Every Tuesday we publish a blog post to lay out in one place what’s going in the life of the church for the upcoming week. See below for a snapshot of what’s on the calendar this week:
French Park Run Club
6:30am - French Park Grass Area
Sunday Gathering at the Ebell Club
10:00am - Meeting Room: Ballroom
On Sunday, we learned that because Christ has provided for our eternal life upon a new earth, we should provide for one another’s lives on earth here and now. He’s given himself to us, so we give ourselves to others. This is the glorious principle at the bottom of all our benevolence. So, HOW do we embrace it and apply it today?
Here are 5 ways you can walk out your responsibility to “keep” your natural and spiritual brother, love your neighbors in need, and respond to the care of Christ.
Feel Responsible - You ARE your brother's keeper. God calls you to strive after the good of those in your home and those within the household of God. How you respond to the most vulnerable around you will reflect how much you’ve been gripped by the gospel and then it will reflect that gospel to a watching world.
Prepare to care for your aging parents - This is important for us as a young church. As believers, we need to reframe our expectations and perspectives for what it means to honor our father and mother and have them reshaped by the word of God. The care of our aging parents first and foremost belongs to us. Not even primarily the church. And certainly, is not something to be left up or entrusted to state-sponsored systems and programs. We may or may not be doing all the hands-on caregiving, but, as Philip Ryken says, “it is the responsibility of children to make sure that their parents receive the best possible care. Whenever possible, they should do the caring themselves, in their own homes.” So look to the future planning to honor your father and mother for all their days that God would bless your days.
Meet the needs of those in need - As you’re able and whenever possible, when you see a need in the life of a brother or sister around you first ask, “How has God blessed me in order to be a blessing to them? What do I have to share? Time, money, stuff, help, expertise? Is there any way I can meet this need or ease this burden?” Take it upon yourself to bear the burdens of your friends and do not look away in the hopes someone else will do it for you. Let’s be ambitious to serve one another.
Bring your needs before the church - On the flipside, when we find ourselves in need, we shouldn’t keep it to ourselves. Material needs or otherwise are not “personal problems” that we should be embarrassed to share and determined to figure out on our own. God has made us family. He wants us to receive the care of our family and not live as private people. In Christ, there are no private persons. But, we’re all one in the body. And “when one member suffers, we all suffer together,”but “if one member is honored, all rejoice together” (1 Cor 12:26).
Connect others to the ministry of our church - Finally, connect those who are, right now, outside of the house to the love and care that Christ has shown those of us who are within the house. Here are a few ways to we can bless our neighbors in need.
Share the Need Help? page - Did you know our church website has a “Need Help?” page? It connects neighbors in need to our team of deacons to receive counsel and support, gives them a way to apply for financial assistance from our church benevolence program, and provides information on all kinds of other community resources. Get familiar with this page and point your neighbors to the practical helps it offers.
Volunteer at organizations that are doing good work in our city - As you have the time and ability, volunteer with organizations that serve those who are in recovery from drug and alcohol addiction, homeless, experiencing a crisis pregnancy, fleeing abuse, foster youth, and on and on. AND, don’t just volunteer out there. Build a bridge to bring them in here. Bridge the gap to the local church. Bring these neighbors in and their needs closer to Christ and welcome them into a community that will strive to love them, receive them, preach good news to them, and adorn that proclamation of good news with good works. Providing for their needs. Offering rides to those without vehicles. Helping someone make a resume or look for work. Connecting someone to local resources. And more.
Here are some organizations that are doing good work in our city:
Orange County Rescue Mission - Serving men, women, and children experiencing homeless with the gospel of Jesus Christ and providing a pathway to self-sufficiency
Olive Crest - Serving orphans, foster youth, and children in crisis
Livingwell Pregnancy Center - Serving women experiencing crisis pregnancies and loving our pre-born neighbors
Orangewood Foundation - Serving transitional aged-youth (18-24) experiencing homelessness or other challenges by providing shelter, necessities, case management, and other resources to help them thrive
Wiseplace - Serving unaccompanied women and children who are experiencing homeless, fleeing domestic violence, and seeking to rebuild their lives
Project Kinship - Serving youth and adults whose lives have been impacted by gangs, incarceration, and violence by offering a pathway to hope, healing, and community
Participate in evangelism and build relationships with our neighbors - In order to bring them near to a community that is called and commissioned to “love,” not just, as the Apostle John says, “in word or talk but in deed and truth” (1 Jn 3:18). Share the gospel of the Savior who meets their greatest need. Invite them to church. Connect them to our fellowship. Labor that they would not walk alone in their struggles.
Cross of Grace Church, would we care for our natural and spiritual families. Believing that as we do, our household here will be healthy, whole, and continuously expanding as we give ourselves to those in need just as Christ has given himself to us.
1 Timothy 5:3-16 concerns the proper care of widows in the church. Out of everything we've encountered in this letter, this passage might seem like the most irrelevant or unfamiliar instruction to the church today. But, it's a word that strikes at the very heart of who God is and at the very center of who we're called to be. Because, a healthy church that stands strong and lasts long will be a church marked by compassion for most vulnerable among us. As believers, we ought to feel a godly responsibility to give ourselves to those in need just as Christ has given himself to us. To the parents, children, grandparents, and relatives in our natural families. To the brothers and sisters we’ve been set side by side with in the family of Christ. To the neighbors we’re praying would soon join us in the household of God.
In lieu of Men’s Meeting this July, the men will be gathering together for a Men’s BBQ tonight. They’ll be sharing in the good gifts of friendship and food to the glory of God’s name. This is a great event to invite your friends, regardless of what they believe or where they’re at with church.
Starting tomorrow through July 14th, students from churches all across the West Region of Sovereign Grace Churches will gather together for a time of worship, teaching, games, and lip-sync battles, all to the glory of God!
In our church alone, there will be 10 youth going and 5 adults chaperoning! Would you join us in praying for all the youth and leaders that are attending. Ask the Lord:
To bring youth to saving faith or strengthen their walks with Christ
To build friendships amongst students
To use the speakers, teachers, and adult leaders to minister powerfully to the next generation of our family of churches
To impress upon our youth that there’s nothing better than living for Jesus
Every Tuesday we publish a blog post to lay out in one place what’s going in the life of the church for the upcoming week. See below for a snapshot of what’s on the calendar this week:
French Park Run Club
6:30am - French Park Grass Area
Men’s BBQ
6:30pm - Lee Home
Youth Camp
7/11-7/14 - Emmanuel Pines, AZ
Sunday Gathering at the Ebell Club
10:00am - Meeting Room: Ballroom
On Sunday, we learned that God has positioned each of us within the church to help one another follow Jesus. Through the work of Christ the Son, we’ve been adopted into a family filled with spiritual fathers and mothers we can learn from as well as brothers and sisters we can walk alongside. God desires to cultivate intentional, long-term relationships amongst his people in order that they would increasingly take on the shape of his Son. This is the essence of what discipleship is all about.
Pastor Jason provided us with 2 simple yet crucial steps to take in order to get in the game when it comes to discipleship.
Find someone to mentor you - Look out at the congregation of Cross of Grace and ask yourself, “Is there someone further ahead of me in the race of the Christian life that I can learn from? Someone who knows me and could speak into my life?” Identify a brother or sister and then ask them to get together with you. To study God’s word, receive counsel, ask questions, and strive after Christ together.
Find someone you can mentor - Next, turn around and ask yourself, “Is there anyone younger in the faith, or younger in age that I could pour into?” Pursue intentional (though not necessarily, formal) relationships with another brother or sister at Cross of Grace. Pray for the Lord’s leading and then take a step toward someone so that the both of you together could take steps after Christ (Heb 12:1-3).
Let’s respond to what we heard in 1 Tim 5:1-2 by asking, “Who can I learn from?” and “Who can I pour into?” and then pursuing those people. Trusting that this will build up all involved, glorify the Savior whose shape we’re taking on, and make our church healthy and happy for years to come.
1 Timothy 5:1 begins a section of the letter concerned with how the pastor should relate to different groups within the church. Paul provides instructions for how Timothy should minister to: those of different ages and genders (5:1-2), widows (5:3-16), other elders (5:17-25), and slaves (6:1-2). All of this is important not just for Timothy but for each one of us. Because, “as go the pastors, so go the people.” There's something for the entire church to learn from the way the pastor relates to every group within the church. First and foremost, 5:1-2 makes it beautifully clear that Pastor Timothy needs to relate to the different groups within the church as he would to family. We, along with him, live in this same family and are called by God to live together as brothers and sisters, fathers and mothers. Encouraging one another. Mentoring one another. Engaging in discipleship together. Striving together so that each of us would increasingly take on the shape of the Savior.
For the 4th year in a row, we hosted our French Park Block Party - and what a party it was! Over 130 church members and French Park neighbors came together for an afternoon of summer fun. We laughed, we limboed, and we ate hundreds of tacos to the glory of God!
Through it all, God used your faithful presence as a church to build up the community of French Park, form new friendships with our nearest neighbors, and shine forth the joy we have in Jesus. We thank the Lord for this opportunity to love our neighbors and for the many hands that made it all possible! As you look through the complete photo album, would it cause you to praise the Lord for what he’s doing to bless our neighbors and bring them into his joy.
From Dave Taylor, Director of Global Missions in Sovereign Grace Churches:
In John 15:4-5, Jesus says, “Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”
Those final few words give us such an important and sobering God-given perspective on how much we’ll be able to do for the Lord by ourselves. How much? Nothing, nada, nought, zilch, diddly squat, empty handed, blank space, nil...So, oh my, how we need the Lord don’t we! If we’re going to be able to do anything, the main thing we need is Him! For apart from Him we really can do nothing!
With that in mind, here’s how you can be praying for some of our Global endeavours in the month ahead...
Please pray for the 20 young adults who are heading to Sovereign Grace Church, Sydney, Australia, from Cornerstone Church, Knoxville, US, 5th-14th July, to run a Kids Club with 50+ children from both inside and outside of the Church. Please pray that God would bless their ministry as they seek to share the gospel with both kids and adults alike, and that the great joy of Sovereign Grace partnership would be cultivated and enjoyed by everyone involved.
Please pray for the Sovereign Grace Philippines Regional Assembly of Elders, as they gather together in Cebu, 9th-12th July. During their time together they’ll be talking through the growing number of Churches interested in partnership with Sovereign Grace in the Philippines, the various updates needed and recommended for the SGC Philippines Book of Church Order, as well as whole host of ministry matters. May the Lord give these brothers great wisdom and insight as they gather together in this way, and extra measure to Jeffrey Jo as he seeks to lead this time.
Please pray for Bart Lipscomb, SGC Area Leader for Africa, as he heads to Zambia 11th-14th July, and then Namibia,14th-18th July. Please pray that he’d be a great blessing to each of the pastoral teams and churches that those trips represent, and that He’d give Bart wisdom and insight as to how to serve them, encourage them and come alongside them well.
Please pray for the SGC Latin America Pastors Retreat, in Santa Marta, Colombia, July 15th-17th. There’ll be ten pastors from Colombia, six from Costa Rica and two from Bolivia, who will be attending the retreat, which will be led by Joselo Mercado (Key Leader in LATAM) and Rich Richardson (SGC Area Leader for LATAM). This will be the first retreat of this type outside of Mexico, may it be wonderful encouragement to all of our Pastors in this region.
Please pray for the two teams from Covenant Fellowship that are headed to Playa Azul. The first team heads June 30th-July 7th, to complete a construction project and to build together in partnership and relationship as churches. Then July 7th-14th, the second team is a team of youth that are headed over to lead a youth camp for local kids, plus any kids from our local Sovereign Grace Churches that are there. Please pray that this would be a great blessing for everyone involved.
Please continue to pray for Michael Ostanin and Arche Church, Dnipro, Ukraine. That the war would soon come to an end, and that whilst they wait for that moment, that the light and hope of the gospel would shine brightly in the midst of darkness and suffering, and that the manifold wisdom of God be revealed through His church.
… Thank you so much for prayers. As we abide in Him, may His grace truly abound to us all.
