The
Lamplighter,
September 08
================================
Engage Tomorrow
2008 Offering
for MD/DE Missions
Week
of Prayer for State Missions
September 7-14
Church Offering
Goal:
$800/State
Offering Goal: $250,000
A letter from
Dr. David Lee
Executive Director of the Baptist
Convention of Maryland/Delaware
One thing
is certain about tomorrow.
Tomorrow is uncertain! A few
minutes with the newspaper reinforces that fact.
Jesus said that tomorrow should not be a source of worry for us.
In fact, we should see tomorrow as something to engage, not
something to fear.
We as Maryland/Delaware Baptist have chosen to “engage tomorrow.”
We believe that together we can make a significant difference by
giving priority to church multiplication, servicing our existing
congregations, developing and supporting our leaders, involving
Maryland/Delaware Baptists in Acts 1:8 missions, and by developing
resources.
At the core of this effort is our own spiritual willingness and
readiness to answer God’s call to be on mission with Him.
Joshua said to his people,
“Consecrate
yourselves, for tomorrow the LORD will do amazing things among you”
(Joshua 3:5).
I believe God wants to do a might work in this
strategic region of the world.
We need to join him now.
I challenge you to partner with us in engaging tomorrow by giving
to the State Missions Offering.
Each dollar will go directly to make possible these designated
ministry efforts.
If we are faithful and do our part, God will honor His Word.
Together, let’s engage tomorrow!
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A word from Dr.
HOKUF
Dear church family,
Greetings in the precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
I trust all of you have had a good summer.
Perhaps you had a chance to get away for a while or take a day
trip here or there. Our
youth just came back from their mission trip to Ocean City, Maryland.
They gave a wonderful report Sunday morning.
Everyone was blessed.
Of course it wasn’t a vacation; but, they seemed to enjoy being at the
ocean in spite of all the hard work involved with ministry.
A special thanks go to Patricia Culver, the team leader, and
Scott Sinclair (First Baptist Church of Perryville), the leader of the
young men. God bless you
both.
As we segue into the fall, we’re looking forward to
lots of good things that the Lord has in store for us.
Our week of prayer for state missions is scheduled for September
7-14. Our goal is $800.00
for the State Missions Offering.
That is also the week that some of our ladies will be attending
the Women of Faith Conference in
Philadelphia,
PA.
Our home Bible studies will be starting back up.
Team Kids will begin again on September 17 on Wednesday nights
for the elementary age children.
And our church picnic is Sunday afternoon, September 21.
There are a lot of things going on and coming up.
I hope to see all of you!
We continue to be emphasizing prayer at church.
I’ve been preaching all summer on that theme.
We still have persons praying around the clock for revival in our
midst and for the many needs in our church family.
Please be sure to take some of your own personal time each day to
bring these concerns to the Lord.
May God bless you indeed,
Pastor Stephen D. Hokuf
===========================================================
1
Chronicles 4:9-10
—Prayer of
Jabez
Jabez was more honorable
than his brothers. His mother
had named him Jabez, saying,
"I gave birth to him in pain."
Jabez cried out to the God of Israel,
"Oh, that you would bless me
and enlarge my territory!
Let your hand be with me,
and keep me from harm
so that I will be free from pain."
And God granted his request.
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Promotion
Sunday—August 31st
Meet the new teachers and have some fun
All
classes through junior high will meet for the entire Sunday School hour
in the sanctuary. We’ll have
a film, games, and will “meet the teachers” before going to the Robert
Hudler, Sr. Fellowship Hall for snacks and refreshments.
Prizes will be given to those who bring
friends who haven’t been to our Sunday School before.
The fun will start at 9:45am and conclude at 10:45am.
Thank You,
Dave Jackson
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Do nothing/grow
cold
By Pastor Dan Mohler
In the great prophetic chapter of
Matthew 24, where Jesus is talking about the days just prior to His
return, He describes the church in verses 12-13 this way:
“Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will
grow cold, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.”
If we truly believe what we say we
believe, we should be passionate in our love for the Lord and in serving
Him. When our Lord was on
the cross He said, “My mother and brothers are those who hear God’s Word
and put it into practice” (Luke 8:21).
And again in John 13:17, “Now that you know these things, you
will be blessed if you do them.”
The church has several opportunities to
exercise your faith by getting involved.
These include:
Teacher for 4 & 5 year olds
Teacher for grades 6-8
Librarian
Keenagers’ Leader
Social Committee Chairman
Nursery Coordinator
Sunbeams Coordinator
VBS Director (2009)
The church is going to be weakened in the coming
year if these openings are not filled.
A good way to get involved is to share the responsibility with
someone else such as being a “team teacher.”
Jesus did not die on the cross so that we could sit
in our air-conditioned pews and sing songs.
He expected His people to serve as He served:
sacrificially.
============================================================================
Dan Sheffield
Director,
Susquehanna Baptist Association
will be our Guest
Missionary Speaker
Sun.,
September 7, 6pm
He’ll be sharing re:
his mission trip to
Guinea, West Africa
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CHURCH PICNIC
North
East
Town Park
Sun., September 21,
4pm-dark
===============================================================
Work
Day
(lunch
provided)
Sat.,
Sept. 6 8am
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Bill MILLS
CONFERENCE
Sun.,
Oct. 19
Deepening
Relationships
with One
Another
Conference Sessions:
8:30am (Worship Time)
9:45am (for Youth &
Adult Sunday Schools)
11am
(Worship Time)
5-6pm (Break @ 6pm)
6:30-8:30 pm
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2008
Harvest Time Car Show
& Family
Fall Festival
It’ll be one
BIG Event
Something old, something new--that’s the best way to
describe this year’s 6th annual event scheduled for
Saturday, October 18, 11am-4pm. For the first time, I have handed
the entire Festival part of the event over to
Phil Meekins. I am solely overseeing the car show.
It’ll still be one big event with two separate heads.
Now I know what you’re thinking. This is in October and that
sounds rather scary. Don’t be frightened. The Harvest Festival has
always been an outreach supported by the entire church. It could not
happen without the support of the church and the blessing from
God--thus, many heads.
The planning stages are where it can
get rather hectic. Phil and I have always worked close together and I
even closer with Kathy Gray. Phil though, has always been willing to let
me run with the ball and be there as my back up. After 5 years, I felt
that I could no longer run at full speed to oversee both sides. At that
point, Phil stepped up to take The Festival side so that I could
concentrate on the car show. Phil will add a new spark to The
Festival--keeping some old and adding some new. He also has great plans
for the Youth Rally that precedes The Festival on Friday night. With the
car show, I have been gathering up our trophy sponsors, getting flyers
out to the car owners and getting donations to fill the goodie bags.
Please
continue to pray for The Festival, the Youth Rally, the Car Show, the
people who will attend, the sponsors, the workers, Phil and I and the
Lord’s ongoing blessing of this event.
As we get closer to The Festival, we will be having frequent
meetings. These meeting are an important part of the planning. Please
check the web site (www.fbne.net) and Sunday bulletins for dates and
times. In addition, if there are any questions, see Phil or myself and
we will be very glad to help.
Dave Bibey
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Children
celebrate Custom Garage program
Prepare for fall—team leaders needed
The boys and girls in Children’s
worship enjoyed having the Youth Ocean City Missions Team lead each
Sunday in July. The team had
“on the job training” each week.
It was a wonderful experience for all.
The doors will be closing on our
Custom Garage summer program for the boys and girls in Children’s
Worship. After a brief break
on a tropical island (VBS 2008 theme), we’ll finish out our summer
program. We spent weeks
learning about the tools needed to Be Ready, Be Strong; Be Smart
and Love God and Love Others.
Looking in the tool box they learned Bible truths each week and
the knowledge of how to use them in real life.
At the filling station they made their own fun snacks.
We hope the boys and girls
enjoyed our Custom Garage as much as Mr. (Dave) Bibey and Mr. Tim
(Glace). After the study we
celebrate with the boys and girls.
Celebration Sunday will be August 24.
We are now preparing for our fall
program. Due to health
concerns, Tim and Kathy Glace asked for a leave of absence from our team
so we’re looking for new team members.
In
September we hope to present a special Children’s Worship Day.
In Christ’s Service,
Patricia Culver,
Children’s Worship Team Member
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Youth
Ocean
City Mission
Trip
Thanks for your
support
The
Ocean
City team had an early
start on Saturday, August 9.
After picking up C.J. Johnson-Aremu at People’s Plaza we were on our
way. (C.J. had just finished
a 6 week science camp and he was off again with us to
Ocean
City.
What commitment!)
This year’s trip was made possible by a young man
from First Baptist Church of Perryville, Scott Sinclair.
Thanks to his willingness to go as a chaperone for our boys he
completed our team. The team
bonded with Scott quickly.
He was soon called Uncle “Skoot.”
After a safe arrival, we found our new accommodations very
convenient. The church had
annexed some rooms over the First Street Chapel to house 20+ girls and
20+ boys as well as a fellowship hall with pool tables, computer access,
dining hall and chapel.
Saturday night was orientation where we heard the
rules of the camp and our assignments for the week.
We were divided into two teams, each having their
own campground. Scott was
assigned three team members, Chrissy Hall, Jimmy Hall, and Ryan Perry,
who were familiar with the program.
I had our two new recruits, Christopher Bibey and Sabrina Vance,
as well as C.J. Johnson-Aremu.
They did a wonderful job at Sunday worship and at the campground.
Sunday we had to do the worship service for adults.
Each campground had 5-10 families show up in addition to
children. Then we went to
Ocean City West for their morning service where we heard a good message
on Honesty and Integrity. We were challenged for the next 48
hours to speak truth and live truth.
Monday (and every day) each team was headed for
assigned campgrounds by 8:15am and worked until 11am.
Each campground had 15-20 children each day.
I had a number of teenagers who became great helpers throughout
the week.
The youth were involved in afternoon ministries
from taking water to the lifeguards, “Parents Night Out”, and cooking
100 cupcakes (thanks to Chef Ryan and Chef Jimmy).
The rest of the team took care of decorating.
Family Night was Western Night.
So we all showed up with cowboy hats.
Everyone loved those hats!!.
After cleaning the dining hall and fellowship hall, Thursday was
a free evening. The team
went swimming, out to dinner, and took a trip to Assateague to see the
wild ponies and enjoy the beautiful beaches there.
Friday was our good-bye day at the campgrounds.
The children were sad to see us leave.
We were sad to go.
Friday night was a long night working at the International Coffee House
for 100+ internationals that work at Ocean
City
for the summer. They
received free coffee and donuts and played games with our teams.
We cleaned up after 12pm or so.
It was a tired team headed to bed.
Saturday we were up early and cleaned all the rooms
upstairs, packed the van and headed home.
God blessed us with beautiful weather and a wonderful team.
We pray many seeds were planted and that God will continue to
bless our work. You would
all be proud of each person on the team.
It was a learning experience for all of us.
God stretched each of us and truly enlarged our territory.
My prayer is that each team member will commit
early to go next year and that some young adults will commit to
chaperone.
We have special thanks for all your prayers and
financial help--and, a very special thanks to Scott Sinclair.
“Well done thy good and faithful servant(s).”
Goodbye from Ocean City
until next year,
Patricia Culver
Youth
Ocean
City Mission
Team Leader, 2008
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Ruthie JARRELL
In Concert
Singer and songwriter from Taylorsville, NC
“Her
concerts encourage, uplift, and change lives.”
Sun.,
Sept. 28, 6pm
©love
offering
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July/Aug 2008