While We Were Still Sinners

We come to a special time of worship, and it should be very special. We worship God for loving us when we were unlovable. Christ made himself a sacrifice for our sin because….because of something we did? Because we are so wonderful? Because of all our great works he wanted us on his team? Yah, that’s it. God wants me because I am a big deal. No, that is not it. The apostle Paul writes in the book of Romans 5: 6 For while we were still helpless, at the appointed moment, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For rarely will someone die for a just person—though for a good person perhaps someone might even dare to die. 8 But God proves His own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us! 9 Much more then, since we have now been declared righteous by His blood, we will be saved through Him from wrath. We do not come to salvation in our strength, but in our humble weakness. Jesus gives this illustration in Luke 18:9 To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: 10 “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’13 “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’14 “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” Christ sacrificed himself on the cross for those who know they need a savior. We do not come to him in our strength, but in our humility. If you have come to worship with a humble heart thankful that we have been given the gift of eternal life through the grace of a sacrificing savior, we ask you to join us in our time of communion.

Memorial Day 2016

We are in the midst of another Memorial Day Weekend. Memorial Day commemorates those who lost their lives in the service of their country. The young men and women we honor gave up their Earthly tomorrows with their families and loved ones so those they loved most dearly would be safe from slavery and tyranny. They went to foreign lands to die so we could live. Memorial Day was set aside to allow time to decorate the graves of the fallen and to remember their sacrifice. We also visit memorials that have been erected to their memory. Some of these, such as the Vietnam Memorial have inscribed on it the names of those who gave up their lives. We have these memorials so that we may never forget the service of those who have died. We have a weekly memorial service here Sunday. We take time to remember during communion the sacrifice of Christ Jesus who left his Heavenly home to go to a world full of tyranny and sin to give us hope for peace in eternity. He sacrificed his life so that we could live with the hope and assurance of life eternal with Him. Unlike the memorials we have where we list the names of the many that died for our sakes, the memorial we have is a cross that represents one perfect sacrifice. Inscribed in that memorial, the Lambs Book of life, are the names of those who live eternally because of the perfect sacrifice of the one who was without sin rescuing us from our sin. If you have accepted Christ Jesus’ gift of grace and life, we ask you to join us in our time of remembrance of Jesus’ death as a sacrifice for our forgiveness and His resurrection providing us with the hope of life eternal as we pass the trays with the bread and the juice.