'Paint Pots' and the Sunday Service

This was the scene today at Alva Baptist and as you can see we had a good turnout for 'Paint Pots' and everyone had a great time. If you look closely you'll find Erin in blue and pig tales at the far table. Julie told me Erin acts like she owns the place as when everyone leaves she shows them to the door and tells them goodbye. She has us laughing all the time.

Yesterday the Sunday service was good as we had probably our best turnout so far since we've been there. There's still a real hyper traditional attitude among some of the old guard. Apparently I must have messed up yesterday with the communion because one of the 'old guard' told someone that it was awful. I think I didn't pray at the right time or something so she had a fit. I'm sure I'll hear more about it before too long. Last week we had some people leave in a huff because the service went over time (7 mins.). They were pretty ticked off saying they weren't coming back. I guess these are the challenges of being a pastor, at least some of them anyway. Oh well, you can't please everyone. Stay tuned for my next screw up, maybe you'll get a good laugh from it.
It's kind of sad when you think about it. So many times I've seen people in churches make a big deal over things that don't matter and then totally ignore the stuff that does. Kind of really makes you wonder.

Stay tuned,

Marc

Great night last night in Alva as we had a few more people show up and had some great discussion. Christianity Explored is primarily designed for those curious about the Christian faith but as we are finding out, it is also good for those that are young in their walk as well. One of things I keep finding out is that there are so many out there that have a really warped view of the gospel because they have never been clearly taught what scripture says about how we are saved. So many still think (even in protestant churches) that you can somehow do enough good works to earn your way to heaven. The bible couldn't be clearer on this as this is what it says, "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God-- not by works, so that no one can boast." - Ephesians 2:8-9

If that's not clear enough (I don't how it couldn't be), give the sermon on the mount a read sometime (Matthew 5-7) and you'll see that Jesus makes it emphatically clear that we all are guilty of sin and our so-called good works aren't going to cut it. There are many more scriptures I could share to support this point which by the way is the most important aspect of the Christian faith. If it seems like I'm a bit passionate about this well, I am. Actually I'm angry that there are so many men and women in pulpits around the world that give such a muddy message. If they don't preach the clear gospel message that we are saved by grace alone by faith alone in Christ alone, they do not belong in the pulpit.

There's an elderly lady in our church who has no peace because for years and years she has sat in churches week after week listening to a works based social gospel. I'm sorry but that is a crime because she lives in fear every day of her life. Jesus doesn't want us to live in fear, he wants us to experience the peace only he can give through the blood he shed on the cross for the remission of sins. One other thing we discussed last night; when we say we need to somehow do good works to enter heaven, we are saying that what Jesus did on the cross wasn't good enough, it wasn't complete.

There's much more I could say but I'll save it for another day.

God bless

What Now After IWT?

Many of you I'm sure are wondering what we are up to these days after the tour has gone through. Well lets just say God's timing couldn't be better.

Last summer in anticipation of the tour we were wondering a bit what we would be doing afterwards and if we would even continue on here in Scotland. At the same time God was tugging our hearts toward this wee Baptist church in the town of Alva about 7 miles from our home.
Some of you will remember that last summer we had a team from New Jersey come over to do a vacation bible school at this church which was very successful. Just prior to this, the church had actually seriously considered closing it's doors because their attendance had dwindled down to about 6 older people who were running out of energy to keep the place going.

After the vacation bible school, we went back to attending Stirling Baptist through most of the summer but kept thinking about this church and finally we made a decision to start attending and see what God had in store for us.

Not long after that, David Barrie, the youth pastor from Stirling Baptist (who was overseeing Alva Baptist) asked us what our plans were after the Impact World Tour went through in early November. We told him we weren't entirely sure as we were praying about it and to be honest we were very concerned about our finances and seriously considering returning to the states in December when our lease was up.

All during this time we were very concerned for the church and the lack of consistent leadership. Because there was no pastor - they would have a different preacher every week with very little substance in the messages most of the time. Well after much prayer, Julie and I were more than willing to step in and help out in these areas but we thought, if this is from God, someone will invite us to fill this role. Shortly there after, that's what happened and now we are pastoring this wee church on an interim basis.

Please pray for this town of Alva that souls would be drawn to hear the gospel by the power of the Holy Spirit. We plan on just preaching the word in an expositional fashion starting with the Gospel of John and going straight through.

We are also starting a Christianity Explored course on the 18th of January for those curious about the Christian faith. Pray for that as well.

If you are interested in what's happening with the church you can check out our blog @ www.hillfootsalvabaptist.blogspot.com There's also a link in the links section at the top left.

The picture above is of the church. Yea it looks really small but can actually seat as many as 200 comfortably believe it or not.

We'll have more updates soon.

Till then, God bless.

Marc