Staying Strong For students in school this is the stretch between Christmas vacation and Spring break. It is no time to let your guard or your studies down. ISTEP, SAT, ACT, and all the other tests make spring an important step to our future. As a church we are in the midst of the Lenten season, that period from Ash Wednesday leading up to Resurrection Sunday. This is atime of diligence, faithfulness, staying plugged in. One of the greatest functions ofthe local church is to stabilize our lives in Christ. Our church families are there for us when things are going well and when hard times hit. But the key is staying involved over the longhaul. It doesn’t work to simply show up in crisis mode - we have to be there for the doldrums as well. Hey friends, don’t get tired ofeach other. Hang in there! COMING UP Just so you know, we will be providing concrete teachingrelated to the family in the coming months and programs for all. Beyond myown regular Biological Church Growth: Thanks to James & Julie and Eli Douglas WE REALLY ENJOYseeing the Cavalcante grandkids whenever they are able to make it over to FCC. SISTERS? Cousins having a great time hanging out. Are you getting your kids to FCC for all of the quality children’s programming? SAFETY FIRST The family is God’s first line of instruction in our children’s lives. Churches, clubs, and schools are there to supplement, not replace. FAITH COMMUNITY CHURCHMARCH 2010DR. RANDY SMITH, LEAD PASTO R WWW.FAITH-COMMUNITY.BLOGSPOT.COM
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encourage oneanother and buildeach other up, justas in fact you are
doing. (NIV)
Lenten ThoughtsKenCollins.com
• • •We avoid Lent and Holy Week because it isn’t ahappy and uplifting time—but to be honest,neither is most of life. Sometimes we come tochurch all scrubbed up, dressed nicely, withsmiles on our faces, and when people ask howwe are, we reply that everything is fine and weeven boast how wonderful things are—but it isall a lie. Life is not always uplifting, or wonderful,or pleasant, or joyous—but we have been taughtthe lie that for spiritual people like us, it must beso.
Yet when Jesus came in the flesh and dwelt amongus, and suffered hunger and thirst and heat andcold and betrayal and loneliness, and finally also
pain and agony and death upon the cross, He gavedignity to His little ones who suffer. He gavedignity to us! Everyone avoids a sad person,except Jesus Himself who is much acquainted withsorrow. Jesus was the only person who gave thedemoniac of the Gadarenes his dignity, the only
one who could exorcise him. Jesus faced the manwho lived in a cemetery, naked and screaming allday and night and calmed his spirit and healed hissoul. How can you think that this same Jesuswould be repelled by your pessimism or your cynicism or your sadness or your grief? How coulda man who seeks the company of demoniacs berepelled by you?
The people of this world believe in the power of positive thinking and in happiness, and in believing these things, they are very shrewd. For people of this world have only the presentmoment, and if they are unhappy in it, they have
lost something. But we who are Christians canendure unhappiness and sadness and lonelinessand backstabbing and betrayal and friendlessnessand poverty and hunger and thirst; we can facemourning and grief and even death, because Jesusfaced all those things. As Christians, we know thatJesus’ suffering was His way to glory, and hisCrucifixion was the door to His Resurrection. Weknow that He ascended on high and sits, alive and
well, at the right hand of His Father, where Herules over all things. We can face our owncrucifixions in life, because we know that we willshare in His Resurrection on the Last Day!