Tips To Make The Season Brighter

Some good advice that should keep you in the right frame of mind during this holiday season.

• Prepare your soul for the holiday. Spend not so much on gifts that your soul is forgotten.
• Don’t burden the shop girl, the mailman, and the merchant with complaints and demands.
• Give yourself with your gift. This will increase its value a hundredfold. And he who receives it  shall treasure it forever.
• Do not value gifts received by their cost. Even the least expensive may signify love, and that is more priceless than silver and gold.
• Do not neglect the needy. Share your blessings with many who will go hungry and cold unless you are generous.
• Do not neglect Christ’s church. To neglect church services for secular celebrations makes a mockery of the holiday.
• Keep a childlike spirit. Not until you have become in spirit as a little one are you ready to enter into the kingdom of Heaven
• Give your heart to Christ. Let Him be at the top of your wish list.

Thank You, Lord

Just this once, Lord, I want to come to you with no problems, but simply to say, Thank You:

For your forgiveness when I fail.
For the sheer joy of sleep when I’m terribly tired.
For the silent strength of humility when pride overtakes me.
For the justice of your laws when men are cruel.
For the remedies for sickness when I am ill.   
For the simplicity of orderliness when I face confusion.
For the assurance that you have made a place especially for me when I feel inadequate among my peers.
For me joy of helping others when I see people in need.
For the earthly evidences of your will when I’m trying to find out what life is all about.
For the reality of your world, when I stray too far into fantasy.
For the rightness of reasonableness when I panic too quickly.
For the fun that refreshes when everything gets too serious.  
For the renewal in moments of silence when I’m dizzy being busy in a hectic world.

Facts About Our Capital

When one considers how irreligious and how offended by Christianity some of our country's leaders are, the following facts are astonishing.

As you walk up the steps to the building which houses the U.S. Supreme Court you can see near the top of the building a row of the world's law givers and each one is facing one in the middle who is facing forward with a full frontal view - it is Moses holding the Ten Commandments.

As you enter the Supreme Court courtroom, the two huge oak doors have the Ten Commandments engraved on each door.

Above the seats of the Supreme Court Justices is a display of the Ten Commandments.

There are Bible verses etched in stone all over the Federal Buildings in Washington D.C.

Every session of Congress begins with a prayer by a paid preacher, whose salary has been paid by the taxpayer since 1777.

Patrick Henry, a founding father of our country, once said, " It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded not by religionists but by Christians, not on religions but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ."

The very first Supreme Court Justice, John Jay, said, “Americans should select and prefer Christians as their rulers."

My Thanks to Glenda Thomas for inspiring this article.
~ C. Shultheisz

Commandments for a Happy Church

1. Speak to people. Speak to everyone, especially to those whom you don’t know. There is nothing quite so nice as a cheerful word of greeting.
2. Smile at people. lt takes 72 muscles to frown and only 14 to smile. Your smile is one of your finest assets. Use lt! lt doesn’t cost a thing!!
3. Call people by name.  The sweetest music to any person’s ears is the sound of his or her own name. lf you don‘t know the person’s name, introduce yourself and likely the person will respond with his or her name.
4. Be friendly and helpful. lf you want friends, learn to be a friend. Everyone needs them. No one has too many.
5. Be cordial. Try to speak and act as if everything you do is a genuine pleasure.
6. Be genuinely interested in people. Try to like everybody and everybody will like you. Do not limit yourself to a few friends then there are so many likable people about you.
7. Be generous with praise. And be just as sparing with criticism.
8. Be considerate of the feelings of others. Usually, there are three sides to a controversy: yours, the other person’s, and the right one. Try to see them all.
9. Be alert to give service. What we do for others counts most in life. Try giving yourself away.  It’s fun!
10. Develop a sense of humor. To this good sense of humor, add a generous dose of patience and a dash of humility. Then get ready to receive many blessings. They’re sure to come!  

India Work Update

Bihar & Nepal Ministry - "Greetings to you in the name of Christ.  Brothers, I am sending you some of the pictures of the Bihar and Nepal ministries.  We are working very hard.  By bicycle we went to Nepal and preached the Good News to the people.  Kindly pray for all these people.  People are very much attracted toward the Good News and they requested us to come and teach to them about the New Testament church.  May God Bless you." ~Massih Tudu

Teen Movie Night

Members:  Check out the pics from the recent Teen Movie Night.

Commitment Report Card

I wonder what it would be like if God issued each member a report card as the schools does? The report card would be based upon how they did in His kingdom. The report card might look something like the one below. Take a few moments and fill it out based upon how you think God would rate you in your Christianity (using the A-F scale):

Well, how did you do? Imagine for a moment that God would only take to heaven those who had "A’s"? Would you go? Of course, I can’t say that’s what will happen, but I do know that God desires us to be doing our very best for Him. What can you do to improve the areas where you wouldn’t receive an "A”? Why not start on improving your Christian life.

Ed Sterchi
The Encourager  

Fools According to Proverbs

The book of Proverbs, God’s manual for "How to Truly Be Wise," also contains a wealth of material regarding foolish behavior. Consider these examples:

1. The Loud Mouth (Proverbs 18:2).
2. The Hot Tempered (Proverbs 12:16; 14:16).
3. The Ego-Maniac (Proverbs 26:1).
4. Those Who Let Praise Swell Their Heads (Proverbs 26:1).
5. The Pseudo-Intellectual (Proverbs 26:7,9).
6. The Know-It-All (Proverbs 12;15; 26:12).
7. Rebellious Against God’s Way
(Proverbs 10:23; 13:19; 14:9).
8. Impulsive Talkers (Proverbs 29:11).
9. "Ladder Climbers" (Proverbs 11:29).
10. Troublemakers (Proverbs 20:3).
11. The Wasteful (Proverbs 19:3; 28:25-26).
12. Self-Confident (Proverbs 19:3; 28:25-26).
13. Gossiping Big Mouth (Proverbs 10:18).
14. Hard-Headed Children (Proverbs 10:1; 15:5).
15. Stubborn Who Never Learn (Proverbs 26:11).

Clean Carts

Been around shopping carts my whole life. Never thought much about them. Alter all, what is there to think about a shopping cart? My grandmother used to refer to one as a "buggy," "Grab that buggy for me," she'd say. Been "grabbin"‘ one ever since. Now I grab one for my wife, push it around the store, pay for its contents, slam it into one ‘ of those corrals in the middle of the parking lot and go home.

I look at those carts differently now though, thanks to a scene I happened upon the other day while driving alongside the Riesbecks Grocery parking lot. A rather clean—cut, professional-looking fellow is standing amidst a sea of shiny, sparkling carts. A water hose lies nearby, obviously the source of their sparkliness. He has in his hand what appears to be a sp1ay—paint can and is standing behind a large box van identified by large red letters as being in the service of a "Shopping Cart Cleaning and Repair" business.

Who knew? There exists in this world a company which does nothing but clean and repair shopping carts? And according to a brief Google search, there's more than one. I was unaware that anyone cleaned them. I sure didn't think anyone repaired them. If it is someone's official job to clean and repair these things, then why is it that I always manage to pull out the one that feels like some sort of disease is camped out on the handle while one of its wheels insists on having an emotional wheel breakdown and refuses to spin? But I digress.

Probably at some point every day we are the benefactors of a service having been performed that we have never given any thought to. We don‘t know who does it, how they do it, when they do it We didn’t even realize it needed done. Only if someone stopped doing it would you then recognize its- necessity. We continually reapthe benefits of a job done by one who did not aspire to do that job.

"What do you want to be when you grow up, Johnny'?"

"A shopping cart cleaner."

I don‘t think so. Safe to say little Johnny thought much more about becoming a teacher, a manager, a lawyer, a builder, or a mailman. But shopping carts need attention and he needs a job.

The Lord‘s church needs attention and you need a job! Things need done that are neither glamorous nor attention-grabbing -- they need done nonetheless. Find a way to contribute to the Lord‘s cause. It may involve a I .subtle and seemingly insignificant task. Possibly, no one will recognize that you did it. Possibly, no one will even recognize it needed done. God will! And Him knowing is all that counts!

~Charles Schultheisz | Pulpit Minister

Why Study the Cross of Christ?

• Because the cross of Christ shows sin for what it is.
• Because the cross is the drawing power that leads men to the Savior.
• Because the cross of Christ presents atonement.
• Because the cross of Christ teaches something about death.
• Because the cross of Christ shows that self-denial is the way to victory.
• Because the cross of Christ reveals our hope for the future.
• Because the cross of Christ teaches what real love is.
• Because of what the Bible teaches that the cross did.