Blessings to you, friends and Family of BBT.  Read on for your weekly update.

I enjoyed our service last Sunday.  Priscilla engaged us in a time of sharing about our hopes for the church.  You hear mine all the time, so I stayed quiet and let everyone else talk.  I will only say that whatever we want to be, it is going to take all of us working together and led by His Spirit to make it happen.  I appreciate the way so many of you have joined in the work.

I have been taking us through Romans, chapter 12.  We finished that last week and I thought it was a fitting conclusion given all of the discord in our country right now.  I hope we can all learn to engage with each other and with those who disagree with us in a respectful and redemptive way.  Always speak the truth, but always in love and with the realization that though truth remains, none of us have it all.

But Paul still isn’t done.  He’s been addressing our relationships in ever expanding spheres, and now we come to government.  I did not plan all of this based on timing, but I can’t help think that the Lord did.  We just had an election.  I think I can safely say that none of us got everything we wanted.  I don’t know anyone who is completely satisfied with our government from either side of the political spectrum.  Some think it should do more.  Others think it does way too much already.  Some see it as corrupt and unjust while others consider it basically good.  What can we do and what should we do to address what we see as problems in our government?

Chapter 13 of Romans begins with a statement that may be hard for us to swallow.  Most of us recognize the need for law and order and don’t have a problem with the idea that we should submit to proper authority, but what about the next part?  The end of verse 1 reads, “there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God.”  How can that be?  How can a government that does evil things be established by God?  As governments go ours is pretty good, but we have some real problems.  Consider that Paul is writing as a citizen of Rome, hardly a model for a Godly nation.  We will read from Romans 13:1-7 and apply it to our world today.

I’m looking forward to seeing you there. We won’t have Sunday school so that there will be time for an event after church.  Pray for each other. Look out for each other.  Stay connected.

Love y’all!

Larry