online)
God has laid in our laps some tremendous opportunities and blessings that I want to share with each of you. First, last year we were blessed with the largest tithes and offerings this church has ever recorded with $310,000 given to the work of the Lord. AMAZING! This is the most generous church of which I have ever heard. God blesses those who give generously of their first fruits and He will bless all who truly believe in Him and follow His principles for money. Thank you for believing in our magnificent God. This blessing brings a question as to what He is preparing us to accomplish. With great blessing comes great responsibility. We have some big visions for the future at Forestburg Baptist Church but to truly understand the priorities we must all be in prayer asking God to reveal them. I ask each of you to pray for our church and ask God to show us what He wants us to accomplish and that His generosity and favor will last as we seek His will and step in faith to do the mission He has given us. Praise God for His favor!
Another opportunity we have is to be a part of the Christian History for North Texas. The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association will conduct a Will Graham Celebration (his grandson) in March at Gainesville. Our church has been involved in the planning since June 2011. There are three things you could do to be a part of God saving many hundreds of souls who will receive Christ during the celebration. #1. Pray. Pray for the celebration, for North Texas, for Forestburg but most importantly pray for five people you know who need to accept Christ into their life. After praying ask God to orchestrate ways in which you can invite them to attend the celebration on March 16-18. #2. Get involved in a Christian Life and Witness course in February. We will take vans to St. Jo from our church at 6:30 on the 9th, 16th, and 23rd of February. These courses will teach you how to share your faith as well as strengthen your walk with Christ. They are awesome and have been nearly perfected over their 50 year history. Finally, give. The BGEA is raising funds for this event. If you feel God leading you to give above your tithes you may donate through the church and write specifically what it is for and we will give it directly on your behalf.
Finally, we are having a special focus on prayer on Sunday February 26th. Much will happen on this day. Our focus will be on praying for those who need Christ in their lives. That morning we will have a special breakfast at 9:15-9:45 in the Fellowship Hall. After breakfast, I have invited Dr. Ted Elmore (Southern Baptist of Texas Prayer Coordinator) to teach on prayer. He has his own ministry focused on prayer and has been doing this for many years for both the Southern Baptist and General Baptist conventions. He will also lead our worship services and teach on prayer. Finally, that evening we will regroup and pray from 6-8pm at a special prayer vigil. The vigil will be a “come and go as you can” evening. I do hope you will take advantage of this amazing opportunity.
There are so many things happening that I haven’t the ability to share them here. I will leave with one final thought. God has spoken so clearly through many avenues in my life lately; what He has been saying for me personally and for each of you is that we all need to be immersed in His Word and in prayer. The enemy is a deceiver and a thief and he wants nothing more than to deceive us and steal our joy in Christ. Thus, I beg of each of you not to miss an opportunity to be in the Word and to pray to your Lord. If you are capable but not regularly in church services submitted under the Word of Christ and with a group of believers you are out of God’s will for your life and I pray you will listen to His gentle nudge in this letter to come home or find another Bible believing church in which to worship and serve. I love you, our church loves you and most importantly our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ loves you. I’ll see you soon, Bible in hand!
In Christ’s Eternal Love,
Pastor Bill
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