Bible Verse for Sunday Service Service , 2024
Philippians 4:9
What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.
Announcements:
Awana begins on September 11. We look forward to having groups from preschool (2 years before kindergarten) through 6th grade, and maybe teens. We will meet every Wednesday night, except holidays from 6:30 to 8:00 PM. We look forward to a great year.
To prepare for Awana, please attend a meeting on August 28, 2024 at 6:30PM at the church. We hope to see all the leaders and helpers to get set for opening night and the coming year. A big thank you to all who have volunteered to help this year again.
Ladies Bible study will restart on September 10, meeting at the church every Tuesday at 10AM. Thank you Sandy Schlosser for leading this important time of Bible study and prayer.
Pastor Jim and Gaylene will be in Gillette for a wedding next weekend so Paul Ostrander will preach for him.
Also, next Sunday is Fellowship Sunday and Communion so please bring some goodies to share.
Sermon:
Pastor Jim spoke to us on Psalm 137 in a sermon he titled “If in Babylon.” This psalm challenges us with its language, its lament, its desire to punish the Babylonians with the punishments that the Jews received through them. To help guide us, Pastor used the motif of an auto accident where someone had gone through the windshield. As part of the recovery, the doctors removed the embedded glass and stitched up the patient. Yet, they missed some, and it slowly worked its way to the surface. Pastor asked us to consider this as way of looking at, and dealing with, our disappointments in three points.
At first, we must recognize our predicament, understand it so we can deal with it a Godly way. Jews in exile had failed. For years, they disobeyed and ignored, or worse, the prophets that God sent. Besides the failure, the Jews in exile had to endure ridicule from the Babylonian captors, where is your God now? Understandably, some felt dejected, remembering Jerusalem before it was leveled.
Our only Godly response to any adversity like this is to renew our commitment to Him. Our commitment should be to our purpose, honoring the Lord. We can do this anywhere, and so could the Jews in exile. Part of the success is to renew our commitment with passion. What is our first response to adversity? Is it like Daniel, who upon hearing the news of the new law forbidding worship or prayer to anyone except the Babylonian king, prayed to the Lord God. Prayer to Him will always be our best response, and a way to show our passion.
In the Psalm, the Jews were eager for revenge on the Babylonians. Pastor preached that we should remember God’s judgment. Vengeance is His. Yes, we live in an unjust world, but we serve a just God who will make it all right in the end, at the Great White Throne Judgment.
So, if we experience grief over an issue that perhaps we believe we’ve dealt with before, but it painfully resurfaces like the glass working its way to the surface, let’s put our hope in Him. Give these hurts to Him. Commit to Him with passion in the face adversity.
Accessing the Service, Bulletin and Sermon Outline:
Here are the pages from the bulletin, click on the images below to see them full size:
If you would like to have the sermon outline, you can download it here, a pdf file.
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