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DYING WELL

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  Acts 6:8-15; 7:1-60 Dying well as a follower of Christ means facing the end of life with peace, trust, and active hope.   Dying well means having eternity stapled over our eyes to see that death isn’t the end but the beginning.  Dying well is not allowing this fallen world to discourage, or dictate, your life away from seeing the glory in redemption that is found in Christ alone.  Dying well is seeing Christ in the midst of the suffering and the storms of life; it’s seeing Christ in the chaos.   This hope is anchored in the belief that Jesus conquered death and opened the door to eternal life.   I love what John MacArthur said in a sermon, “For those of us who are Christians there is no fear of death. Death is an entrance into the presence of the Lord. We have no fear of what is coming after death, only joy and anticipation. Even when I die, I will not be abandoned, but I will go through death into the path of eternal life, eternal joy, et...
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WORKING TOGETHER THROUGH GROWING PAINS

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  Acts 6:1-7 Growing pains are something the church will continue  to feel as we wait for Christ to return.    There never will be a time when growing pains are not felt in the church, even when things seem to be going well.  A few years into the new church age , Jerusalem was still its only location.  And the early years of the church were mainly spent growing and forming in the same city in which Christ died, and was buried, and rose, and ascended.  As the number of believers increased, so did the difficulty of ministry, this ultimately produces growing pains.  "Growing pains" typically refer to the predictable friction and challenges a congregation faces when expanding. These usually include overburdened leaders, changes to decision-making structures, and a shift from a close-knit "family" dynamic to a larger, more structured organization that requires intentional assimilation.   People were becoming distracted and this caused gru...
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