Getting To Know Your Church

Getting To Know YOUR Church

“So for a whole year Barnabas and Saul met with the church and taught great numbers of people.

The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch.” Acts 11:26

Intro: I believe this is a great church! God is doing great things!

[But there is still greater work that God is calling us to do.]

Over the many years there have been difficult times…,

lean times of struggle and labor

There have been times of birth and joy

And times of sorrow and death

But I am convinced as Your Pastor…, that there are still greater showers of blessing…, that are yet to come…

Today we are going to talk about “Getting to Know Your Church.”

Some of you have been life-long members of ____(YOUR CHURCH)___ Methodist.

Others have only recently joined in the past few years…

I believe it is important for us all to remember the history of how Your Church United Methodist Church came about.

If we are to learn what Our Mission is…

And Why We are here…

I believe it is important for us to learn how we got started…

And how we came to where we are…

[ INSERT A BRIEF HISTORY OF YOUR CHURCH ]

Your Church Methodist Church came into being around the end of the 19th century.

In the late 1890’s a small group began to meet in homes…

And finally found a place to organize at the First Christian Church here in Your Church.

By 1900 this group decided to build a church of their own.

The first step was to purchase a lot from Mr. J. D. Beldon for the sum of $264.00 on May 5th 1900.

The old First Methodist Church was build and dedicated in 1907.

There were seven stain glass windows

Six of the memorial plaques that are over 120 years old hang on the wall of the entrance of our building today.

The church started as a four point circuit…

That means there were four churches…

Liberty, Middleburg, Bruce’s Chapel and Salem

Under the spiritual leadership of one pastor…

The first parsonage was at Middleburg

Later Your Church and Middleburg became a two point circuit

And finally in the 1940’s Your Church became a full-time appointment.

With the Rev. R. L. Anderson the pastor…

The old parsonage was built in 1945

As the church grew in 1930’s

and more space had to be added on to the church when Rev. B.M. Wesley was pastor.

The Sunday School grew in the 1950’s and a concrete block building was added

But ten years later the church continued to grow…and by 1960 more Sunday School rooms were needed…

Thinking and praying and planning and labor and love

built the Sunday School rooms that are still part of the church today.

The final phase of the dream

was this new sanctuary which was built in 1972 with the Rev. James Powell as pastor…

In 2005 I became the pastor of Your Church

In 2008 the new parsonage was built

I’m in my sixth year as pastor here…

This historical sketch of your church pivots on building sanctuaries

and adding more Sunday school rooms…

and constructing new parsonages

But buildings… are not the mission of the church…

Buildings are the result of faithfulness…

I. ___YOUR CHURCH_____is the result of FAITHFULNESS

Their purpose was to be faithful and obey God…

Like the disciples in the Upper Room in Luke 24:49

"Stay here in the city until the Holy Spirit comes and fills you with power from heaven." Luke 24:49 (NLT)

The temptation might have been to pack up and go home…

The temptation might have been to not wait where Jesus told them to wait in the city of Jerusalem

But to go somewhere else and wait…

The temptation might have been to not be open and obedient to the Holy Spirit

But they were faithful…

They didn’t give up and go home

They didn’t quit and search elsewhere

They were faithful…

Faithfulness and Obedience are always the link to power and blessing from God.

The promise to the disciples of course, was the blessed Holy Spirit.

Jesus had promised in Acts 1:8, "But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you . . ." This promise is made to every person who has the desire to receive it from the Lord.

Their result was an extraordinary authority to witness and spread the Gospel of Salvation

Their response was their understanding of what the Mission of the Church was…

The same way our response to receiving the power of the Holy Ghost

is our understanding of what the Mission of the church is…today

They were to be witnesses . . ."both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in

Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth" (Acts 1:8).