Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Pancakes for supper...again

Another interesting aspect of small town life is that it's actually possible to throw a town-wide meal and include just about everybody (without it costing a fortune or requiring a volunteer staff the size of a small country). I think I've mentioned before about one of the blessings of small town life that we noticed even early on: that people organize benefits to raised money for those in the community who are suffering. However, this past Wednesday there was a benefit of another kind. The Underwood Civic Club (like a Chamber of Commerce) organized an Appeciation Supper on behalf of the companies in town. Basically the residents were treated to a free meal as a thanks for supporting the local businesses. These benefits meals are also fairly predictable (pancakes and sausage)...but free food nontheless. It's really neat to see the whole town come together for events like these...something that you'd almost never see in a larger community. I don't know about others, but I enjoy breakfast for dinner occasionally.

Tonight will be our last regular youth ministry Bible study before the summer. Next week we'll have an event to go out to eat in Bismarck and then to see "Prince Caspian." Please pray for wisdom in how we should proceed with the youth ministry in the future. On another youth note, I will be taking the high school Sunday School class this summer through the book "Do the Hard Things." Please pray for my time with the guys and that God would use this to challenge them to live up to His standards and not down to the world's.

Sunday I preached on Matthew 4:12-25 and the sermon was entitled "The Messiah's Ministry Takes Shape." In this passage Jesus' ministry begins and you see His ministry values: preaching, calling disciples, teaching and healing. If these are Jesus' ministry values, shouldn't they also characterize those who follow Him? Click here to listen to the sermon.

By God's Grace, Jeff

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