Pray for Compassion / Missions

For the past 40 Days we have been praying for Ingathering. Today is the day. We will give well. We will give sacrificially. Then what?

Our mission is to glorify God by sharing the gospel and serving others. So, that is what we must continually refocus toward, and missional opportunities lie before us we must all get behind. Join us in praying for and serving in the success of these opportunities:

The Compassion Experience—2-weeks from now the Compassion Experience will be here for a 4-Day event. Presently we have over 1,800 registered attenders (Fri – 428, Sat – 745, Sun – 488, Mon – 152). We expect 50% of people to RSVP and 50% of people to simply walk up. Therefore, our estimate of seeing 4,000+ people on our campus for the event is certainly realistic. You can sign up today to help at our Hospitality Center or to work in the Compassion Experience on any of the days they are here, Oct 9-12. Our goal is 100 prospect families and 200+ children sponsored. My prayer is that 20 of those children are sponsored by Shadycrest families. Pray & Serve with us! 

Kids Hope Mentors—we will have 10 trained mentors this year. Pray for them and pray they are matched up with the kids God wants us to help!

Operation Christmas Child—our world missions ministry to care for needy kids at Christmas. Pray for success. Begins in October.

Angel Tree—our local missions ministry to care for needy kids at Christmas. Pray for success. Begins right before Thanksgiving (Nov.).

I Love My Church!

Lately I’ve been contemplating all the great things I love about Shadycrest. As I began to make a list I was overwhelmed by the number of great ministries and great people we have here who serve the LORD so well. It literally made me exclaim, “I love my church!”

I LOVE:

Watching our kitchen crew serve our members with great love.

Hearing the stories of members like Alvin Rose and Gene Weaver who visit our homebound and nursing homebound. 

Listening to the testimonies of our youth (Blaine Israel) about what God is doing in their young lives.

Hearing the giggles and watching the smiles as the children played this past week at our AWANA kickoff carnival.

 Praying with our prayer warriors during our 40 Days of Prayer.

Singing with our Celebration Choir and awesome praise band. 

There is so much to love about Shadycrest! What a great place to serve the LORD!
What do you love about Shadycrest? I’d love to hear your story. If you have a story to tell, please contact me. I’m collecting stories and I truly want to hear yours. Call or write me ASAP, and tell me why you love your church! 

Moms Are Awesome

The phrase, “working mother,” is redundant. 

Of course she works, and harder than we men and we her children fully realize! We know our mother’s work hard and we often wonder why they don’t complain more than they do? This answer is obvious too…because they are too busy to have time to complain! We all can learn a lot from this example. Proverbs 31 describes her well when it says, “She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness.”

Have you ever wondered what it is about your mother’s house that makes you feel like you can fully relax? Let me help you with the answer…it’s your mother! Even the memory of your mother there is comforting and helps you feel at home, helps you relax, and helps you think everything will be okay. In other words, moms are kind of like superheroes. They should be given super hero capes upon leaving the hospital after giving birth to each child.

Quite possibly my favorite quote about moms is this: “you can fool some of the people some of the time, but you can’t fool your mom” (anonymous). Oops, shame on me for trying all those years.

Washington Irving once said of mothers, “A mother is the truest friend we have, when trials heavy and sudden, fall upon us; when adversity takes the place of prosperity; when friends who rejoice with us in our sunshine desert us; when trouble thickens around us, still will she cling to us, and endeavor by her kind precepts and counsels to dissipate the clouds of darkness, and cause peace to return to our hearts.” 

Stay on Target...Stay on Target

Yes…for all you Star Wars fans…the title of this blog is a reference from the movie! These encouraging words helped Luke Skywalker to stay focused on his mission: to drop a bomb into the belly of the Death Star and destroy it, stopping the evil plot of the Empire.

Our mission is quite different in many regards, but the focus we need to stay on target is just as pronounced as it was that day for a young Skywalker. Most people generally feel that the condition of the world is not getting any better and that conditions are actually worsening each year. I would agree. For Christians especially, recent months have recorded stories of Christian persecution that feel more like pages ripped out of the book of Exodus than modern-day news reports.

A Christian couple beaten to death and then burned in a kiln…more than 200 schoolgirls kidnapped in Nigeria…a mother forced to give birth in chains in Sudan…the mass exodus (millions) of families forced from their homes in Syria, driven out by the brutality of ISIS…the violence and cruelty seem to know no bounds.

If we don’t understand it, we are certainly starting to feel it, even as we are “safe” in our nice homes here in the US. The news reports are getting closer and closer to home each day. Christ will be the only solid rock that will supply us with hope in trying times. Mark 13:31 says, “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.”

We live in a lost and dying world!!! And, we possess the only cure…the hope of the gospel!!! It is too precious a gift to hold for ourselves…we must share it! Focus now…let’s stay on target!