New PM Series -- The Lord's Supper

I am looking forward to this Sunday night's worship.  We will begin a new study series focused on the Lord's Supper.  The plan is to spend three weeks studying everything the Bible teaches about this very important type of worship.  A study like this maybe doesn't sound as exciting as some others like, "Spiritual Warfare" or "End Times Prophecy", but the truths we will uncover in this study are just as valuable to our walk and our worship.

So here is a rough outline of what is coming...

Week 1 (3.13)  -- The First Lord's Supper

• The Setting
• The Elements
• The Meaning of the Supper
• The Instructions To Repeat
• The Controversies
• Transubstantiation
• Consubstantiation
• Memorialism

Week 2 (3.20) --  How The Lord's Supper Was Practiced

• The First Church
• The Corinthian Church
• The Love Feast
• The Error
• How to Properly Prepare For and Partake In the Lord's Supper

Week 3 (3.27) -- Celebration

• Questions & Answers
• A Unique Celebration of the Lord's Supper

There is a 50-50 chance we won't get this done in three weeks, but that is the goal.  If you want to read ahead, review these passages...

• Mark 14:22-25
• Matthew 26:26-29
• Luke 22:17-20
• 1 Corinthians 11:17-34

Pastor Noel

Lord's Supper

This Sunday morning we will share in the taking of the Lord's Supper in our main worship service. Ordinarily we do this in the evening, so this will be a special event.

I've been thinking about what I want to say for a while now. As I have studied the first Lord's Supper in Scripture, I believe the Lord has shown me a great insight into how to communicate the importance and value of this special celebration.

We will be focusing on the account of the events just preceding the Lord's Supper in John 13. I encourage you to prepare by reading the chapter and asking the Lord to prepare your heart. It will be a good day of worship!

Pastor Noel

Prayer Requests...

Last week was a challenging week. It wasn't a bad week, just a challenging one. I had two very long days that I don't think I really ever recovered from, several counseling appointments a few of which were heart rending, one day trip to St. Louis, and a few distractions. Sunday was a good day. We had a good service in the morning; the deacons and I did our last day of one-at-a-time Lord's Suppers; and we had two good services in the evening.

I am looking forward to this week. It is starting off well. I got some very good news this morning that I believe is the Lord saying that this is going to be a good week of ministry, full steam ahead...

Here are some things to keep in your prayers...

• I have prospect visits lined up for Tuesday and Wednesday evenings. Pray for these families.
  
• Donna and the girls and I are praying about doing our first big family mission trip this Summer. We are going to try to make a decision in the next couple of weeks. Donna is working on passports right now, just in case.
• So far this morning, we've had seven people sign up for our April 1 New Member's class! Pray that we will be able to make connections with all of those God is sending our way.
• We have a leadership meeting (council) this Wednesday where we will be considering some upgrades to our youth ministry.
• VBS meetings this week...
• We are making the last preparations for publicizing our Easter services this year. We have a very special presentation the Friday before Easter, and then we will offer our Easter worship service three times on Sunday.

Thanks for the Prayers!
Pastor Noel

Quick Update...

It has been a week or so since I've posted, so here is a quick update of what has been going on...

• In the past couple of weeks we've added six new members to our church in addition to six baptisms! It is great to see how God is working in people's lives and how our church has been able to be a part of that. It was also great to see the generations represented in the baptism time. Of the six we baptized the Sunday before last, one was in the 12-18 age group, one was in the 19-25 age group, two were in the 26-35 age group, and two were in the 60+ age group.

• I was able to make three prospect visit appointments following the morning worship and the Sunday Extra Worship yesterday! Thank the Lord for the opportunities for ministry that He has set before us.

• This coming Sunday will be the last day of our 'family at a time' Lord's Supper services. The original plan was to bring every interested family in one at a time for a time of prayer and worship through the Lord's Supper in one marathon day. Well, one day turned into two and now three. When it is all said and done I will have been able to pray with hundreds of people in family groups and share the Lord's Supper with them. This has turned into one the highlights of my ministry life.

• Things are progressing with bringing Scott Parry in and up to speed as our new administrator and ministry director. Tomorrow will be focused solely on that. Scott and I will be spending the day consulting with another church that has made a similar transition.

• Sunday Extra Worship... Last night was our second official week of our Sunday Extra Worship service (if you don't know, this is a repeat of our morning service that takes place on Sunday evenings at 6:30 in Harmon Hall). How is it going? So far, so good. Not counting children and children's workers, we had 48 in the service the first week and 58 in the service last night. We have several people who are completely new to our church attending. Keep on praying. Invite people you know who may be interested in a little more laid back service that takes place in the evening...

• The five staff wives spent this past weekend together at a Beth Moore conference for pastor's wives in Nashville. Sounds like they had a great time. I hope you will keep them in your prayers. They play such an important role in our church and often make thankless sacrifices that few people know about. Praise the Lord for the character and sweet spirit that each of those ladies possess.

Pastor Noel

Study Retreat

Well, I'm in Greensboro, NC this morning heading back to Ohio after spending a great week getting away to do some studying. I am both exhausted and refreshed... and I am very much looking forward to tomorrow.

Let me say a giant thank you to my wife and girls for allowing me to be away from the family for seven days. This wasn't the easiest week for them for me to be gone. They are so supportive of me, though. I've got the greatest family in the world.

Also a big thanks to Pastor Wally, Pastor Shawn, and Pastor Troy for holding down the fort while I was away. Either everything went great while I was gone or they've done a good job of keeping anyone from calling me and telling me what went wrong. Either way is good. Thanks for all of your extra work.

I am thankful for a church that allows me to take a pause in my schedule like this and spend a week focused on the ministry of prayer and the Word.

Let me share with you what I was able to get done in a week's time...

I was able to have six extended, uninterrupted, unhurried devotional times of Bible reading and prayer. That was very refreshing!

I was able to read four books... One on writing (called "On Writing"), one on time management, one on how to better study and prepare, and one on apologetics. The last one I would recommend to you. It is called "The Reason for God" by Timothy Keller. Keller is a pastor of a very large church in New York City. He spends a lot of time ministering to a crowd of people who have many intellectual and cultural objections to believing in Jesus Christ. In this book he shares how our faith can best be taught and defended in a modern culture.

I was also able to write 65 pages on a project that will form the basis for a sermon series in the Fall. As a church we will use this both as a sermon series and also in new member training. More to come...

This has been my most productive study week ever.

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I am really looking forward to tomorrow. Four big events have got my motor running...

First, I will be preaching a message in the morning service on having margin in our lives and in our marriages. I have been looking forward to preaching this message for six weeks.

Second, we will be worshiping through the Lord's Supper in a very different way tomorrow. I've never done this before so I don't know for sure how it will go, but I am excited. During all of my time tomorrow when I'm not preaching (we will be having three worship services tomorrow, more on that in a moment), I will be leading in worship through the Lord's Supper in my study. I will meet with the church body, one family at a time, every seven minutes, for prayer and worship. I think the deacons have a great system worked out to make this a very special time for our church. Carla told me this week that so far we've got people signed up for every seven minutes until sometime past 9:00 p.m. It will be a long day, but I am looking forward to it. There are still slots available if your family hasn't signed up yet, but they are all after 9:00. We may do this again the following week to accommodate those we couldn't fit in this week, but I'm not sure. I'm trying to move some things around on my schedule to make it work.

Third, we will have a 'members only' preview of our new 'Sunday Extra Worship.' Beginning next week we will be re-doing our Sunday morning worship service on Sunday evenings after our regular Sunday evening service. I know that sounds complicated, you'll have to hear more as we talk about it at church tomorrow if you don't already know how it works. Our prayer is that this new service will do two things... First that it will help relieve the overcrowding in the morning service, and secondly that it will allow us to reach people we could never have reached before. We will be doing something special in the 'preview' tomorrow.

The fourth special thing tomorrow is a special announcement we will be making. I have been working with the leaders of our church for a few months on a special project that I think is going to be the key to our church reaching a new level in its outreach and its ministry. We have worked and prayed very hard to get this put together. Tomorrow we will be able to share the good news...

Well, I need to get on the road so I can see my family...

Pastor Noel