“Getting Back into the Swing of Things”

“Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.” – 1 John 3:18

To the Saints of CPC,

Well, it seems that, barring any massive or unseen change, we, as a country, are in the upswing out of the pandemic and will be returning to normalcy over the coming months. With the rollout of the vaccine smoothing over and more states opening up and lowering restrictions, it seems that we are on the mend. The first and most important response is to praise God for his sovereign hand guiding all things during this time and leading us out on the other end. For it is only by his will that all things have come to pass. So, we should lift up praise and worship to him, not just on Sundays, but on every day. Of course, this doesn’t mean that God is done or that we can fall back into our old ways, quite the opposite. Which brings me to the main point of this letter.

The important work of the church is evergreen, it is always needed. As we get closer to opening up fully, we are going to be opening up in smaller ways first. Meeting in person for worship has been the first step in this area, but we are going to be opening up in programs that we have stopped temporarily. This doesn’t mean that everyone is required to go to these things, but all hands are needed in order to make sure our work is done. For those that are comfortable, your hands are needed in order to help spread the labor and bring important perspectives to the table. For those who aren’t comfortable meeting in person yet, your help is needed in helping to spread the word and present ideas. All of your prayers are needed.

One of the constant themes that the apostles teach on in the New Testament is the theme of action following belief. You see this in James where he tells us that, “So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” (James 2:17) You can also see this in the teachings of Paul, “For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: “The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.” (2 Thessalonians 3:10) But I think that this is best summed up in the simple teaching of John in his first letter where he writes, “Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.” John states it simply and plainly that we can often talk a big game, but in reality, we do not follow up on it. The important note that John makes here, and that I love, is that it should be our genuine faith which drives us to do these things. Because God first loved us, we should love others. This love for others should be a want to bring people into communion with God. So, when we do work for God it should be a joy for us and not a curse.

It seems a cliché at this point but in many ways, it is true that we often hold high standards for ourselves or even pay lip service to church teaching, but fail to actually live it out in our lives for all sorts of sinful reasons. We want to see action on the part of others, but don’t live up to it ourselves. So, as we move into this new season, we are really going to need all hands on deck so we can make sure that we are the hands and feet of Christ in the world. This ranges in everything from getting involved with one of the teams, to volunteering for children’s time or VBS. In this newsletter you will see links and contact information for these things. I pray, that you pray and consider how you can be of service to the church.

The world is busy and we have many things that pull us in different directions, but at the end of the day all of those things will wash away and only the work that we have put in for the kingdom of God will remain. The doors to this kingdom were opened by Christ upon the cross when he died for our sins, but the work of the kingdom is worked out by the Holy Spirit working in us. We are going to be getting back into the swing of things and in order to do that we are going to need all hands on deck.

In the name of Christ the Redeemer,
Pastor George