Back To Africa

The house that needs work.

We have been very busy putting together our first team to go back to Africa to begin the work as we partner with Dan and Pam Johnson in Tanzania.  The dates for this trip are July 18-29 and will consist of two separate teams that will travel together but spend much of the week apart.  Team 1 will be a construction team that will take an old house and work to convert it into a bunkhouse that will accomidate many teams in the future.  This work will be mainly light construction, cleaning, painting, plumbing, etc.  Randy Sorrow has agreed to lead this portion of the trip.  Team 2 will be an evangelism team that will go further into the bush to scout out new areas where a high concentration of Maasai can be found.  Once in these areas, we will share faith with them and try to establish a positive relationship for future work.  I will lead this team myself.

If anyone is intrested in going on this trip, we are having an informative meeting this Sunday, March 27 at 4:00 pm in room 213.  This meeting will give many details concerning cost, training, preparation and other vital details.  If you think that this or any mission trip to Tanzania might be in your future, please try to attend this important meeting.  I hope to see you there.

I think I saw a church!

Most of you know by now that we here at Old Fort have been seeking to fulfill the Great Commission of our Lord by hosting the Community Impact for Christ every Monday night, where hundreds of people come each week for physical, emotional or spiritual support.  Served by hundreds of deicated voluteers, CIFC has provided a way for us to share the love of God and His gospel message with hundreds that we may have never even met before beginning this program.  Over the past seventeen months, literally thousands have been served and best of all, many have been saved. 

Most recently, my concern has been to find a way to get our many clients, especially the regulars, involved in a local church.  I recognized that there are many barriers deviding the people of God and that these barriers are never more apparent than on Sunday Morning.  I had been praying earnestly that God would show me how to connect these beautiful people, many of whom were already his faithful servants, into a church home; either here at Old Fort or some other Bible believing fellowship.  Then it happenned.  I saw the church.

One Monday several weeks ago as I walked through the crowd of guests waiting patiently to be checked in, I noticed some things that felt very familiar to me.  They were calling me "pastor" and talking as if they had known me for a long time.  They were fellowshipping among themselves and with many of our OFBC family.  Once things got started, I noticed how they went out with our members, talking and laughing to other areas where God's people were waiting to help them with food or medical attention or prayer.  Then I remembered a Bible verse about the first church recorded in the book of Acts.  "All the believers were in one heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had."  (Acts 4:32)

That's when it hit me.  I was looking at the church in its purest form.  These many clients had not been coming to a community service organization all these months, they had been coming to church; God's church.  While we had been busy building a Christian service center, God had been building His Kingdom.  What a revelation!!  Now I am no longer praying that God would show me how to get our clients involved in a church, but rather that He would show me and all of us how to accept them as our church.   I believe that once we learn to do that, they will then feel the barriers that divide us crumble and will find there way to worship with us (or someone) on Sundays.

What do you think?