Missions and Ministry
GOSPEL MUSIC
Of all the varieties of music in our world today, none is more beautiful than Gospel Music – music which gives praise to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. All through the Bible it tells us to sing and make music with instruments to honor Him. Read the following Scriptures:
Judges 5:3
Psalm 27:6
Psalm 66:2
Psalm 95:2
Psalm 98:5
Psalm 108:1-3
Ephesians 5:19
From the earliest days of the Old Testament into the New Testament singing and making music has been used to worship God.
We have been honored for the past several years to enjoy – yes, I said enjoy, we as Christians should be the happiest people on earth – the Gospel Concerts at Azalea through the efforts of the Concert Outreach Ministry. The Groups who have shared their ministry in music with us have been Christian men and women of integrity and dedication to their calling to share their God given talent to reach as many people as possible for Christ. While we only see them on stage performing, we should never forget the many hours of travel and leaving their families as well as the tremendous expenses involved to support the ministry and their families.
For those of you who have attended the concerts you know what a blessing; encouragement and uplifting experience it is. For any and all who may never have taken the opportunity to attend, I wholeheartedly invite you to come. Is there joy and laughter – yes! But oh what a blessing you will receive from the words and music as well as fellowship with the people who attend the concerts from all over the Tidewater area.
Friday evening, April 3rd, we were blessed to have in concert The Harvesters Southern Gospel Group. And – what a blessing they were! These guys hail from Sanford, North Carolina, almost in our back door and have quite a following. Our Concert Chairman books them at Azalea as often as she can as they travel the entire country.
Mark your calendars – Saturday, July 11th, 7:00 p.m. McMillan and Life will be in concert at Azalea. This group has been here several times in the past and never fails to bring a great message in music.
Please join us for these concerts – you will be blessed beyond measure!
PRAISE GOD FROM WHOM ALL BLESSINGS FLOW!!
Dana Stewart
Men’s Bible Study
In one more week the Men’s Bible Study group will have completed the Gospel of John. We will have spent about one year studying that great work. Do you think that a bit much? Then consider that we spent seven weeks studying John 3:16. “For God loved the world in this way: He gave His One and Only Son, so that everyone who beliieves in Him will not perish but have everlasting life.” (Holman Christian Standard Bible) Why do those few words require seven weeks? Would not a few sentences work just as well? Or maybe ten minutes would be sufficient. Let me answer that by quoting John 1:1-5.
“In the begining was the Word: and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the begining. All things were created through Him. In Him was life, and that light was the light of men. That light shines in the darkness, yet the darkness did not overcome it.” (HCSB)
After studying those words and those words leading to JOHN 3:16 and with help of video and word prepared by Max Lucado we found that “For God so loved the world…” is expressed in many ways starting with the Book of Genisis and lasting through each following book into the last Chapter of Revelation. Seven weeks, was that enough time? If the truth be told seven times seven may not have enough time.
Upon the conclusion of John the group desires to next study the Letter from James. This will quickly as James has only five chapters in it. But that may not be the whole of it. There is no telling where God’s word will lead us. Join us if you will. We all could stand a little closer to our Lord Jesus. 7-8 pm most Thursday evenings, blessings to you.
Kingdon Advance
Holy Week: Dying Words
There wasn’t one cross, there were three. All the gospels make a point of saying that it was a group execution. Jesus is not even given the distinction of a spot-lighted solo death; he’s inserted to make a party of three, a last-minute addition to someone else’s execution.
We all know about the placard hung above Jesus’ head: “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.” This was standard at a crucifixion. Post the name and the crime with the horribly dying body so all who pass by can see. If the other two crosses had placards, the names didn’t survive into the Bible’s accounts; only their crime survives. “Bandits,” we’re told – meaning insurrectionists against Roman rule, guerillas ambushing a convoy here, hitting an outpost there, taking and killing where they could. Luke just calls them both “evildoers.” So there is Jesus, keeping the same kind of company as always. As in his ministry, so now more grimly in his death, he embodies the words of a long-ago prophet: “he … was numbered with the transgressors” (Isaiah53:12)
.Sometimes I think we are too harsh toward the one who reviled Jesus. Maybe he had his reasons. Awful pain had seized him, the panic of dying was in his throat – maybe
for an instant he had dared to entertain some mad hope that this so-called messiah might really pull something off. But then, no, he can plainly see that the so-called messiah is already nearly dead – and isn’t that just like hope, to die before you do! So he screams bitter words at the crucified Jesus. Luke says that the other of the two actually defended Jesus to his comrade, “Do you not fear God? You and I are guilty. We earned this. But this man did nothing wrong.” And then he does something that no one else in all the gospels ever did. He addressed Jesus simply by his name: “Jesus.” Others called him Teacher, Rabbi, Master, Lord – a very few said, “Jesus, Son of David.”
But in the whole record, no one had ever once just called him by his simple name. Only now does it happen, from someone who is dying. This is how the dying speak: each word simple and earnest as breath. “Jesus.”
“Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” That’s the whole of what he said. “Think of me, Jesus. Remember me, Jesus. In your kingdom, Jesus.”
Who knows if, as he spoke, he really thought Jesus in his own death struggle could even hear the words. But the most wonderful thing happens. Jesus lifts his head, the great face turns, and words are given back: “Truly I tell you, today. You will be with me in Paradise.”
Any number of people overhearing such an exchange between two convicts bleeding to death would have no doubt this was delirium talking, just the nonsense of two delusional, dying fools. We might think that ourselves, if we’re just observing this from some safe distance. But I doubt we should assume any distance for ourselves
This is Holy Week, and it involves a dying before it involves a living. I think this story is recorded in such detail for us by all four gospels because we are being asked to imagine our own dying, which comes to us in so many ways. In just a few minutes I’m going to stop by the hospital to visit a young mother who may lose her first-born child today and death is deep and real. In a way, the man talking with Jesus from his own cross is a sign of what Jesus’ death cannot do for us; it cannot deliver us from death or from our own dying. In some ways, that is us up there, our lives draining away, Slowly but steadily, irreversibly.
And some of us can see ourselves in him, not just because we’re dying. Some of us know we have our own guilt, that our lives too have done real damage as well. And we are in no more position to undo any of it than if we were pinned and suspended from the ground like that evildoer.
What a vision of our awful powerlessness he is, fixed like that, and finished, and nothing even left He can ask for, just this simple, dumb request; –“Jesus? Think of me? In your kingdom?”
And like this one, we hear an answer too. Only it’s so far beyond an answer to what he and we actually asked. It’s like a beggar asking a king for a penny, and the king gives him the whole kingdom. Someone with nothing prays, “Remember me when …” And Jesus answers with the whole green garden of God, this very day!!
Isn’t it amazing how silly and how sad we are, hoping somehow to get things right, wishing we knew what we don’t, dreaming of resolving our lives? If we could just get it right and think right. If we could somehow get it prayed right. The dying criminal shows how badly we miss the point. The point is not to get all of it right, or any of it right, not us who have no power but to want and to need and to ask the simplest thing: “Jesus, remember me.”
Sometimes we say these words crudely, often with a sob or a sigh, because we can’t begin to say what we really need. It is then that his ruined hand reaches for the Paradise gate and opens it wide. It is opened not just for those to pass through on some far-off tomorrow. It is also opened for us this very day, to grant us the sweet, abiding company of the One who does indeed remember us and gives us abundantly more than we had known to ask. Isn’t it wonderful we have Holy Week to remind us of this?
John Upton, Executive Director,
BGAV and VBMB
Used with permission.