Weekly Encouragement
Good Wednesday Everyone,
Blessings to all this week. Don’t forget – Tonight is our Wednesday Night Fellowship. The menu is spaghetti, so as always help where you can with a side to pass or a dessert to share. The Bible study afterwards will continue in Revelation. We have just started so join us for this exciting study. We have had an excellent turn out with our children in recent weeks – Thank you parents for bringing your children to church. Children love being in church, and this will result in teens, and young adults, and families who love to be in church. Later this month: January 29, 2023, we have our “Fifth Sunday Fellowship”. We will meet in the fellowship hall immediately after the service. All are welcome!! This is an excellent opportunity to invite others to Bethel Baptist. The greatest social media platform you will ever have is a loving Christian church, and Bethel Baptist is such a place. If anyone has any ideas, input, or vision for any of our ministries please let one of Bethel Baptist staff members know. We want to meet the needs of families and children the best we can. Lastly for announcements, remember Bethel’s website (www.bethelfortdeposit.com) and Facebook page. Direct others to it and share your blessings with others. What matters to you, matters to others.
We continue in our sermon series of “Navigating Through Life” seen through the calling upon Nehemiah. Nehemiah’s was called to rebuild the wall surrounding Jerusalem. In Nehemiah’s day a city’s wall provided safety from criminals and security from invasion. In America today, we don’t live in walled cities. The city walls exist from our overwhelming superior and fierce military forces, 24-hour mobile law enforcement units, and 24/7 advanced security systems we depend upon for protection. But imagine life without a national military, law enforcement, and a severely limited ability to protect yourself and your family. This was the way life in Jerusalem. Nehemiah arrived with a much-needed solution, empowered by the Persian King Artaxerxes, with all the resources to get the job done. However, God’s calling upon Nehemiah’s life wasn’t about having all the necessary worldly resources. God’s calling was about obedience to what God directed Nehemiah to do in the powerful name of God.
So, for us today, in whatever God is calling you personally or Bethel Baptist congregationally to do it will be from the application of rebuilding the walls around another’s life. Because consider this truth, every resource to rebuild someone’s walls is available. Acceptance is available. Forgiveness is available. Faith is available. Grace, hope, love, prayer, truth, and Scripture is available. And far above all these – Jesus Christ is available. Each week our encouragement ends with a closing phrase, it’s not written to be clever or witty. It’s written because we at Bethel Baptist and within each of us personally have the answers for people’s lives. We all know a person or a family trying to live without walls. At Bethel Baptist we have the solution, we are empowered by the King of Kings, and we have all the resources available to rebuild lives.
If you haven’t joined our sermon series, there is plenty of time and it is never too late. We are learning together at the pace God is leading. Join us at Bethel Baptist. Invite someone to join us at Bethel Baptist. Prepare to hear God’s call because, “people really want what we have, they just don’t know it yet.” What we have are answers through grace firmly grounded in faith, hope, and love.
In Christ Jesus,
Pastor Michael
