June 18, 2010

The “Buzz” around SBC these days is all about the “Rockin’ Rainforest Kids’ Week” beginning next Monday!   This is one of the greatest weeks of SBC summer ministry, and one of the greatest weeks of Children’s Ministry all year.   Over 100 leaders are trained, resourced, and prayed-up ready to go…kids are being invited throughout the community…the weather promises to be perfect…so join the team and volunteer to help where needed, bring some last minute supplies, invite some children to attend, and especially PRAY that God will once again work in surprising and wonderful ways in the lives of many children through the Rockin’ Rainforest!

Pastor Mark

June 11, 2010

Please pray for Nila Stevenson and family in the loss of her mom in the tragic accident that occurred earlier this week on Hwy. 108.  We will be having a memorial service for Audrey Vest on Saturday at Heuton’s at 1:00.  The young driver of the vehicle remains in critical condition.  Your prayers would be greatly appreciated!  Thanks.

Pastor Mark

June 4, 2010

Please pray for Pastor Mark and Evalyn as they are on vacation in Bend, OR, for a much needed getaway.  Have a blessed weekend!

May 28, 2010

Today launches our Faith In Action Weekend.  I know one person putting their “FIA” today by completing a special project for a friend.  Saturday, one of our “official” weedeating projects takes place where the point person is praying that not only the weeds get cut down but that people putting their “FIA” will be a positive witness to the homeowner who tends to be negative towards Christians.  And Sunday…well, everything from weedeating to ramp building to school clean-up to a blood drive to ATCAA and InterFaith teams to painting to repair jobs to trash removal to elderly visitation to making items to sell for Courage House to…well, you name it, and this FIA Sunday someone from SBC may well be doing it in our community in the name of Jesus.  Pray that this FIA Sunday not only successfully concludes our Becoming  A Good Samaritan series, but also begins a new level of outreach to those in need across our streets…and around our world.  Thanks to each one who is putting their FIA!

Pastor mark

May 21, 2010

It’s Quito Yard Sale Time!  What a great run we have had during our Becoming A Good Samaritan series, reaching out to the needy in our world…across the street and around the world!  Pray and participate this weekend in raising funds for the For His Children orphanage in Ecuador.  They are a model ministry of Christ reaching out to the most needy and neglected in our world and working to establish them in loving families…sounds like God’s work.   This weekend, we conclude our Becoming A Good Samaritan message series before celebrating all we’ve learned together during our Faith In Action weekend  on May 30, when we don’t just “go to church” but “be the church” serving our community.

Pastor Mark

May 14, 2010

It was fun last night with our LIFE Group asking the question:   “How could the 10 of us, working together for 3-4 hours, make a difference in the life of someone we know who could use some help?”   This question arose, of course, in response to our Becoming A Good Samaritan study and in preparation for our Faith In Action Sunday.  I hope you are asking the same question with some of your friends, because our corporate possibility becomes something like,  “How could a thousand people, working together for 3-4 hours, make a difference in the lives of people in our community?”  Now it sounds even more exciting!  And the possibilities even greater.  Pray and plan with us for another great Faith In Action outreach Sunday on May 30.   This Sunday morning, we will be taking sign-ups for projects you know that could be done and for people who are looking for how they can help – see you on the patio at the Faith In Action table!

Pastor Mark

May 7, 2010

Today is Grandparents Day (at least at Soulsbyville School!).   It reminds me of a couple of my favorite Proverbs (or at least ones that have become in recent years some of my favorites):  “Gray hair is a crown of splendor….Children’s children are a crown to the aged”).  So, it’s off to school this morning…or should I say, it’s off to Grandparenting?   I like the sound of that better!   Happy Grandparenting to all of you “crowned” people this morning – it may be one of your most important ministries this day.

Pastor Mark

April 30, 2010

Today, our Elders head to Arnold for our annual 2-day Retreat.  While the timing is because of the priority of establishing a proposed budget for the coming fiscal year, this is hardly the concern that will receive the most attention.

Our REVEAL study “revealed” that we have lots of people who are growing Christians but who are not faithfully practicing basic Christian disciplines and are not regularly living out a Christ-centered life.  So we will ask ourselves…how can we help people (including ourselves!) become daily readers of God’s Word, involved in ministry, generous stewards with our resources, consistent in their prayer life, actively reaching out to others in evangelism and compassion both across the street and around the world, etc.

We also continue to have lots of new visitors to SBC that fail to integrate into our ongoing ministry, and we will be seeking ways to better connect people, first of all, to Christ and then to His Body so they can be actively growing as Christians.   Actually, when you look at our highest level agenda items, it looks like what we are mostly concerned about is how we can “introduce people to Christ and together become more like Him” more effectively!  It’s good to know that our main concerns are how we can live out our purpose better!

We are also “reassigning” two of our Elders to less elder work and more missions involvement:  Bill Polley is becoming “emeritus” in order to give more time and energy to our ROR (Russian Orphan Rescue) missions outreach, and Mark Wildoner is going to be giving less elder time so he has more missions preparation time for a possible “Halftime” adjustment to some area of medical missions.  Sounds like they are doing what we could wish everyone in our church family would be doing:  focusing primarily on fulfilling Christ’s Great Commission in our world!

We would appreciate your prayers this weekend.

Pastor Mark

April 23, 2010

I’ve been thinking:   Could a church in a small Sierra Foothill town actually make a village in Tanzania, Africa, “malaria free” so a couple thousand children’s lives are not threatened by this deadly disease?   Could this church maintain a witness in a town in the middle of Russia so residents see Christ in action reaching out to a local orphanage giving kids a new lease on life?   These are just a couple of the questions we’ll be investigating this weekend in our morning series on “Becoming A Good Samaritan” and our Sunday night “Doing Justice” event – this week, “A Taste Of Russia.”   We’d love to have you with us on this journey of making a difference for God…across the street and around the world.

Pastor Mark

April 16, 2010

Trivia from the Tiger Cruise: so you thought you had a big gas bill? Monday when we “topped off” the tank on the Bonhomme Richard before heading for port we took on 550,000 gallons of fuel in about 90 minutes via two large hoses from a replenishment ship bobbing along in the waves only 140 feet to our side. The cost? A little over $1,300,000 (no government discount I guess!). Wow, I could really get some air miles fast with that fill-up! That’s some gas tank! And you thought you owned a gas hog? While we were chugging along for an hour at 25mph we were burning 6,500 gallons of fuel-that computes to something like 260 gallons/mile! Thanks so much to all of you who prayed for safety and a special time with my son-in-law Matt sailing home from Honolulu. The trip worked out great and it was most informative and interesting to say the least! Hope to see you Sunday as we launch the Becoming A Good Samaritan part of our series with a challenging morning message, a moving and disturbing awareness concert by Courage To Be You in the evening, and small groups using the BAGS participant’s guide during the week!

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