Our Prayer Request:
All of Our Military, Their Family’s & All the Civilian Workers in The Middle East, Zee Mink Fuller and Family, Her son’s Bryan Armstrong and Hunter Hackie, Daughter Shannon, and Brother Philip & Sondra Thornsberry, Johnnie Stephens, Alecia Stephens, and children, Frankie Baldridge and daughter, Buckie Thompson, Frank & Sonya Trusty, Frank & Dawana Reigel, Andrew Preston, Larry & Martha Mollette and Her Family, Ted O'Bonion, Larry Mollette II & Family, Kerry Pennington, Kim Poole, Danny & Nita Mollette, The Muncy Family, Wendell Henderson, Joshua Kidd, Matthew Kidd, Ronnie and Sarah Henderson, Cindy Lane, Ronnie Henderson Jr. & Children, Ricky Henderson and Family, Jacie Henderson, Velma Hammond, Charles, Don Hammond and Families, Vickie Adkins, Archie & Barbara Griffin, Donna Johnson, James and Luann Reynolds, Timothy Fails, Nathan Fails, Jacob Ramsey, Jerry Hughes, Pastor G. L. Burr, Melody Carr, Janie Capps, Linda Hughes, Roy Lemmon, Rosie Tomlin, James and Lynn Tomlin, Pat Abercrombie, Donna Jones, Brandy Sullivan, Gina, Tammy Hairston and family, Brother Kelley and Sister Hinson, Manual Seymour, Sr, Dewayne Sewell, The Harris Family, Teresa Bookout, Little Titan Thomas (Trent and Tiffane Thomas child), James – Diane and Brooke Thomas, Jace Fails, Steve Sparks, Brother Harold & Ann McSwain, Brother Curtis Pugh, Brother Dan Sullivan and the work in Thailand, Brother Raul and the work in Romania, and Bro. Sergey Mochalov and the Churches in Russia.
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A Thought From our Pastor:
The Greedy
1 John 3:17 “But whoso hath this world's good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?”
I am a believer in sharing. Most of us have been without in this world and have been in the need of help. The worse people in this world is greedy people, but even worse are the greedy Christians. God has spoken so many times in His word about helping others in need. But, when it come to the household of God and other Christians, greed should never exist. No one will ever out give God, He has given so much us that it would be impossible to ever out give him. Let us look at a few gifts of God. (1.) He gave his love, before the creation of anything God had already given a remnant of people His love, (2.) He gave of His Son, God elected that only His Blessed Son could ever deliver the sinner from their sins, therefore He sent Him to this world born of a woman to sacrifice His life and blood for our sins. (3.) God gave the blessedness of adoption into His family, God could have chosen to give heirship to any of His creation but He chose to give it to the worst of His creation, sinful man. And (4.) He gave of the rest of the list of fruits listed throughout the scriptures. God did not have to give of these things, but he did and because He did we as believers in Jesus Christ are eternally blessed by God’s compassion. The Psalmist wrote in Psalms 86:15 “But thou, O Lord, art a God full of compassion, and gracious, longsuffering, and plenteous in mercy and truth.” The word compassion means - to have pity – This word compassion comes from the word mercy because it also means to have pity. Paul wrote of mercy "But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us...Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;)" Ephesians 2:4 – 5 God loved us because He was merciful unto us. God was not or is not forced to love us, He does not love everyone, but if you are saved then He loves you.” As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.” Romans 9:13 The purpose in going through all this is to show that God is the prime example of what love and kindness is. Giving without being asked too. The hardest thing for people to give up is their money. I know it is hard, but if we are going to follow the commandments of God, then we cannot sit around and watch other Christian do without. God asked if a Christian “…shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?” What would you do if you where the believer in need? Would you want someone to help you? Folk’s, we must be careful here and obey the will of God. It is easy for us to shut up the bowels of compassion, but it is not godly too. Let us all be thinking on this subject the next time we see another Christian do without because we refused to help them. God said “Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.” Hebrews 13:2 We must be careful, because we never know whom it is that is in need. Angels have visited this world as men several times and they could again. We need to think and pray before we shut-up the bowels of compassion to those believers in need. "Gracious is the LORD, and righteous; yea, our God is merciful." Psalms 116:5
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THE LAW AND CHRIST:By Brother Curtis Pugh
Signs and stickers proclaim “God's Ten Commandments.” Probably everyone knows that the ten commandments are a part of the Old Testament law of God. Paul wrote, “But we know that the law is good, if a man use it lawfully,” (1 Timothy 1:8). There is a right use of the Old Testament law and there is a wrong use of it. One is “lawful” while the other is not.
Paul explains the law's purpose, saying: “Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight,” (Romans 3:19-20). The purpose of the law is not to enable men to be righteous in God's eyes by their good works. Just the opposite is true. The law was given to shut men's mouths and stop them from boasting in their own good works. That is, to prove to individuals that they are “guilty before God.” The law does this since no person has ever nor can ever keep the law of God.
The Lord's brother, James, wrote: “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all,” (James 2:20). Peter called the law a “yoke” saying, “Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?” (Acts 15:10). Saved or lost, no man can keep the law!
Farther along in Romans 3 (quoted above) we read these words: “To declare, I say, at this time his [God's] righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith,” (Romans 3:26-27). Because of the sacrifice of Christ in the place of His sheep, God can now be just (fair) and at the same time “the justifier” of those who believe in Jesus. This is “the law of faith.”
This method of justification (God's declaring men righteous) does away with bragging! If God declared men righteous based upon their good works (law-keeping) they would have a right to boast. But “the law of faith” is this: God declares sinners righteous at the point of faith in Christ and so excludes boasting! Sinners saved by Christ have nothing in which they can boast! Even their faith “...is the gift of God,” (Ephesians 2:8). They can only glorify Christ for their salvation. After all, it is God's purpose, “That no flesh should glory in his presence,” (1 Corinthians 1:29). And so God's preachers proclaim this great truth: “And by him [Christ] all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses,” (Acts 13:39).
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