Thanksgiving Blessings & Christmas Excitement (Nov 30, 2009)
We here at Grace Baptist Church trust you had a wonderful Thanksgiving time with your friends and family. Karen, April, and I were able to travel to Pensacola to spend Thanksgiving with our middle daughter Amy who is a freshman at PCC. The Lord blessed with a great weekend. We traveled back to Columbus Saturday afternoon and began to prepare our hearts for a wonderful day in God's house. Though attendance was down yesterday, largely due to people being out of town for Thanksgiving, the Lord gave us some significant blessings that we would like to share with you.
Bus attendance was down (96 riders), but the Lord got ahold of one child's heart during bus church, and that child made a trip to the counseling center to receive Jesus Christ as personal Savior. Amen! Our chapel in Lumpkin was slightly up in attedance, as was our base ministry. Brother Ingram reports that nine soldiers stood to receive Christ as personal Savior this week. Praise the Lord! All totaled, we had 612 for Sunday School this week and 662 for the morning worship.
Several visitors were in attendance yesterday morning. Pray for us as we follow up with them. In addition, two people visited Grace for the first time last night. The sermon was on "Why Does Christ Like Blood So Much?" At the conclusion of the service, both visitors walked the aisle to receive Jesus Christ as personal Savior. Amen!
On school front, don't forget that our annual Christmas programs begin tomorrow night. The Upper Elementary and High School programs will be presented December 1 at 7:00 PM. The Lower Elementary program will take place a week later at 7:00 PM.
Christmas at Grace is right around the corner. Three big rallies are planned this year. The teen rally, featuring Evangelist Bryan Samms, will be December 11 at 10:00 PM. The children's rally, with Uncle Charlie, will be December 12 at 4:00 PM. And the adult rally with the Daybreak Quartet and a free Christmas dinner will take place December 13 at 10:30 AM. We are expecting to exceed 1500 people throughout the weekend and are trusting God for dozens of salvation decisions. I trust you will pray with us about this most important weekend.
This coming Sunday, I will begin my annual Christmas series. This year's sermon series is entitled "People Who Missed Christmas." I trust that you will be in attendance all four weeks of December. End the year right by being in the house of God!
Thank you for your continued prayers and support of this ministry. May God's richest blessings be upon you this week.