Bartimaeus Baptist Temple

Merry Christmas y’all!  This week will be our Christmas celebration.  We’ll have a shorter service.  I will read the traditional Christmas story and say just a few words, and then we’ll move to the back for the food and fellowship.  It will be more of a picnic style event.  Bring a side if you can and a $5-10 gift if you want to participate in the exchange.

I have some good news.  I have been contacted by someone from my neighborhood who is donating the basics for a security system for the church.  Actually, his friend contacted me and I haven’t gotten the man’s full name yet, but we will be sure to acknowledge him properly.  I had put out a request for references for someone who might be able to help us determine the best solution.  By the time I heard from him, I had done some more research and decided what seemed best, and that is exactly what is being donated.  It is not everything we will eventually want to have but it is a great start.  God is good!

I think everyone knows by now why that has become a priority.  The building was broken into last week.  We’re thankful that no one was hurt and little if anything was taken.  We have some damage to repair, but in this too we have had a donor step up to help.  Of course I would have preferred that this not happen, but I think that our Lord is using it to bring good things to everyone involved, possibly even the perpetrator.

Last week i put aside the message I had planned in order to speak what I felt that the Lord would say to us about the situation and how we should respond.  You can find it on our Podcast, Facebook, and our YouTube Channel. Thanks again to Kimi, Kenneth, and Cathy for their parts in bringing this incident to a satisfactory conclusion.

See you Sunday.  Love y’all!

Larry

Hi everyone!  I hope you enjoyed your Thanksgiving holiday.  Linda and i spent a nice quiet day at home listening to worship music and praising our awesome Lord.  We all have so much for which we can give thanks.

It has not been an easy week for everyone.  Priscilla did sound better when I talked to her this morning.  She and Kimi are improving.  Cathy’s brother Gary fell and broke a hip yesterday and is to have surgery sometime today.  Brenda is attending her uncle’s funeral today.  Pray for her family.  Cindy’s cousin Cathy passed away on Tuesday from covid.  Pray for her family.

Sometime last week, a window was broken at the church.  Public speculation as to who and why is probably not helpful.  Let us just pray for them, and do what we can.  Thanks to everyone who has worked to get it fixed.  We are making slow progress.

This Sunday, we’ll be continuing our kingdom study with the account of the “rich young ruler” from Matthew 19:16-26.  You will recall, I hope, some of the material, as we covered this from Mark’s gospel just over two years back.

We’ve probably all heard some version of the saying, “You can’t be too rich or too thin.”  We know one actually can be too thin, but can you be too rich?  In our culture of envy, it certainly would seem that the answer is “yes,” but how much is too much?  I’ll bet whatever that number is, it’s more than whatever people who believe that have.  There’s no tangible indicator of “too rich,” because the problem is not in the possessions, but in the possessor.   You are too rich if your possessions own you.

Jesus said that it is impossible for a rich man to enter the kingdom of Heaven.  This was astonishing to the disciples.  After all, even the law taught that God would prosper those who obey Him.  Riches were seen as a sign of God’s favor.  Sometimes they were.  If riches alone excluded one from the kingdom, then Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob didn’t make it either.  The point is that no one can get in unless God makes a way.  When questioned, Jesus said, “With people this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (v. 26)

I’m thankful for all of you. I am richly blessed, and I look forward to seeing you on Sunday.

Love y’all!

Larry

Peace to you, loved ones.  As I sit here listening to the rain outside my window, I’m thankful for all that God has done and all that He has brought us through.  By His grace, we are still here.  I trust that He has more for us to do.  As I write this, Pris is on her way home after getting her treatment for the pain she has been in.  She says she feels a little better.  Hopefully this will bring some relief, but keep praying for healing.  She and Kimi also seem to be getting colds.

What makes a person great?  Accomplishments?  Status?  Wealth?  What about character?  Does someone in particular come to mind?  Why?  My guess is it isn’t someone who proclaims their own greatness.  Would Jesus think they are great?  He does have something to say about the matter.

This Sunday, we’ll be in Matthew 18:1-6.  Jesus’ disciples have come to know who He is, but they don’t yet understand what that means.  They expect a kingdom, but they are still thinking of an earthly kingdom that works on the same principles that others do.  They don’t yet understand that His kingdom is something very different, and they assume that as His closest followers they’ll have high positions in His new kingdom.  They seem to expend a great deal of energy arguing over who is the greatest among them, and the bickering doesn’t stop right up to the night of His arrest.

In this chapter, Jesus turns their thinking on its head.  He says that greatness is defined by servanthood, and no one even gets into his kingdom without the humility of a child.  Then He goes on to impress upon them how much He values His children.  These lessons are critically important for us to understand.  They have implications for how we treat each other and how we conduct our lives inside and outside of the church.  Let’s explore them together.

See you Sunday.

Love y’all!

Larry

Blessings to you, loved ones.  I hope you get a chance to enjoy this beautiful weather.  I’m thankful for the rain and the pleasant temps to follow.  Speaking of things that refresh, it was good to be back together on Sunday.  I hope we’re done with things that keep us apart.  I am looking forward to better things.

This week, we’ll examine the last three kingdom parables in Matthew, Chapter 13. (Mt 13:44-50)  We talk a lot about context, and it’s just as important here in the gospels as it is in the letters.  Each author means to communicate something by the things he chooses to include and also in the way he chooses to include them.  And of course all of it is being directed by the Holy Spirit.

Chapter 13 consists almost entirely of illustrations (parables) that Jesus begins by saying, “The kingdom of Heaven is like…”  Our chapter and verse divisions are somewhat arbitrary, but it does seem that these ideas were meant to go together.  Jesus apparently spoke them in the course of one day’s teaching.  I am only just beginning to see for myself what Jesus is doing here and I am sure that understanding will be refined with more study.  To put it simply, Jesus has given us a snapshot of the kingdom as it relates to history and the world, and especially of it’s king, Himself.

If I repeat this series in the future, I will probably rearrange the last couple of messages, because the parables we’ll be looking into directly follow the explanation of the parable of the wheat and weeds found earlier in the chapter.  Jesus has used pairs of similar illustrations, and he does so again here.  The parables of the treasure and the pearl go together, then the analogy of the dragnet has a theme similar to that of the wheat and weeds.  All of it serves to give us an idea of what God’s kingdom is and what its king is like.

I get so excited when I see something in His word that I have not seen before.  I can hardly wait to share it with you.  Come join us!

Love y’all,

Larry

I didn’t want to do this.  I still believe it isn’t really necessary, but it will insure that we remain above reproach should anything unexpected happen.  On Wednesday I was informed that someone I had lunch with the day before and sat next to tested positive for covid-19.  I have already had it and he was not symptomatic at the time, so I have no reason to think that I caught it.  However, since 5 days after exposure are required before one can be tested and that takes us to Sunday, I’ve decided to switch to a virtual meeting for that day.

Since there seemed to be issues with some of us getting charged for the conference line we have been using, we’ll try Zoom this time.  Regular attendees received a link from me via text for joining the meeting and I also sent an email if I had an address for you.  You may want to come in a little early in case you have trouble.  If you didn’t get a link and want to join us, you can contact me directly, on our web site, or through Facebook.

This will be a first for me and I don’t know how well it is going to go, using a screen reader to manage the meeting.  It is a bit of an experiment to see how we might get together more often without having to be in person.  We will have a short meeting just to catch up and share praise and prayer requests.  Though there will be no formal program, you are welcome to share anything that will be of benefit to the rest of the body and we’ll keep it open as long as people want to talk.

I hope you will join us.

Love y’all!

Larry