Well … What Is It?

We’ve been in the book of John for nearly one entire year. This June, as we move on from the compelling narrative of the Gospel of John, we’ll be spending 6 weeks in a short summer series answering this most important question. The Gospel is the message that we stake our lives on. It’s the message that we claim that our church is founded upon. It’s the message that we say is the only hope for salvation for anybody. So, what is it?

Invite your Santa Ana friends and neighbors this summer to join us and discover what the answer is to this all-important question.

Preparing Men For Ministry Through Theological Education

For the past 18 months, 7 men from Sovereign Grace Church of Santa Ana and Sovereign Grace Church of Orange have been working diligently to complete a new initiative that we’ve begun called “The Theology Course”. This course is a means to guide men who aspire to pastoral ministry or some other leadership roles in the church through a course of theological education that also serves to prepare them for ordination within our denomination. While this does by no means guarantee that they will be pastors, nevertheless, it helps to lay the foundation for the expansion of the mission of spreading the joy of Jesus in Southern California.

We congratulate these men, but even more significantly, we congratulate and thank the wives involved who freed up their husbands and made sacrifices to make completion possible.

Our own Jeff Schlieder was among the 7 graduates and was recognized this past Sunday at Church. Congratulations and THANK YOU, Taylor and Jeff, for your sacrifice and faith to be a part of the spread of the joy of Jesus in Orange County, CA.

Bring a Chair and a Sack Lunch

Head straight over to the Second Street Promenade immediately after the service on June 2 for a lunch in the midst of our neighbors. It’s a great opportunity to spread the joy of Jesus as we enjoy His gifts of food and fellowship!

Thursday at 7:00pm - New Location This Month Only

All women, high school-age and up are invited. It’s a meeting where women gather to learn to talk like women about God. No need to bring anything but yourself and a Bible. If you don’t have a Bible, we’ll have extras available for you.

The location for this week’s meeting has changed. Please contact Rebecca Erkelens at bequita_17@yahoo.com for more address and details.

The Arrest and Trial of Jesus

This past Sunday was a very different Sunday. Our usual meeting place, Heninger Elementary, was unexpectedly unavailable to us. At the last minute, we shifted gears and moved our Sunday meeting to the Houlton home. We were packed into the living room like a bunch of sardines, but aside from the location, nothing was different. We worshipped together, we listened to the preached Word from John 18, we took the Lord’s table together and fellowshipped with one another in the joy of Jesus.

There is no sermon audio recording available from last Sunday’s sermon, but nevertheless, the Lord has a lesson for all of us reading this blog post right now: the local church is a body of people gathered by God through Jesus Christ for the worship of His name. Regardless of where we meet. Regardless of how planned or unplanned our Sunday morning’s are.

Who knows, maybe we’ll make a tradition of an annual house-church service …

Lunch After Church In The Midst of Our Neighbors

On Sunday, June 2nd, come to church with a folding chair and a sack lunch prepared. Immediately after the service, we’ll walk or drive over to the second street promenade and enjoy lunch in the midst of our Downtown Santa Ana neighbors. It’s yet another moment of getting to spread the joy of Jesus in our city.

We’re Also Mindful Of Moms For Whom Mother’s Day Is Hard

Mothers are a gift from the Lord. We learn about the comfort, gentleness and kindness of God through mothers (Is. 49; 66; 1 Thess. 2). They’re the ones who raised us, loved us, fed us and taught us what sacrificial love looks like. Mother’s Day is a chance to acknowledge this and show them our affection. It’s a lovely day for mothers.

But not all mothers. For many mothers, this day simply brings to mind sorrowful memories and hard decisions. That’s why this Mother’s Day, we gave a gift to Livingwell Pregnancy Centers - a local nonprofit devoted to serving these very mothers and the children they bear in their wombs and give birth to.

We love the mothers in our church and in our neighborhood and ask God to bless them in their role as mothers.

Discipleship Happens At Small Group Meetings

These meetings are rare opportunities to gather in an undistracted way to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and to help one another do the same. In short, we grow as disciples of Jesus Christ. According to Romans 8, that’s one of the primary purposes of our lives as individual Christians.

Are You In A Small Group?

If you’re not currently in a small group, please contact office@sovgracesantaana.org. Anybody and everybody in the church, including guests are invited and encouraged to participate in the life of the church through small groups. We currently have two small groups, both of which meet on the first and third Friday evenings of every month at 7:00pm in the following locations:

• Houlton Home - Downtown Santa Ana / 17th Street and Flower

• Schlieder Home - East Santa Ana / West Tustin

Stay tuned in the next few months as we prepare to launch a third small group!

Two Implications For You

1. Welcome The New Members Among Us: This next Sunday, we have the opportunity and privilege of welcoming new members into our church. It’s a rare moment when we see the tangible evidence that God is indeed spreading the joy of Jesus in Santa Ana. Come prepared this Sunday to celebrate.

2. Move up and move in: Sunday mornings are filling up with guests and newcomers. When you walk into our worship service, take a moment to think like a first time visitor - for a number of reasons, you’d probably want to sit in the back or on the sides. Let’s be sensitive to and thoughtful of our guests by choosing our seats on Sunday morning with them in mind. If you can, please move forward a couple rows and toward the center of your row of chairs … for the glory of God!

Jesus Prayed For Sovereign Grace Santa Ana 2000 Years Ago

In one of the most profound and holy scenes in the New Testament, we find Jesus, God the Son, pleading with God the Father in John 17. In that “High Priestly Prayer”, Jesus prays for “all those who will believe through the [11 disciples’] word”. In other words, He prays for all future believers. Included in that number is our very own local church. What Jesus prays for is His greatest desire for our church in 2019. What is that desire? Unity. Jesus desires unity so that the world might be persuaded of His love for the glory of God.

Listen to last Sunday’s sermon to hear about Jesus’ priority of unity for our church.

Listen to the message here.