The idea of making connections has been on my mind a lot lately as I have thought about the mission that God has for our fellowship here at Gilead. My desire for us is to spend the rest of this year intentionally focused on making broader and deeper connections with other people. The life of God is experienced in community and in relationships, and as such it requires believers to be constantly living their faith in relation to other people. When God wants to do something in the life of a particular person or a particular congregation, He does it through the contacts that they make with others. We mustn’t forget that God uses human communication and contact to transfer the truth of the gospel from one person to another. “But before people can ask the Lord for help, they must believe in him; and before they can believe in him, they must hear about him; and for them to hear about the Lord, someone must tell them.” (Romans 10.14 [NCV]) This verse is simply the Bible’s way of saying that human connections are essential to the spread of the knowledge and love of God. Our connections need to grow in two directions: new and necessary. I'll talk about necessary connections next week but right now I want to think a little about "new" connections.When we think about the spread of God’s truth we often think of it in the newness direction. We traditionally call this evangelism or reaching out to someone new and sharing the truth of the gospel that is “new” to them. These new connections are ones that God often uses to introduce people to Himself. They happen whenever a believer moves out in faith and makes him or herself available for new intersections in life. This often means placing yourself in new situations. As an example of this the Pastors of Gilead and some of our members have been assisting Creekside Elementary School with and after school homework help program. We have done this to make new connections and recently we received a note of thanks from the Director of the schools Family Resource Center:
'Brothers Sam, Michael, and Bryan,
Guys you are so appreciated! Thank you for all your time and love you gave to the children in the homework help program. You all are a blessing to the children. The boys especially need a positive male role model. I am excited that you will be able to stay in touch with some of the children over the summer.
God Bless You and the work you are doing in our community,
Debbie
I am glad to say that this is just one of the ways in which God is reaching out through the members of our fellowship and making new and meaningful connections. I will be challenging you over the next few months to reach out even more and be bold in putting yourself in new situations. We are going to be handing out free coffee to vendors and visitors during the Springfest, we are going to be doing a gas station service project in June and a free car wash in July. Our GO Team will be making another round of community contacts this summer to try and welcome people who are new to our area. We will be reaching out through VBS in July and going on a mission trip to Princeton in September. I don’t know what the Lord will do through all of these efforts, but I do know that it will bring us into contact with people that the Lord wants us to meet. When God has a work that He wants to do in someone’s life He sends someone into their life to provide the knowledge, insight, or conviction that they need in order to see that work. I am thankful that you are ready to be sent.
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