A Word from our Pastor...

I trust the week of Thanksgiving has found us spending some time thanking God for all He has done and committing to be much more faithful in the area of gratefulness in the year to come. I thought you might like some after Thanksgiving laughs so here are a couple of things I hope put a smile on your face.

After-Thanksgiving Poem - I ate too much turkey, I ate too much corn, I ate too much pudding and pie. I’m stuffed up with muffins and too much stuffin’ I’m probably going to die. I piled up my plate and I ate and I ate. But I wish I had known when to stop, For I’m so crammed with yams, sauces, gravies, and jams that my buttons are starting to pop! I’m full of tomatoes and french-fried potatoes, my stomach is swollen and sore, but there’s still some dessert so I guess it won’t hurt if I eat just a little bit more!

You Know You Overdid Thanksgiving When....  Doctor tells you your weight would be perfect for a man 12 feet tall. ~ Paramedics bring in the Jaws of Life to pry you out of the EZ-Boy. ~ The potatoes you used set off another famine in Ireland. ~The "Gravy Boat" your wife set out was a real 12’ boat! ~ You receive a Sumo Wrestler application in your e-mail. ~ You set off 3 earthquake seismographs on your Friday morning jog . ~ Pricking your finger for cholesterol screening only yielded gravy. ~ A guest quotes a Biblical passage from "The Feeding of the 5000." ~ You consider gluttony your patriotic duty. ~ Representatives from the Butterball Hall of Fame called twice.

                I heard of a man who wished to sell his home. He called a real estate agent and said, "I want to run an ad in the paper to sell my home. I want to get rid of it as quickly as possible. I'm tired of this old place."

                The agent said, "Tell me about your home so I can run a good listing on your house."

                The man told him how many rooms it had. The rooms were carpeted and the kitchen had a nice tile floor. There were expensive shrubs in the yard. He told about some fruit trees in the backyard and many other advantages. He described the home in detail. When he finished, the agent told him, "Listen as I read it back to you and you tell me how it sounds."

                The agent read the ad- about this beautiful three bedroom home with two baths, a good stand of grass and beautiful shrubs, fruit trees in the back yard, new roof, central heat and air, a remodeled carport for two cars. He kept reading until the owner stopped him. "Wait a minute! Wait a minute! Stop! That house is not for sale. All my life I've wanted a place like that, but I did not realize I had it until now!"

                As we approach Thanksgiving this year--- may this story serve as a reminder to us that we need to take some time to sit back and think about what we have and be thankful! I bet if we do we will realize, like this man in the story above, that we have things we have always wanted, we just haven't taken the time to recognize it!

                Here is another thought on being thankful- We need to be like the little old lady who was getting ready to enjoy her Thanksgiving meal. Everybody that was gathered around the table was asked to share one thing for which they were thankful. As she shared, she said, "I thank the Lord for two perfectly good teeth, one in my upper jaw and one in my lower jaw that match so I can chew my food."

                Take time this Thanksgiving to focus on what you do have and how God has provided for you! Read Psalm 136 or Psalm 100 or any number of other Scriptures that will help you focus on God's activity in your life! Doing so will give us cause to be thankful not just around Thanksgiving but every day of the year!

                Here is a Operation Christmas Child Shoebox Story for you this week. It's incredible to think that by packing just one shoebox a person could potentially impact an entire family and community. May this story inspire you to help pack a shoebox this year.          

                In December 2011, 80 children in a desperately poor village in the Vunika region in Labasa, Fiji received a shoe box through Operation Christmas Child. In this village were many Hindus, Muslims and native Fijian people of other faiths. Soon after the distribution, 30 children enrolled, with the consent of their parents, to do The Greatest Journey, our 12 lesson, children’s discipleship program.

                By the end of the program, 15 of the children had given their lives to Jesus. One of them was Melvin, a 10 year old boy who lived with his grandparents. Melvin’s grandfather was known as a religious leader and witchdoctor by the local villagers. Amazingly, Melvin’s grandfather agreed to have The Greatest Journey classes at his house.

                Pastor Waisea from a neighboring town came and taught the classes and some of the children’s parents came along to see and hear what their children were learning. The children completed The Greatest Journey in 14 weeks. They asked Pastor Waisea if he would keep teaching the classes so that they could learn more about Jesus and so a Bible study group was established in Melvin’s grandparents’ home.

                The Bible study group grew steadily over the next three months and 5 of the adults accepted Jesus as Lord and Saviour, including Melvin’s grandparents, to the astonishment of many neighbors.

                Melvin’s grandfather then asked Pastor Waisea to start a church in his home. The church grew with 25 people attending regularly over the next seven months. Melvin’s grandfather and Pastor Waisea approached a local landowner to buy some land so that they could build a church and on Sunday, 16th September, 2012 the first church service was held under temporary shelter on the land with forty people!

                In 2013, Melvin's grandfather went to be with the Lord. Today Melvin is growing into a fine young man and a bright student. He faithfully attends Sunday school and prayer meetings every week and his young sister is also involved in the activities of the church.

                Melvin is doing his best to get his Dad to come to church and is sure that God will bring him.

Operation Christmas Child is a part of the ministry of Samaritan's Purse. If you would like more information about this ministry please visit www.samaritanspurse.org and look up Operation Christmas Child.

                This week we as a nation honor our Veterans and deserving of our honor they are! To say I am proud of my brother would be an understatement! To honor him, today I share a letter he wrote a couple years back. It truly catches the heart behind Veteran's Day! Brother, thank you for your service and your words!

                July 4th, 1776.  Independence Day!  People dancing in the streets, the Redcoats defeated and hostilities ended.  Right?  Absolutely not.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  You might envision that day as a celebration of victory but history would prove you wrong.

                Did you know British troops did not leave New York City until November 25^th of 1783?  More than 7 years after our founding fathers had the courage to declare our independence even as the British fleet and army were arriving on our shores.  7 years of battle, blood, sacrifice and suffering.  7 years of determination, loyalty, faith and belief. 

                Our independence was declared in the face of what seemed to be insurmountable odds.  We were engaged and ready to battle the most dominate navy and army in the entire world at that time for what we believed in – “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government…”

                Signed copies of the Declaration of Independence were not sent to the states until January of 1777.  The ideal of freedom began to spread and the words of this document began to penetrate into the hearts of the citizenry. Numerous battles were fought from Princeton, NJ to Savannah, GA, in the dead of winter and the sauna of summer – over 10,000 dead or wounded soldiers were recorded during our Revolutionary War.

                Independence.  Freedom.  Country.  It came with a cost.  The cost to preserve those ideals has been tremendous in the wars fought during the intervening years to our present day.  Those men fell in love with the idea of our country and then fell, in love for our country.  Love never fails.  So this Veteran's Day, remember those who displayed courage of conviction and a vision for a better tomorrow.  May God through His son Jesus Christ and the working of His Holy Spirit continue to bless the United States of America.

STEVE A. YARBROUGH, Lt Col (Retired), USAF

                Normally the flight from Nassau to Miami took Walter Wyatt, Jr., only sixty-five minutes. But on December 5, 1986, he attempted it after thieves had looted the navigational equipment in his Beechcraft airplane. With only a compass and a hand-held radio, Walter flew into skies blackened by storm clouds.
                When his compass began to gyrate, Walter concluded he was headed in the wrong direction. He flew his plane below the clouds, hoping to spot something, but soon he knew he was lost. He put out a mayday call, which brought a Coast Guard Falcon search plane to lead him to an emergency landing strip only six miles away. Suddenly Wyatt's right engine coughed its last and died. The fuel tank had run dry. Around 8 p.m. Wyatt could do little more than glide the plane into the water.
                Wyatt survived the crash, but his plane disappeared quickly, leaving him bobbing on the water in a leaky life vest. With blood on his forehead, Wyatt floated on his back. Suddenly he felt a hard bump against his body. A shark had found him. Wyatt kicked the intruder and wondered if he would survive the night. He managed to stay afloat for the next ten hours. In the morning, Wyatt saw no airplanes, but in the water a dorsal fin was headed for him. Twisting, he felt the hide of a shark brush against him. In a moment, two more bull sharks sliced through the water toward him. Again he kicked the sharks, and they veered away, but he was nearing exhaustion. Then he heard the sound of a distant aircraft. When it was within a half mile, he waved his orange vest. The pilot radioed the Cape York, which was twelve minutes away: "Get moving, cutter! There's a shark targeting this guy!" As the Cape York pulled alongside Wyatt, a Jacob's ladder was dropped over the side. Wyatt climbed wearily out of the water and onto the ship, where he fell to his knees and kissed the deck. He'd been saved. Nothing less than outside intervention could have rescued him from sure death. How much we are like Walter Wyatt.
                Do you need to be rescued? Are you in need of outside intervention to save you from your present situation? Know that Jesus is the Rescuer! He is the One who died on the cross in your place and if you call out to Him, He will rescue you!
                Do you need to share this message with someone in the coming days? Who do you know that needs to be rescued by the Rescuer?