Hey Folks…
I have a love/hate relationship with road trips. How about you? I am writing you today from Interstate 70W as we head to Ohio to celebrate our daughter Rachel’s doctoral graduation. Where are you headed next? Oh…and I don’t just mean the next road trip to some far away destination. I mean where are you headed—where is God taking you next in your journey of life, purpose, and direction? I know that’s an ambiguous concept… I’m sure you’d tell me if you could. Isn’t it impossible to know? Well… yes… and no. We’ve got more clarity on that trip than we likely recognize. I’ll tell you more in Deeper Thoughts below. But first…. · Ladies: Saturday, May 25… 9:30 – 11:30 a.m. – Join us for breakfast and a prayer walk at Morven Park in Leesburg. Click here for more details! · Mt. Hope Worship and Prayer Night: Sunday evening, June 2… 5:30 – 7:00 p.m. (or whenever God is done!) – Join us for a powerful and unscripted evening of worship, togetherness, and prayer as we seek God for our church family, God’s direction for us, and God’s provision for our growth and capacity challenges. We will guide you through the experience and make it safe and relevant no matter where you are spiritually. The movement of the Holy Spirit will be thick, God’s presence very tangible. Don’t miss it! · Summer Kick-off Celebration and Carnival – Sunday, June 9… 11:45 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. Join us right after church for our “second annual” celebration of all things summer with food, fun, fellowship, games, and activities. While we’ll aim this to be super-fun for the kids with relay races, competitions, and games, this is for the entire church to gather for a great day in the pavilion! (Rain date will be June 23.) · Our next Sunday teaching series begins June 2—“God’s Game Plan—Beginning, Middle, End: A Study in Biblical Prophecy.” More on this in Deeper Thoughts below! OK…that’s it today for you email skimmers and those who never want to leave home. BUT… Some Deeper Thoughts… Our trip today is a grueling one. Eight hours of gruel. There is absolutely nothing out the windshield as we meander through every farm field between here and northwest Ohio. Rachel graduates on Sunday with her Doctor of Pharmacy degree from Ohio Northern University. We could not be more proud! While we’re gone, Mt. Hope’s beloved Randy Richardson will powerfully share the Word of God with us on Sunday. More on that in a moment… you won’t want to miss it. But first, let’s talk about road trips. And I mean the one that you and I are on together, not our insufferable I-70 slog through Nowhere, Ohio. If you are going to go anywhere, you’d better pack properly. For today’s family highway trip, this means a lot of snacks and caffeine; it also means being sure we didn’t forget our toothbrush, clothes, shoes, and all the other essentials. But when it comes to our lifelong road trip with Jesus, where are we going? What do we need to pack? And who are we traveling with? Romans 8:28-30 reveals the destination. Everything that happens in our life, every single turn of events, every hardship and bump in the road—all of this leads to one specific outcome. It’s been God’s travel plan for each of us since well before we were born. Where are we going? To a life that is just like Jesus. Sound a little lofty? Well, we’d better pack well, ‘cuz God’s train is moving and you and I are already on it (geez…can I come up with any more travel analogies?). The Word of God provides a ton of clues as to what should be on our spiritual packing list. Some are fairly generalized: be spiritually prepared; make the most of every opportunity; avoid evil; seek God’s Kingdom (see Matthew 25:1-13; Ephesians 5:8-17; Matthew 6:33). Other guidance is more precise: be filled with the Spirit; take every thought captive for Christ; immerse yourself in the scripture; put on the armor of God; pray boldly and fervently (see Ephesians 5:18; 2 Corinthians 10:3-5; 2 Timothy 3:14-17; Ephesians 6:10-18). Not only must we prepare ourselves and pack well for the journey with Jesus, but we must also be sure we are traveling with the right people. The Christ-centered spiritual life was never designed to be experienced in isolation. Acts 2:42-47 and Acts 4:32-35 model this quite specifically. Which leads us to Randy Richardson and this Sunday. If you’ve been around Mt. Hope for a bit, I know you’ve met him. He happens to be the tallest guy in the room. But he is also one of the most outgoing, loving, and engaging people in our church. This is not by accident. While Randy was still cooking in his mama’s womb, scripture records that God was knitting together a very unique man who would bear God’s image through his exceptional passion to connect people to one another. You see, when God shapes us in our mother’s womb (see Psalm 139:13-16), God is always forging at least one aspect of His character and nature into us. Since one of God’s most noteworthy attributes is how He profoundly loves each individual and then demonstrates that love by placing us in the Family of God (we taught on this last Sunday), God precisely shaped Randy to lead us to connect to one another. Around here, that manifests in Randy spearheading our small group life at Mt. Hope, along with other efforts to get us connected to the kind of togetherness God intends. Because of all manner of wounds and insecurities, most of us prefer to stay isolated and manage life on our own. But this isn’t how God truly wired us up. According to the scriptures, we were made to live in deep connectivity to one another—what the Bible calls “fellowship” (from the Greek word “koinonia”, which means to be deeply intertwined with one another). You can see the power of this life in places like Acts 2 and Acts 4. This Sunday, Randy will unpack for us Romans chapters 14 and 15. We will discover the practical specifics of a Christ-centered life built on the Word, in biblical community, and in support of one another. Do some digging around those two chapters in advance. One last thing about where we are headed: NEXT Sunday, we’ll bring our 21-week study of the Book of Romans to a close. Then, June 2, we launch into a “Summer of Hope,” fourteen weeks of discovering “God’s Game Plan—Beginning, Middle, End.” It’s a study in biblical prophecy—where we are headed towards the ultimate return of Jesus Christ and the great “reset” of humanity. But it is also a discovery of our roots in the Old Testament, our present New Testament spiritual life, how we should be living in view of Christ’s return, and what is the great joy awaiting us. Pack your bags… this is going to be an incredibly joyful, hopeful, and powerful summer together! Can’t wait to travel with you all… but for the moment, back to I-70… Chris Eads Mt. Hope Pastor Friend
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