Sunday, July 3rd, 2005

I Surrender All. If I could some up the theme of this morning, it was for me the song I Surrender All. We spoke on "The Joy of Being Used Up and Wasted for God" as we look at the last beatitude in Matthew 5:10-12, "Blessed are the persecuted." We have spent the last two months talking about Experiencing the Joy of Jesus, and it has been a challenging study for me. I am glad we went through the beatitudes, as I feel it has been a good series. I just pray that our people get the last one - blessed are the persecuted - that they remember those who have endured persecution (and who are enduring persecution) - and that they surrender all. I pray that our people at The Journey would live in such a way that they will embody the wisdom of Jim Elliot who said, "He is no fool who gives up that which he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose" - surrendering all. For our invitation, we sang the song I Surrender All. God help us to do more than just sing that song, but to live it!

It is the summer, and we were missing many families, but our attendance was still at 102! We praise the Lord for that, and trust that God will continue to add to our numbers. A man named Pete was back for the 2nd week, and I hope to get to speak to him as last week (June 26th) he raised his hand that he asked Jesus Christ into his life. I hope that we are able to minister some more to him.

Our second service was small this week, and I hope that I can get this service built up some more. I would appreciate your prayers on this.

But the highlight of the day was baptizing Zander Allen and Kriss Gagno (see pictures below). I love seeing people respond obediently to Jesus Christ, and this is the very first step of obedience for any Christian. The water was colder, but it was good.

I thank God for what He is doing at The Journey. I pray that our people would break and learn to truly surrender. Some of our people are HARD - hard nosed and hard-hearted. Pray that the Lord would break them down and that they would make themselves mold-able in the Lord's hands.