A call for vigilance

Every blogger has a difficult task in sorting through what will be shared with our readers. I tend to keep it light, and share the really great things that happen. But I will also admit that I tend to keep clear of the sad things that happen. No one wants to be a downer.

However, I want to be authentic in my presentation to you, so let me show you the season we've found ourselves in here at SRC:

Great things:
1. Jenna's Salvation
2. Kevin signing up for baptism
3. People signing up for membership class
4. Large Group Training day
5. momentum in our Sunday gatherings, (40 people last Sunday)
6. SRCers inviting people
7. Guests coming

A ton of awesome things.

But in the last week and a half in the midst of all those things...

We've had an eruption of terrible things: Immorality, hurting marriages, and family pain.

It's all been hard to handle, the tipping point was last night when I received a call during our operations team meeting from someone so broken they couldn't even speak. We prayed together over this person's situation on speakerphone. Christine prayed a fantastic prayer. Matt and Doug and I agreed with her. Then we concluded our meeting and drove to that person's house and talked and cried together. And in the middle of that something amazing happened...

Someone in the group began to speak to our host explaining God's forgiveness and the hope of his forgetfulness. When they finished the host shared that Billy Graham in a TV program earlier that evening had said the same thing. It's why I love being pentecostal. Here in these minutes of our small group feeling powerless, and unsure of ourselves or what to say and do, the Holy Spirit prophesied through my friend to confirm the words that God was trying to help our host hear.

What a great God we serve.

And so I call you to vigilance. We are under the attack of the enemy. So as my friend Carol would say, "Pastor Ben, you must be doing something right, and the devil doesn't like it." If this is what we have to go through, consider what it will be like on the other side. It reminds me of a verse from Pastor Matt's message from Sunday "2 Corinthians 4:17 (NIV) ¹⁷For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all."

The Operations Team began a group study in December discipling us to share our faith with others. As part of that first lesson I shared that we would most certainly come under spiritual attack because of our dedication to this process. Well, we certainly have, but if this is the price of greatness, of becoming without spot or wrinkle then so be it. In the mean time, I follow the example of Christ who when seeing the moneychangers in the temple, made a whip, and then went on the offensive. Bind up your whip in prayer and pursuit of God, and let's go for it. Satan can attack us,but he can't occupy us. We give no place to the Devil.

--Ben