Imagine...

Over the past few weeks we've been imagining what could be if God or His people accomplished some big things like...

Imagine...if all Christians tithed - Did you know that if all Christians around the world tithed their income (gave 10% to the work and mission of the local church and kept 90% for themselves) we would generate approximately 143 Billion dollars more than we currently give! With that money we could fund every church budget, feed, clothe and educate ALL impoverished people around the world for that calendar year, and still have a few billion left over just for evangelistic efforts! Think about that...it is within the power and reach of THE CHURCH to eradicate poverty in our lifetime! God's Word encourages us to give...period. It doesn't demand a certain dollar amount or even (in the New Testament) a certain percentage. But we now know that if we could live on 90% and give away 10% we could change the world for millions of people...in one year. Just imagine...

Imagine...if we saw "the church" as being for them and not for us - You might ask, "what do you mean "them" and "us"?" What we mean is that Jesus intended the purpose and work of the church to be primarily for the lost and hurting people of the world. It was through evangelistic and benevolent ministry that we would connect with people who needed God's intervention in their lives! But over the centuries we have slowly and subtly fallen into a club mentality. A mentality which says, "Hey, this is my club, I give the money to support it, it should be and do what I want it to be and do for me!" This is very, very far from Jesus' hope and dream for His church. It's not about fun events for Christians, it's not about night after night of Bible studies and classes for people who have been in the church for years and years. It's about ministry and discipleship that makes a difference in the lives of people who are far from God or who are hurting, downtrodden, sick or lonely. The purpose of "the church" is to be the people who carry out those ministries, not to just be the beneficiary of them! Imagine if we were not only hearers...but doers of the Word...just imagine...

Imagine...If God Brings Revival to His Church - Throughout biblical history and throughout modern history God has chosen times, places and people to revive spiritually so they could be equipped and empowered to do 2 primary things: 1) Know Him and glorify Him more! 2) Accomplish His mission in the world! If you do a Google search on "Revival"or "Christian Revival" you will find countless articles and descriptions of how and when God has done this over the years in nearly every part of the world! Why should we not imagine that He will do it now...for us? We cannot push a revival button and make it happen. Only God has the ability to revive His church! But we do know that some common denominators were always in place when God chose to bring revival to a group of people: 1) Waiting on God 2) Praying for Revival 3) Preparing our hearts and lives for it 4) Repentance for those things that have been barriers to God using us 5) Requests for God's will to be done on earth as it is in heaven 6) Resistance to the attacks of the world, the flesh and the devil as they battle against the church and against the purposes of God! Imagine if God brings revival to His church in Mooresville...in the United States of America...and in the world! Just imagine...

This coming Sunday we will be finishing this month-long series with Imagine...If Jesus' dreams for His church came true - What were some of the dreams that Jesus had for His people, His church? Have they come true? Can we be a part of helping them come true? Is there some tangible way that we can participate in the dreams of our Savior? The answer to all of the above (we believe) is YES! In fact, we're going to look at one particular dream of Jesus: That his people would multiply the gifts, talents and resources He gave them to accomplish great things in this world for His sake! And you will have an opportunity to actually live that dream out in a very tangible way beginning this Sunday...join us and find out how!

For His Sake,

Pastor John & Pastor Jeremy

Prayer for the Taylor Family & for Grace Church

Tonight Mooresville Church of God is grieving with Jim & Sharon Taylor and the entire Grace Church (Mooresville) family. Jim and Sharon's son, Jarrod, died this afternoon (Saturday, July 11). Please join us in praying for the Taylor family, all of their close friends, Grace Church and for our entire community. Jim & Sharon are special people and have become vital leaders in the Mooresville Community. Our hearts are heavy for our friends, colleagues in ministry and brothers and sisters in Christ. Jim and Sharon we love you and extend our hearts and our hands to help and support you during these challenging days!

With much love,

Mooresville Church of God

A 2 Sunday Challenge!!

Here's 2 Sundays you don't want to miss! In fact, 2 Sundays we NEED you here!

This Sunday, July 12th: As we continue our "Imagine" series we are asking you to imagine...if God brings revival to us! Can you imagine it? But more importantly...can you believe that He wants to? Join us as we seek Him together and implore Him to pour out His Spirit in a fresh, new, exciting way!

Next Sunday, July 19th: You do not want to miss this Sunday! Something will happen that may have never occurred at MCHOG before...we are going to hand out money! You heard right...hand out money. You need to be there to find out why, how much, the purpose and the plan!

Listen...God is moving at Mooresville Church of God! Isaiah 43:19 says, "See I am doing a new thing, now it springs up, do you not perceive it?" Another way to put is, "Can you imagine it?" God goes on to say in Ephesians 3:20-21, “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”

Let's see what God will do over these next few weeks!

In His Grip,

Pastor John

Family Bonds: The State of Our Church Family

The state of our church family at Mooresville Church of God is:

1) Growing - Numerically and Spiritually!

2) Hungry - We are getting hungry for community impact, healthy relationships with each other and to experience the manifest presence of God in our lives and ministry!

3) Getting Focused - We are steadily getting focused spiritually, in our ministry plan, and on God's call to us as a congregation!

Because of these truths we can say that the state of our church family is:

1) Strong!
2) Good!
3) Forward Moving!

So if this is all true, then some natural questions arise:

1) Where do we go from here?

I believe we stay focused on the major calls of God, including:

- The Great Commission (Matt. 28:19-20) - This is the heart of what God is trying to do in the world through His church!

- The Great Commandment (Mark 12:30-31) - This is at the heart of HOW we accomplish the Great Commission; by loving God with all that we are and then loving others in the same way!

- The Early Church Model (Acts 2:42-47) - If this happened once...it can happen again! The passion, determination, power and effectveness of the 1st Century Church can be ours today!

2) What should we be doing?

I believe Jesus' words to His disciples in Acts 1:4-14 detail what we should be doing immediately...Wait...Pray...Prepare! Wait on God to empower, equip and direct us! Pray daily, moment by moment, every chance we get, for this to happen SOON! And prepare our hearts and minds so that when God pours our His Holy Spirit in a new, fresh way, empowering us to do new ministry with new effectiveness, we are ready to act!

3) What are the keys to effective ministry that will change the world?

There are many things we could list: Faith, love, patience, all the fruits of the Spirit and many other godly traits and practices! However, from a "big picture" perspective there are two primary keys:

- Prayer - Jesus said that His house should be called a "house of prayer". We should be crying out to God in prayer, asking Him to empower, equip, resource and lead His church in such an obvious way that we can't miss it, that we will do it, and that we will succeed in it! If we don't ask, seek and knock...God will not answer! We must labor in prayer until God moves and acts on our behalf!

- The Holy Spirit - In his book "Fresh Power", Jim Cymbala says, "The degree to which we understand and experience the Spirit of God will be the exact degree to which God's plan for our churches will be accomplished". God then says in Zechariah 4:6, "Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit says the Lord Almighty"! We can try every invention of humanity, but until God's Spirit moves in a fresh, empowering way, we will not succeed in our efforts to change the world!

4) What will inspire God to send a fresh outpouring of His Holy Spirit?

We are planning a preaching series about these things in the next few months (that's how important we believe an understanding of these godly actions are!):

- Brokenness - This is allowing ourselves to be humbled before the Lord. To be broken open so His Spirit can flow out of us!

- Repentance - This is consciously choosing to turn and live differently than we presently are in order to be better used by God for His purposes! Repentance is a key to knowing and following Jesus Christ effectively!

- Surrender - This is choosing selflessness. This is following in Jesus footsteps by saying, "not my will, Father, but Yours be done!"

- Holiness - This is growing in Christlikeness; being set apart for God's purposes; conforming every aspect of who we are and how we live to God's will and desires for us as His children! And it springs from brokenness, repentance and surrender!

- Praise - Everything we are about, everything we do, everything we are should lead to glorifying and praisinng God! Only He is worthy of praise! Everything should eventually, always lead to us praising Him!

Let's begin with prayer and call out to God for Him to give us a fresh empowering of His Spirit and then let's change the world as we act in obedience on His call for His church to make disciples! As we do that together, a beautiful community of faith continues to develop and God is glorified! Let's get praying together...

In His Grip,

Pastor John

Family Bonds: Marriage

"What if God created marriage to make us more holy than happy?"

This is the question author Gary Thomas asks in his book "Sacred Marriage". If we ponder this question we may find that it can bring a dynamic change in how we view our marriages! If happiness is way down God's list of reasons for creating marriage, then why do we see so many marriages end because "I'm just not happy with this person anymore". What if we began seeing marriage as one of the tools God uses to conform us to the image of His Son. What if we began to view our marriages as a spiritual discipline instead of means to simply meet our needs. What if we began to view our marriages as a sacred possession...a sacred creation of God...a sacred gift? If we could adopt these views our marriages would cry out to the world that our God is good, He is loving, He would die for us (and did!), He wants intimacy and oneness with us!

So in order to investigate this "sacred" view of marriage we must do three things:

1) Search for God in our marriages: We'll call this Sacred Searching

Throughout the Bible you will find God using marriage as the illustration or symbol for what He is trying to do in us and through us to the world! For example: "...as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you." (ISA 62:5) Here God uses marriage to illustrate how He feels about His people! He feels like a bridegroom on his wedding day (or even His wedding night!). It describes commitment, passion, intimacy, excitement, joy, love...and on and on!

2) Learn what our marriages can teach us: We'll call this Sacred Learning

Through the illustration of marriage and matrimony God can teach us things like love, perseverance, forgiveness, and servant hood, along with many other necessary life lessons and disciplines! Marriage can be a training ground for so many areas of our life! By learning to love our spouse unconditionally we learn how to love God unconditionally...By persevering in marriage we learn to persevere in many other areas of life...When we can forgive the person who knows us better than anyone, our spouse, we can learn to forgive others for much lesser things...And when we can learn to serve our spouse, even when we don't feel like it, or when we feel they don't deserve it, then we can learn to serve God and learn to serve most anyone!

3) Allow God to reveal His glory through our marriage: We'll call this Sacred Presence

In the Old Testament God gave Moses very detailed instructions for how to build the Ark of the Covenant. One of the instructions was that he was to put two angels kneeling with their wings outstretched toward one another. This gives us a portrait of what marriage can be when we follow God's instructions. How, you might ask? Well, angels are created beings, just like humans, and so God wanted two created beings with their arms reaching toward one another placed on the ark and then he said this in Exodus 25:22, "There, above the cover between the Cherubim that are over the Ark of the Testimony, I will meet with you...". God has promised that when we reach for each other as husbands and wives...He will be in between us...meeting with us...and the closer we get to each other...the closer we both get to God! That's God's promise to us in our marriages!

We can choose to have a sacred view of marriage. We MUST have a sacred view of marriage if we are to see it and live it like God wants. Does God want us to be happy in our marriages? Yes, of course, but is happiness the point? No. God has much higher purposes for our marriages than we often understand or imagine. But if we search, learn and pursue His presence, we'll find that He has beautiful days ahead for all of our marriages!

In His Grip,

Pastor John

Family Bonds: Mothers

2 Timothy 1:5-7 & 3:14-17 reveals a process through which our mothers (certainly Timothy's mother!) can deeply impact our lives! Paul writes to Timothy, "I have been reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also. ⁶ For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. ⁷ For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline...¹⁴ But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, ¹⁵ and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. ¹⁶ All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, ¹⁷ so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

The process we hear Paul describing goes like this:

1. Our mothers pass on a "sincere faith" to us.

It's important to note that whether you were parented well by your mother or not, this process is her dream for you. She was made in the image of God and, like God, she longs for this process to be lived out in your life! Timothy's grandmother and mother were so influential in his sincere faith that God chose to single them out through the writings of the Apostle Paul!

2. That sincere faith leads to salvation and receiving the Holy Spirit.

Paul refers to "the gift of God which is in you". This refers both to the spiritual gifts and calling that Timothy received, but also to the ultimate gift of God...Himself! His Holy Spirit is the gift in us that will bloom and produce all the good we will every know or do in our lives!

3. The Holy Spirit enables us to understand and apply God's Word.

Paul goes on to tell Timothy that through his mother "from infancy" he was taught the Holy Scriptures. He then details how that knowledge will bless Timothy and those he is called to teach, lead and reach!

4. The we are equipped through the Holy Spirit and the knowledge of God's Word to serve the world and accomplish the mission God created us for.

The point of this entire process is not just to bless us, or honor our mothers, or make much of us in any way! The point of this process is to lead all of God's children to acts of service that will lead others to know and follow Him! Paul said, "so that the man of God may be equipped for every good work"! This is the product...the payoff...the sum total of all the time, energy and effort that our mothers poured into us! God uses our mothers to prepare us to SERVE THE WORLD!

What a blessing mothers are! I know my mom was a key factor in the development of my own "sincere faith". And now I'm blessed with a wife who is blessing her own children in the same ways! Take the time to thank God not only for your mom, but for the ways in which He has used her to prepare you to serve Him well! HAPPY MOTHERS DAY!

In His Grip,

Pastor John

Battleground: The Flesh

What a powerful Sunday yesterday! Isn't it awesome to see God at work in our church? I was overwhelmed with the cardboard testimonies and the power of God at work within people. Thank you to everyone who willingly chose to share their thorns yesterday and to all those who were actively involved in the service.

In James chapter 1 we read that we are tempted when by our own sinful desires, we are led away and enticed to sin. Sometimes we blame God or the devil but the real enemy is our own self. The battle against the flesh is often unseen but one of the most intense battlegrounds we struggle to win on. Yesterday I shared that we can experience victory in the battle against the flesh through...

1. Salvation in Christ Jesus
• John 12:23-26
2. Dying to Self
• John 3:22-30
3. The Power of Holy Spirit Living
• Romans 6:8-14
• Titus 2:11-12
4. Relying on God in Adversity (hardship, problems, difficulty, misfortune)
• 2 Corinthians 12:7-12

Let us have hope during this battle that Christ has already won the battle over sin. Remember that, "the Spirit helps us in our weakness" (Romans 8:26) and that "He who began a good work in you, will carry it on to completion." (Philippians 1:6) You CAN be the victor and not a victim. I wonder how many others have a cardboard testimony. If you would like to share what battle God is bringing you through feel free to do so at the welcome center or post something right here on the blog.

I'm starting 5 days of spiritual renewal today. I'll be spending much time in prayer, reading and getting some rest from ministry. I look forward to seeing everyone on Sunday.

Blessings,

Pastor Jeremy