We might need a boat.

Hey everybody…
 
We’ve both missed all of you these last couple of weeks while Sherri and I took a much-needed vacation. We got home on Monday, but then I jumped on a flight to Colorado for a quick visit with my father who is in failing health. I fly home tomorrow. But before then, can you look into getting a boat? We might need one. Let’s chat about it in Deeper Thoughts below….
 
But first… some key upcoming things:
                                                                                                                 
·      THIS Sunday, God (and United Airlines) willing, I am back and will be sharing the scriptures with us. But more than that, we’ll be baptizing one of our Mt. Hope teens! Come out for a great worship experience and time in God’s Word!
 
·      Teens:  Youth Group meets THIS Sunday 11:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m., snacks, games, testimonies, and the Word! To get plugged into our growing and awesome youth group, email Jessica Sauder: [email protected].
 
·      Kids, middle schoolers, and parents: Furnace Mountain Christian Summer Camp is coming up FAST! Join us for this Day-Camp for age-based experiences, August 4 - August 8, 9:00 – 3:00 p.m. each day. BEST NEWS: For Mt. Hope families, the cost is only $25.00 per student! For a whole week of camp!!! Transportation to/from the church is available. To secure our special Mt. Hope pricing, Chris Bowen will be handling your registration individually. Click here to email Chris to RSVP or with questions!
 
·      Join me for “The Daily Six” – six minutes each morning in the Word of God, Monday through Friday, on our YouTube channel. If you’d like to receive daily email reminders and you’re not already getting them, click here to sign up!
 
·      Mark your calendars for Mt. Hope’s 190th Anniversary celebration August 24 – a great day of worship, fellowship, southern pot-luck yummies, historical experiences, and gratitude to our God. If you’d like to be involved—especially with helping pull together historical content--click here to email Sherri Eads.
 
OK…that’s it today for you email skimmers and you who don’t like boating … BUT…
 
 
Some Deeper Thoughts…
 
There are times when real-life current events come into stark contrast with the Word of God. This past week has been one of those. I’m sure you have been watching the terrible accounts of tragedy in central Texas as flash flood waters took the lives of so many precious people last weekend. Notably, long-ago pre-recorded episodes of The Daily Six were scheduled to air this week that took us into our next chapter in our Old Testament study of “Knowing God”—the very well-known character of Noah, through whom God chose to save humanity during a massive global flood. It’s one of the most recognizable of all Bible stories. And it is all about a boat.
 
My first instinct was to pause our series for a week and put this topic off so we wouldn’t accidentally create too direct a comparison between Noah, his ark, and the horrible suffering of the Texas flood. And yet, while we may recognize parallels in human suffering between that biblical story and our precious peers in Texas, the events are tremendously different. God’s purposes with the global flood of Noah’s day were unique. God covenanted with Noah that it would be a once-in-all-history event. The tragedy in Texas is connected to our more generalized troubles of living in a fallen world—curiously the topic of NEXT week’s Daily Six as we study the life of Job… also pre-recorded weeks ago and airing this Monday.
 
While a first read of the story in Genesis 6 - 8 could very naturally lead us to focus on the flood, the real subject of the story is not the water. It is the boat.
 
You’ve probably heard of this boat. You might have even had a picture of it painted on your bedroom wall when you were a little kid.
 
In every cartoon picture I’ve seen of the ark, everybody is smiling. There is, of course, Noah with his long white beard and happy family. And the giraffes. You can’t forget the giraffes—two of them with their smiling heads towering above all the other happy animals. Monkeys. Bears. Goats. Horses. Pigs. Tree sloths… er… I never saw a picture of Noah’s Ark with tree sloths hanging out the window, but they must have been there.
 
The colorful, cheerful animations of Noah’s Ark adorning walls of children’s bedrooms might seem a bit insensitive if you think about the story from the perspective of the flood. Devastating floods are never cheerful. You’ve seen that on the news this week. Multiply that sorrow by a million-fold when the flood is entirely global.
 
So why the cheery images?
 
It’s the boat. The story of Noah is not about the devastation of the flood—though to be sure, it is the starting point. The story is about the ark. While God had His infinite reasons to engage humanity in this horrific judgment and great “reset” of everything, the real movement of God is His ark of rescue. Judgment leveled against such grand wickedness also immediately garnered a grand rescue. God had Noah build a boat so God could rescue his family and all the happy animals.
 
And in it, God was rescuing the future of His entire creation. You, me, and the tree sloths all included.
 
This rescue has a critical detail we need to explore this Sunday. It will land with incredible relevance to you and me. This detail is why I also need a boat, and why you need one too. We need God’s ark of rescue to overcome. We need a boat.  
 
So, let’s lean into Noah. If you haven’t already been with us in Genesis 6 this week, spend a little time there. And… everybody grab something new as well: Check out 2 Corinthians 6:14 – 7:1. Let’s see where we need God’s ark of rescue and how God is going to pull all this off.
 
 
Much love to you all… so glad we’re going to be with you once again!!
 
Chris Eads
Mt. Hope Pastor
Friend