Question: How many people do you think will read this bulletin? If you read this, please let me know so I can get an idea. My guess is significantly less than 30% of the church. Yet, for some reason, we keep writing them. Why? 

I am also lucky enough to manage a group of people at work. And I can’t tell you how often I have had people ask for information I already gave them. There have even been times when people complained in group settings about not having information I had sent to the group in written and verbal form. So why do I keep providing information to the organization?  

The real problem to the questions above is why I have such a misunderstanding of human nature, that I even ask the question. Does anyone listen – generally, no – and that is normal. Study after study has shown that people are bad listeners. As any type of leader, we should expect to have to say something seven times for most, not even all, of the group to hear what we are saying. However, if we don’t say anything, no one in the group will be able to listen. 

The same thing goes for spreading the Gospel. If we don’t say anything, no one will hear it. Jesus was the greatest teacher of all time, yet most people did not believe. And he kept teaching. We also need to just keep teaching, knowing that most will not believe or listen. But some will – and that is why we teach! 

Pay Attention to Others.  Generosity starts when you pay attention to someone else.  Have a meaningful connection with someone.  Spend 30 minutes with someone who seems lonely.  Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Philippians 2:3 

Build Bridges.  Be brave and offer a hand of forgiveness and friendship to someone on the other side of an issue you care about.  Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as Godin Christ forgave you.  Ephesians 4:32 

Share Knowledge and Wisdom.  You possess knowledge and wisdom that others may benefit from.  Sharing it could light up someone’s life.  Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom.  Colossians 3:16a 

Extend Hospitality and Enable Connections.  Host a dinner party and encourage deep conversation.  Enrich your social circle by including people who may not know each other very well.   When you give a dinner or banquet, do not invite your friends, or your brothers, or your relatives, or your rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid.  But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you.  For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.  Luke 14:12 - 14 

-Kliff Rodgers

King Solomon was given more wisdom than anyone who has ever lived, with the exception of Jesus, yet even with his wealth of knowledge he still lived a life of disobedience in many ways. Because of his disobedience, he was led to do unthinkable things, like worshipping false gods. This alarms me, because I am not as wise as Solomon- not by a long shot. How can I be sure that I don’t fall into the same deplorable acts? Ironically, Solomon can help.  

Ecclesiastes 12:13 says,  

The end of the matter, all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments for this is the whole duty of man. 

This is a very simple command, but the simplicity of a commandment does not mean that the obedience will also be simple. The most important truths of the Bible are easy to understand, but we have been struggling to obey from the very beginning. Wisdom and obedience alike begin with the fear of God. Proverbs 1:7 says, 

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge;  

A wonderful thing is that when we fear the Lord, and begin to live a life of obedience, our obedience that began in fear becomes an obedience that is born of love and overwhelming gratitude. How does the love and gratitude occur? It begins to develop when, by faith, we obey and observe that God’s ways are truly better than our own and that every teaching is for our greatest good and never for our harm. Having wisdom alone is not enough to live a Godly life, but wisdom combined with obedience produces a harvest of righteousness.         

May God bless us all! 

Mike Pawlik 

So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath; 20  for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God.  (James 1:19,20) 

 Most of us can remember those times that we got angry and said something we later regretted.  James in encouraging us to listen and be slow to speak was telling us that our anger often results in saying hurtful words to another.  Therefore, anger can bring about harm, both to those we react to in a harmful way as well as to ourselves.  James tells us in verse 20 that our wrath or anger does not produce the righteous life that God desires. 

Anger must be controlled if we desire to live righteously.  Paul wrote "Be angry, and do not sin…”  (Eph 4:26)  Anger itself is not a sin but certainly the result of uncontrolled anger or wrath is.  What can we do when that anger occurs - LISTEN.  Be slow to react or say anything before we think of what we are saying.  Being slow and hesitating before we speak also gives us an opportunity to say a prayer to ask God’s help.  This is the righteous life that God desires.  Our Lord is the great example of this, when Christ was arrested, brought before Caiaphas the high priest and accused by false witnesses the scripture says Christ remained silent.   This is a wonderful example, even if the words spoken by another hurt, we need to be slow to speak and maybe even remain silent.  

 Solomon wrote, “A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver.” (Prov. 25:11) Historians tell us that at Solomon’s banquets the dinner settings would be an apple made of pure gold that was a present for the guest to keep.  Let us always be slow to react that our words will impart grace to those who hear and be as precious as an apple of pure gold.  

Grace and peace, Bill Holt 

Isaiah 7:14 - Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. 

The virgin birth of Jesus has long been a source of debate. Some reject it outright, others downplay its significance, while others view it as important but oddly disconnected from all else that we know about Jesus. Each of those views is wrong.  

The virgin birth of Christ is central to the deity of Christ. We know that Jesus is both man and God. Not half man and half God, or man some of the time and God some of the time. Jesus is both man and God — 100% man and 100% God. 

How can that be explained? The only answer is the virgin birth. The only answer is that Mary was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit (Matthew 1:18). The only answer is that “when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman” (Galatians 4:4). Christ’s deity demands Christ’s virgin birth.  

The virgin birth explains the significance of the name Immanuel — God with us (Matthew 1:23). The virgin birth explains how Jesus is the only begotten Son of God (John 3:16).  The virgin birth explains Jesus’ statement that “before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58). The virgin birth explains how Jesus “is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation” by whom “all things were created, in heaven and on earth” (Colossians 1:15-16). The virgin birth explains how “there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus” (1 Timothy 2:5).  None of these things can be explained or understood apart from the virgin birth.  

The virgin birth of Christ was prophesied in Isaiah 7, it happened in Matthew 1, and the attributes and work of Christ absolutely and fundamentally require his virgin birth.  Let’s proclaim the virgin birth, and let’s thank God for the virgin birth!  

“For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” (Isaiah 9:6) 

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14)