Saturday Insights

I will have been in pastoral ministry 27 years this coming September. The following list is some "core values" that I have developed over that period. What I mean by "core values" is that these for me are beliefs about pastoring and ministry in general that have served as guidelines over the years. They are in no particular order of importance.

~ Be honest and transparent with people

I probably do this to a fault. But it keeps everything simple. I absolutely hate not being myself or trying to be what people expect me to be. I started out in pastoral ministry very young and it seemed like people were always trying to lay their expectations on me..."this is what I think a pentecostal preacher must look like, act like, and sound like." Even to this day, I detest that. However, I will say that my Heavenly Father is teaching me to be patient when people do this and love them anyway.

~ After people come to Christ, the real work of the church begins (discipleship)

I don't like to admit this, but when I first entered the ministry I was a big numbers guy. It was all about how many we had in Sunday School or Morning Worship. "I was addicted to counting heads." I read every church growth book that was ever written my first 15 years in ministry. I went to every church growth conference. I wanted to have the biggest church in the state and the biggest in the Church of God.
It really does pain me to talk about this. Over the years, the Lord has taught me that "its not about numbers but people." Jesus left the ninety-nine and went after the one. He carefully nurtured and loved the one. The Lord has taught me to minister and love the one. This is why I believe so strongly in one-on-one discipleship and mentoring. This is why we train cell leaders to do...to disciple "the one." This I believe is the greatest ministry of the church with the end result being "mature believers."

~ My Greatest Responsibility as a Pastor is to be a Godly Example 1 Peter 5:3 "Neither as being lords over God's heritage, but being examples to the flock."

I will admit, I have to work at this hard and often fail. I know a lot of people are watching me so they must see Christ in me. God help me!


~ Love People Unconditionally

Again, this is easier said than done. Sometimes I have to exercise "tough love" which some people don't see as love at all. The hardest part of loving people is loving God...thats right, you heard me right. As I love God, He gives me the capacity to love people...no matter what they do or say. You KP people have heard me say often, if you want to love someone start by praying for them. As you pray for them, God will enable you to love them...show them acts of love.

~Try to Be Disciplined...in all areas of Life

This too, is a tough one. My daily disciplines sometimes can get in my way of obeying the voice of God. However, the apostle Paul aid that dsicipline leads to godliness, so discipline is imperative.

My daily disciplines include prayer; the reading and studying of God's Word; finances (recording every penny spent); and exercise and nutrition. I have attempted for 25 years now to pray at least an hour a day. Do I sometimes fail...absolutely. But I also have larned the importance of praying without ceasing throughout my day.
Secondly, I try to study the Word of God daily. I am very weak in this area...not because I don't want too study. I love to study God's Word. But just making the time with ministry and family demands is tough. Thirdly, being disciplined in our finances has brought great freedom to Annette and I in our ability to give. We literally watch every penny we spend and everything is recorded and evaluated. This takes a lot of work but it is worth it. As we have proven ourselves to be good stewards of what God has given us, He has given us wisdom along the way. I am thankful for God's grace in this area.
And finally, in spite of my aches and pains, ruptures, spasms, heart and back issues, and too much fatty tissue...I put a great value on exercise and eating right. I also believe in regular fasting and prayer which not only helps me spiritually but cleanses my body of toxins.

Well, thats enough. You are probably bored stiff by now. But hopefully something I wrote down will inspire or inform you in some way. See you in worship tomorrow!

-Pastor Randy

Friday Countdown

Hello everyone...its good to be back. Actually, I have used this week to get some stuff done around the house and Annette went back to work this week. It felt good to have two weeks off. It really takes a good five days to begin to relax and get a clear mind. Over to the left of the blog I downloaded a few vacation pictures for anyone that might be interested.

Well, I know many of you are glad the week is over and the weekend is here. It is my prayer that God will renew your strength (physically and spiritually)this weekend. I really appreciate the men that ministered in my place while I was gone. They each did wonderful jobs. I appreciate them all...Reverend Tim Orr, Reverend James Garrett, Reverend Ron Smith, and Adam Johnson. You can listen to their messages on our web site (click on sermon downloads on the home page) or you can download them on your ipod (see podcast on home page).

This weekend is the last weekend to give to the Missions team for their El Salvador trip. I know I will be giving my final offering this Sunday. Also, Wendys is once more giving 15% of all their proceeds to the missions team after church this Sunday fom 12 to 4 pm. Also, tomorrow morning (Saturday) we will be leaving from the church at 4:45 am to feed the homeless at City Gospel. I know John Bauer and his team could always use your help. I hope you can go! I know you will be greatly blessed by feeding and ministering to "the least of these."

Please be praying with me about something. At the end of June, I shared a vision with the congregation of beginning now to put back food and funds to help people in the months and years ahead. As you know, the scriptures clearly teach that the church is to take care of the widows and orphans. The church of Acts brought their goods together and made sure everyone's needs were met. There is no doubt that food prices are going to continue to rise along with oil, electricity, and gas in the years to come. We will see more of our people in need and no doubt many people outside the church will turn to the church for help as well. So we got to be ready! Over the few months, we will be appointing a committee to help put together some plans and policy for what I am calling the "Joseph Project." Please pray with me that God will provide for us the people, materials, and finances needed.

Have a great weekend!

-Psstor Randy

A VACATION RANT...NOT REALLY

HELLO EVERYONE!

Please check out the podcasts! Brian Griffin has been working real hard and has done great job making podcast available. Of course, if you don't have an IPOD you can still do it the old fashion way by downloading. Thanks Brian!

This is th first time I have had access to the internet...I FOUND THE INTERNET! Anyway, we are having a great time. Annette is in heaven...she has plenty of time to crosstich and relax. Gabe and I actually played some tennis yesterday. First time I have played in 15 years approx. He was pumped. He had taken a high school class and was taught by a good high school friend of his who is one of the best in our area. Gabe's favorite player is Nedal ( the men's champion at Wimbeldon...I don't know if I spelled it right or not...maybe its Knee'Doll...maybe not). But anyway, Old School prevailed 6 to 3.

It has rained here a lot. All day Sunday. Yesterday was very nice. Today, so far is cloudy and rainy.

One of my vacation rituals is getting my Fantasy Football picks prepared. I'm almost ready. I always do well in the regular season and one of the first out in the playoffs. But I'm getting excited about football starting up..NFL and college. GO COLTS!!!

The economy is pretty bad down here (Florida). I think there are more Euros here than Americans. I watch CNBC a lot and ready my Bible afterwards. There is no doubt in mind why America doesn't play a prominent role in prophecy...we are being bought up by the world. Our very sovereignty as a nation is up for sale to the greatest bidders. What's happening right now is very sad if you love this country. What are parents and grandparents have worked so hard for is disappearing before our very eyes. BUT...as Christians we have to keep reminding ourselves that this world is not our home. We are just visitors and GOD HAS PREPARED SO MUCH MORE FOR US THAN WHAT EVEN "THE GOOD OLE USA" CAN PROVIDE! I don't know about you but "the worse it gets down here, the more homesick I get for up there."

I appreciate Tim Orr, James Garret, and Ken, and of course, the great KP staff and leaders who I am sure did a wonderful job this weekend. It's nice to be able to get away and know everything is in good hands!


Make it a great week. Love you all!Please remember Alvin Money, Travis Daniel, Phyllis Titus, and Arlene Miller in your prayers.


Pastor Randy & Annette, and Gabe

Friday Countdown

Well, the week is almost over and the weekend will soon be here. This will probably be the last blog I will be be doing for a few weeks. As some of you know, I'll be taking some time off and I don't think I will have access to high-speed there.

Usually, when we take time away from the ministry and the church; we park ourselves somewhere, we read, we eat, we sleep, and we stare...usually at water. Then, we go to bed and get up and do it again the next day. Thats our idea of relaxation. And thats what we do when we take a vacation - relax. I know some people like to sightsee and thats fine. But when I take those kinds of vacations, I am worn out when I get back. Then I need a vacation after my vacation.

Please be sure to join us this week at KP. For the next two to three weeks we will have nothing but pure Word, praise, and worship. It ought to be great! After the AM service, the mission team will be preparing hamburgers and some other stuff in the fellowship hall for their El Salvador trip. Thank you so much for your support.

Make it a great weekend. Worship like crazy, rest, and let your light shine for Christ! You will be in my prayers and I mean that. Love you all!

-Pastor Randy

Why I Do What I Do

Good morning everyone!

This morning, Dale Boegeman came by to do some tile work. Dale was telling me that he is celebrating a little over one year now walking with Christ. He shared with me that before he got saved he would hear me talk about praying throughout the day or "praying without ceasing." He said he would lean over to his wife, Rachael, and say "How can anybody do that?" "Now", Dale says, "Since I have gotten saved, I cannot imagine going through a day not talking to God. I praise him and thank him constantly, and I pray in my van as I go from job to job. I really enjoy my life as a Christian."

As a pastor, I do what I do to see God change people like Dale. It's a joy to see the power of the Word of God transform lives and see people discover their new life in Christ. Dale is truly living out 2Corinthians 5:17, "Therefore if any man [be] in Christ, [he is] a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." I hope you are too!

Please remember Arlene Miller as your pray. Her condition is very, very critical. She continues to lose weight and grow weak and the doctors cannot find out why. Please join with me in prayers and fastings for her. Please pray that God give the doctors knowledge or she be healed totally without a medical breakthrough. As I have said before, this is an attack of the enemy on her body. She needs intercessors right now to stand in the gap for her. Please join us!

Also, remember Alvin Money and Travis Daniel in prayer. They both are in the hospital.

Finally, I just want to thank the great people at KP for giving to assist the churches in Indiana that incurred flood damage. You gave right at $600. Your giving lately has been amazing! Thank you so much for your faithfulness.

I love and appreciate you all! Have a great day.

-Pastor Randy

It's About Your Spirit, Not the Gift, Part II

Mark 12:42 "Then a poor widow came along and dropped in two little copper coins, worth about a penny." GNB

We call this, mite, from the French word, miete, which signifies a crumb, or very small morsel. The prutah was the smallest coin in use among the Jews: and there is a canon among the rabbins that no person shall put less than two prutahs into the treasury. This poor widow would not give less, and her poverty prevented her from giving more. And whereas it is said that many rich persons cast in Much, πολλα, (many), this may only refer to the number of the prutahs which they threw in, and not to the value.

Mark 12:43,44, reads, "And He called His disciples and said to them, Truly I say to you that this poor widow has cast in more than all those who have cast into the treasury.For all cast in from their abundance. But she, out of her poverty, has cast in all that she had, all her livelihood." KJV

Christ saw her…

1.piety (integrity, goodness, kindness), how rare it is to find so much "poverty in spirit" in this poor widow.

2. spirit….not her appearance. She did this in a better spirit, having a simple desire to please God. God looks upon the heart, and the poorest person has it in his power to make his mite as acceptable to the Lord, by simplicity of intention, and purity of affection, as the millions given by the affluent.

3.liberality in her giving. He shows that men should judge impartially in cases of this kind, and not permit themselves to be carried away to decide for a person by the largeness of the gift on the one hand, or against him by the smallness of the bounty on the other. Of the poor widow it is said, She has cast in more than all the rich. She gave more; she gave her all, and they gave only a part.

4. her total dependence upon God by her giving!

Its About Your Spirit, Not Your Gift

Since 2005, Americans have been spending more than they have been saving for the first time in history. What are we buying?

You name it...we have been eating out and drinking out more with the growth of Starbucks and other specialty coffee stores, buying big screen TV’s, borrowing more and building bigger houses, putting more on credit cards, spending more on lotteries, movies, sporting events, phones, and video games. Bankrupties and foreclosures are up! And Americans are putting back less and less for retirement and giving less to charity and churches. Indeed, as a nation we are in a drunken stupor of spending.

Question: Do you think it is God's will that His followers (born-again Christians) waste their resources like people who do not follow after Christ? Does God have a better plan for His people...a better program with a better outcome?

The essence of God's plan is DEPENDENCE UPON HIM, not our job, or our investments, or stocks, inheritances, etc. GOD WANTS YOU AND I TO GET TO THE PLACE WHERE WE GIVE HIM TOTAL CONTROL EVERYTHING WE OWN EVERYDAY.

In Mark 12:38-41, Jesus one day while teaching says, "Watch out for the religion scholars. They love to walk around in academic gowns, preening in the radiance of public flattery, basking in prominent positions, sitting at the head table at every church function. And all the time they are exploiting the weak and helpless. The longer their prayers, the worse they get. But they'll pay for it in the end. And sitting down opposite the treasury, Jesus watched how the people threw copper coins into the treasury."[THE MESSAGE]

And then Jesus said, "And there came a certain poor widow, and she threw in two mites, which make a farthing." [Mark 12:42, KJV]

I find it interesting here that we see Christ observing all men and all things: all our actions are before his eyes, what we do in public and what we do in private are equally known unto him. He observes the state and situation we are in: his eye was upon the abundance of the rich who had given much; and he was well acquainted with the poverty and desolate state of the widow who had given her all, though that was but little in itself. What an awful thought for the rich!

If I can, let me point out a few things:
1. “God sees every penny I possess, and constantly observes how I spend it.”
2. Christ sees all the motives which lead men to perform their respective actions; and the different motives which lead them to perform the same action: he knows whether they act through vanity, self-love, interest, ambition, hypocrisy, or whether through love, charity, zeal for his glory, and a hearty desire to please him.
3. He observes the circumstances which accompany our actions; whether we act with care or negligence, with a ready mind or with reluctance.
4. He observes the judgment which we form of that which we do in his name; whether we esteem ourselves more on account of what we have done, speak of it to others, dwell on our labors, sufferings, expenses, success, etc., or whether we humble ourselves because we have done so little good, and even that little in so imperfect a way. And many rich ones threw in much.

Can we pose a pointed question or two to ourselves as followers of Christ? Have we too become like the world irresponsible and self-centered with our possessions? When we consider our actions, our motives, our circumstances, our individual indulgences; what would Christ think as he looks at our heart as we give our offerings to Him?

Tomorrow, we will see what Christ saw in a little widow lady as she put her offering into the church treasury. Not what she gave, but the spirit of which she gave with.