News From First Baptist

Something new is in the works for First Baptist in Shawneetown!  Our Associate Pastor Mike Rushing is building a website for our church.  It is a work in progress.  However, you can go on line and check it out.  To get on go to www.shawneetownfirstbaptistchurch.com.  In fact, you can watch from day to day as there is more and more added to the site.  One of the things I am excited about is the prayer link.  You can get on the website and make prayer requests.  I want you to know that I will check each day and pray about your requests.  We will take the prayer requests very seriously.

   Sunday was another sad news/glad news day at Shawneetown FBC.  Scott Luckett, one of our very faithful members and Sunday School teachers, announced that he would be leaving us (at least for a while).  That is the sad news—sad not only for our church but for Scott himself.  But the glad news concerns the reason Scott is leaving.  Scott will be preaching at a church in Junction that is without a pastor.  We are glad because that is actually the reason First Baptist of Shawneetown exists—so that we can grow disciples and send them out to do what our Lord, Jesus Christ, has commissioned us to do.  At the beginning of Sunday’s Morning Worship, we had a prayer of blessing and commissioning for Scott just before he left to go and preach at Junction.

   One of the most important things in God’s plan for His church is that every believer recognizes God’s call in his or her life and to obey that call.  The first time the call of God is remembered by most people is in Genesis 12 where God calls a man named Abram to leave his home and family and go to a place that, at the time, he did not know where he was going. (Heb. 11:8).  Abram was promised by God that He would make him “into a great nation” and bless him and make his name great. (Gen. 12:2).  Abram eventually was given the name Abraham and now we call him the “father of the faithful.”  Abraham was not a supernatural being.  He had his sin and difficulty just like you.  But Abraham believed God and obeyed Him and God used him!

   Moses received and unusual call of God from a bush that “was on fire but was not consumed.” (Ex. 3:2).  God called Moses to go and deliver the people of Israel from their bondage in Egypt.  Moses, like many of us, made all kinds of excuses before he went; but he went and God used him in a miraculous way!

   In the New Testament, God called a man named Saul, a Pharisee, a persecutor of the church in a dramatic way by striking him blind. (Acts 9:8).  Saul’s life was turned around that day.  And, he became just as adamant and zealous for the church as he had been against the church.  If it were not for this persecutor turned preacher, much of the world would not have known the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  We now know him as Paul, apostle to the Gentiles.

   God is still calling men and women to go to that country that they don’t know about to spread the good news of the Gospel.  He is still calling those who are willing to go and deliver people from some kind of bondage.  He is still turning people’s lives around in ways that seem spectacular.  He’s still calling people to Junction, to Shawneetown, and to wherever He sees there is a spiritual need.  In fact, God has called every believer, not to sit idly by while someone else delivers the message of salvation; but to “Go, make disciples!”  What’s God calling you to, Christian?

   “Reach Up!” Basketball & Cheering started last Saturday with a bang!  We have over 60 kids making up 6 teams.  There are two Kindergarten teams, two teams of first and second graders, and two teams made up of kids in grades 3 through 6.  There was a lot of action in the Family Life Center of First Baptist.  From 10:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., there were kids running back and forth, wall to wall parents on the sidelines watching, and cheerleaders popping in every now and then to do a cheer!  It is a fun and exciting time!  I’d like to invite any of you to just drop in any Saturday for the next 7 weeks just to check out the excitement and to watch our kids have fun! 

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Bro Jack
I am sure of this, that He who started a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. (Philippians 1:6)