Life @ Montrose, Sept. 4, 2008

This Sabbath we begin our fall series on 1 John entitled "That you may know." This first week's message is entitled "See, Hear, Touch, and Smell." The writer of 1 John wants you to know something special about Jesus, and we're going to learn about it as we study God's Word this week. 

On Sunday, Sept. 7, we are going to have a work bee at the church. Many of you participated in the work bee this spring where we cleaned inside our church, but now it is time to do some work on the outside as well. With thanks to W. D. Hess, Joan Cooper, and Tammi Brown we are going to prune back hedges, trim trees, and even remove a few overgrown specimens that need to just be gone. This is a team effort as we seek to beautify our church grounds.

Have you enjoyed watching the political conventions? I am thankful that we will not have politics in heaven. As Adventists we believe in the importance of religious liberty so I just want to encourage each church member that as a church we are careful not to become involved in politics. Please don't pass out political literature at church, post signs on church property, etc. I think this goes without saying but I just want to remind our church members that it is important as a denomination that we not do this, and we have a rich heritage of religious liberty upon which we build upon.

After church on Sabbath we went up to the Maestas's home for lunch and spent Sunday through Tuesday up in Arrowhead on a family retreat for the holiday weekend. I was able to get lots of writing done. I was able to get a start on my new book on Adventism and Fundamentalism. Plus I was able to get a couple of additional articles and book reviews written. Some times we all need an opportunity to have some down time--especially when it is in nature where we can fellowship with our Creator. It actually has been quite interesting because we have been skipping around in our family worship each morning as we read Uncle Arthur. Right now we are reading the Creation story for our family worship. What a magnificent God we have who created such an incredible world for us to enjoy.

Yesterday I had our monthly chaplain's meeting at the hospital. I'm thankful that several of my pastoral colleagues are coming to my ordination on Sept. 20. I also discovered my name accidently bumped off the list, but that this was unintentional so after a summer hiatus I am back on track to volunteer each month at the hospital.

A quick word about the Sept. 20 worship service. This will be a join worship service with all three of my churches so we will have something a little different than normal from Sabbath School through the rest of the day. Stay tuned for more details.