It's beginning to look a lot like CHRISTmas

Well the year has literally flown by, we’ve celebrated Thanksgiving which means that Christmas is right around the corner. On Sunday November 29^th, we will have celebrated the first Sunday of Advent beginning the anticipation of the celebration of our Savior’s birth. The Prophet Isaiah promised God’s people over 700 years before hand in 7:14 “Therefore the Lord Himself shall give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel.” Immanuel means “God with us”. God becoming man to be with us humans, for the express purpose of redeeming us back and providing a means for us to be in a right relationship with God through faith Jesus Christ. Contrary to our modern way of thinking of a first and last name, Jesus Christ is not the first and last name of our Savior. “Jesus” (Jehovah is Salvation) is the name God the Father named His Son born in the flesh who would be God’s provision for the salvation of mankind. “Christ” is his title from the Old Testament as the promised Messiah who would save His people from their sins. While the marketing agencies on Madison Avenue and retailers jockey for position to capitalize on gift buying dollars during this season of celebration, the politically correct crowd is going to do their best to shove Christ out of Christmas with the mantras of “Seasons Greetings” or “Happy Holidays”; for Christians, we know that its “CHRISTmas” and that Jesus really is the reason for the season. Regardless of what pop culture or the politically correct talking heads think, do not be ashamed to respond to people “Merry Christmas” when they tell you “Happy Holidays”. Put a big smile on your face and reply “Merry Christmas to you too.” Christ can only be removed from Christmas if we sit by and say nothing when we have opportunity. Just be sweet, show the love of Jesus and honor the Lord as you go.

This is an exciting time of year as we are preparing for a wonderful celebration of our Savior’s birth. I want to remind you it is one of the two times a year people will respond and come to church if you invite them. Many people want to go to church at Christmas and have no idea where to go, but if you invite them, they’ll come. I need your help doing just that, inviting people. Saturday Dec.5^th is our Christmas blitz where we’ll walk through a neighborhood near church and place a bag on door handles with our schedule of events, info on Calvary, a bag of popcorn with an invitation to “pop in and see us” and of course the gospel. We’ll have hundreds of these to pass out and we need people who will walk to distribute these. We’ll feed you lunch but plan now to help us on Saturday, Dec. 5^th at 11:00 a.m. If it pours the rain, we’ll aim for Sat.12^th. December 13 is our choir musical in both services, Ken and the choir have been working hard and I’ve heard pieces of their music and it is awesome. Invite people to come with you to hear this powerful musical. We’ll have Christmas carols in our worship services all through December and each service will be special.

We are also kicking off our Lottie Moon Christmas offering for international missions. Our church goal is $24,000.00 which is an incredible opportunity for us to invest in God’s kingdom. Our international mission board uses every dime of this money for missionary support on the field  and we have missionaries who cannot go overseas because there is not enough money to support them. I made a determination with my family several years ago that we would not spend more on ourselves at Christmas than we would give to the Lottie Moon Christmas offering as a birthday present to Jesus. What this meant for the Greens is that instead of giving our 5 kids each four presents, we might give them each 2-3 and we took the difference and gave that money to Lottie Moon as a gift to our kids in their names. Even as youngsters, our children got excited they could be part of the Lottie Moon Christmas offering. Let me challenge you to not spend more on yourselves than what you give to Jesus for the Lottie Moon offering. If we all made that commitment, we’ll not only meet our goal, we’ll exceed that goal. Of course I’m not living in a cave and I know it’s tough economically and there’s much uncertainty financially, but I do know that we can never out give God. He gave us the very best He had in the person of Jesus Christ, what a thrill to give so that others may know Him personally.

On a personal note, Cheryl and I pray that this Christmas will be a wonderful Christmas for you and your family. We thank God for you, we love you and we’re excited to see what the Lord will do through each of us this Christmas. From my little corner of the world to yours, it’s beginning to look a lot like CHRISTmas…

Ralph Green

Senior Pastor, Calvary Baptist Church

www.calvarybelair.com

Posted via email from Pastor Ralph

Bearing much fruit...

This past week, I attended the annual meeting of the Baptist Convention of Maryland-Delaware. I was so encouraged that our state convention has a vision to plant new churches and strengthen existing churches. I was pleased to see pastors of our local Susquehanna Association in key positions of responsibility and taking on leadership roles in our convention. I was humbled to be asked to serve in leadership so quickly and was amazed to be elected as the President of the Pastor’s Conference for 2011. What this means is that I’ll be involved in planning the Pastor’s meeting on Monday of the convention that year. One of the guest preachers, a fellow named Ron Sylvia from Florida challenged our convention with a question that has bugged me almost non-stop since he asked it. He had someone ask this of him related to his church years ago and it bugged him also. The question is this: “If Calvary Baptist Church ceased to exist tomorrow, would the community (in our case Bel Air and Harford County) notice it was gone?”

Of course we’d all miss it, the other churches around would notice, the association and state convention would notice because of our giving; but what he means is, would the pagan lost people in Harford County notice we were gone? What a challenging question that is! For those of us who want to make a difference for the kingdom of God, I hope it will bug you like it has me. I think at this point in our history, the answer would be yes and no. I think things like our care night food ministry would be something people would take notice of. I think the AARP who uses our facility for tax consultation would miss us. There are probably some other areas people would miss us. The thing that bugs me primarily is most of the “missing” would be due to our facility usage. People shouldn’t miss us because of our buildings, they should miss us because of the people, the people who are so in love with Jesus, they are showing God’s love to a lost and dying world which is consumed with pursuing every form of pleasure and entertainment trying to fill a God sized hole in their lives. They should miss us because we were responsible to introduce them to the Savior. Does this mean we’re failing? I do not believe so. I think we have much on the ball and that we are making a difference, but this question challenges me to what else we can do. I wish I could tell you I have it all figured out. I don’t.

Having had this question rolling around in my head now for a couple of days since I heard it Sunday night, I’ve been talking to the Lord about this. This morning in my quiet time, I was reading in John 15:5 “I am  the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.” Jesus goes on to answer the question for us in vs. 7-8 “If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you. By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be my disciples.”

By abiding in Christ and in His Word, Jesus promised when we ask Him to help us become fruit producers, it will happen, it will bring glory to the Father when we bear much fruit. Isn’t that awesome? That God wants us, the people of Calvary to produce much fruit in the form of lives that He wants to change and transform. In this same passage, Jesus talks of pruning dead wood so the tree will begin to produce fruit again. We need to evaluate what we’re doing and why we’re doing it. What’s not producing fruit, we need to prune and even what is, sometimes needs pruning so it will be more effective. I love my mom’s strawberry jelly she’s made for years. I’ve watched dad mow down her strawberry patch, but boy does it produce strawberries next year!

I’ve said and continue to believe that some of the best and most effective ministries Calvary will ever have haven’t even been started yet. But God wants to do something great and mighty in and through you, the people of Calvary. He wants us to bear much fruit – not just so the community would weep if we weren’t here. The point is that we would bear fruit that lasts for eternity to the glory of God. The next question is, “what about me, am I bearing fruit for Jesus?” If not, ask what do I need to prune to begin producing fruit? Ask yourself if you’re abiding in Christ and asking him to make you fruitful. Something to think about from my little corner of the world to yours…

Ralph Green

Senior Pastor, Calvary Baptist Church

www.calvarybelair.com

Posted via email from Pastor Ralph