Notes from Sunday - 3/7/10

Yesterday was another wonderful day of worship and fellowship at the Shiloh Metropolitan Baptist Church of Jacksonville.

I was not feeling well physically. But the Lord gave me strength to get through the day and blessed our worship services in a rich and powerful way.

We celebrated the Lord’s Table in both of our worship services yesterday. I believe it is one of the highest times of worship when the saints commune together to deliberately remember the Person and Work of Christ in the manner he prescribed.

I taught my New Members Class yesterday for the first time in about two months. It was great to be with our new members and to teach them about the essential elements of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

It was good to meet some of the guests who joined us for worship yesterday.

Our new Youth Pastor, Andrae Robinson, led the congregation worship song – “Here I Am To Worship.” It is a beautiful song. I hope it will become a regular part of our worship life.

We had special guests yesterday. The Concert Choir (not Gospel Choir) of Florida A&M University (FAMU) led the musical praise in our 10 AM worship service. Their two musical selections were very good.

I preached on “The Freedom of Forgiveness” from Matthew 18:21-35.

The Lord sovereignly “tricked” me into preaching this sermon. I had been working on a message from Luke. But the Lord took it from me about 5 AM Sunday morning. As reverently as I could, I told the Lord he had 15 minutes to share with me what the agenda for the day was. When the Lord led me to a message on forgiveness, I protested. I did not think my congregation was ready for this message. But it was 5:30 AM. I was too desperate to argue. So I did what the Lord was leading me to do. And he proved, as he always does, that he knows what is best for his people. Praise God!

In his book, The Power and Freedom of Forgiveness, John MacArthur argues that most spiritual problems are rooted in either guilt (the need to receive forgiveness) or bitterness (the need to express forgiveness). I agree.

Praise God for all who were saved and added to the church in our worship services yesterday!

I am tempted to say what next Sunday’s sermon will be. But the way things have been going the past few weeks, I had better just keep my mouth shut and wait and see!

I had several important announcements that I wanted to emphasize yesterday. And I did not make any announcements in either service. Oh well.

A brief testimony: I am starting to have fun learning how to pastor Shiloh.

Crystal and I tried to watch the Oscars last night. But we had not seen most of the movies that were winning the awards. So we did more fast more fast forwarding through it, rather than actually watching it. Let the church say, TiVo!