The Lord really blessed our Easter services at Shiloh Metropolitan Baptist Church. In fact, the entire Holy Week was special - from our Palm Sunday services, to our visit to St. Thomas Baptist Church Thursday night, to our Good Friday Service, to our church-wide fast, to our 3-1-6 evangelism emphasis. During our Bible Study Fellowship hour, our children led a program songs and recitations. It was beautiful to hear the children sing praise to God and quote from memory passages of scripture. And I was glad to see how many people came out to support our children.
The music was great! Our music did a great job leading us in musical praise to God. I was really blessed by "The Midnight Cry," which I had never heard, and "Don't Cry," were particularly moving. And a special thanks to the choir members who do not regularly attend the 8 AM service. Your sacrifice may the day extra special.
We gave a book away to all of our guests - Anchor For The Soul by Ray Pritchard. It is one of the clearest explanation of the gospel and a good read.
Thank you to every member who worked to invite or bring a guest with you to worship.
I preached a message from Acts 2:22-24 entitled, "God's Testimony About Jesus Christ." In these three verses, Peter gives three ways in which God himself testified that Jesus is both Christ and Lord:
1. God affirmed the life of Jesus (2:22).
2. God planned the death of Jesus (2:23).
3. God brought about the resurrection of Jesus (2:24).
Whatever the quality of the sermon, I had a great text to preach from in which Peter declares, "God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, for it was not possible for him to be held by it." (Acts 2:24)
I got a whopping one hour of sleep Saturday night. And I was wiped out Sunday morning. But by the day got into gear, the Lord gave me strength and I did not feel tired at all. God is Good.
I preached for about 10 minutes during the 8 AM service trying to block out a woman fighting with a baby in church. Woman: Crystal. Baby: Hailey. Who do you think won?
Praise God for those who were saved and added to the church in our services yesterday!
Kim and Copelia, from Mt. Sinai in Los Angeles, were in town and worshiped with us. When Crystal pointed them out, as I was giving the welcome, it absolutely made my day. I was a little homesick over the weekend, as I thought about this being my first Easter away from home. Worshiping and fellowshipping with Kim and Copelia over dinner, was a great blessing for us.
Our A.B. Coleman auditorium was set up for overflow. And at least one hundred people viewed our 10 AM service from Coleman, because we were running out of room in the main auditorium.
I understand that parking was a madhouse yesterday. Thank you to all of the brothers who served by helping people find a place to park and get to the campus. For that matter, thank you to all of the SMBC members who served in any way.
Please remember the Shiloh Metropolitan Baptist Church in your prayers this week.
