Many years later, the Apostle Paul would write that God knew exactly what he was doing and that his timing was perfect. “But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, to redeem those under law, that we might receive the full rights of sons.” Galatians 4:4-5 (NIV). The word for “time” here is the Greek word kairos, which means “the right or opportune moment.” We often look backwards and see those kairos moments in our lives, but in real time, God’s timing looks suspect. For this very reason we need to heed the Holy Spirit’s whispers and stay attuned to God’s voice. God always acts at just the right time, even when it may not look like it to us. We need to be ready to say yes, even if the timing looks to be a little off to us.

It’s been almost six years now, but I remember it like it was yesterday. My District Superintendent called and asked me if I would come and speak with Bishop Gwinn. I knew what the meeting was about…moving! I didn’t want to go and talk to him, because I had NO INTENTION of moving. I had my speech to the bishop all worked out in my mind. I planned to tell him that the timing was all wrong. After all, we were starting a building program; I was leading a mentoring ministry that was completely dependent upon my current setting; I had just hired two new staff members; and most importantly, I did not feel called to leave where I was serving. If that was not enough to dissuade him, I would add that my family was content, my wife had just started a new ministry job, we had just finished painting our house and we wanted to enjoy the fruits of our labors for a few more years.

Just to be safe, I had come up with an excuse for why I could not go to any of the churches I knew needed pastors that year in our annual conference. I drove to the location where the Bishop was meeting with his superintendents, and listened graciously to the bishop’s speech to me, thoroughly intending to refute anything he had to say. Then, he surprised me! He told me he thought I would be a good fit at Covenant in Greenville. All of sudden, I found that I had nothing to say to him. In fact, I knew immediately that this call was not from Bishop Al Gwinn but from God. I told him I would go home and pray about it, but when you know that God is right in the middle of something, can you really say NO to it? I didn’t understand the timing of this call to move, but I telephoned the bishop back and affirmed that I would indeed move to Greenville.

Of course, I’m glad I did. I couldn’t imagine not being here now. I love serving at Covenant, and I love being your pastor. I am thankful for his call, even if I was reluctant to hear it at first.

I am thankful God is still speaking and calling people. I am also thankful that his timing is still impeccable. Our job is to learn to listen to the voice of God and to be ready to say yes. I still love Mary’s answer to the angel: “I am the Lord’s servant! Let it be to be just as you have said.” What an example of spiritual attentiveness and obedience! Here’s to a new year of listening for and obeying God’s miraculous timing in our lives!

Merry Christmas to all you! Praise the Lord for his marvelous gift of Jesus Christ to us.

Branson

Of course, the problem is that it’s a long way away! First, we lived in Fuquay-Varina. Then we moved an hour east to Bailey, and now we are another hour east of Bailey. So, these days, it takes 17 hours for us to drive from Greenville to Champaign.

And each year, we dread that long drive. We get all geared up with snacks, books on tape and reading material, and we set out hoping to stop as few times as possible. In our earlier (dumber) days, we tried to drive straight through, but for the last 15, we’ve stopped for the night. We’ve determined that the halfway point is Charleston, West Virginia.

Yet, seems like it takes forever to get to Charleston! Every other family seems to be traveling at the same time, and I-40 is bumper to bumper. This year, road construction on I-40 caused long delays. We finally arrived at our hotel after midnight and completely exhausted!

The next morning, we all got up with a renewed energy, however. We were only halfway there, but the next day seemed like NOTHING! The toughest leg of the journey was over, and it felt like we were almost there! We arrived excited and ready for a great week with Teff’s parents.

Likewise, believe it or not, we have completed five months of Crossing Together (our one-year initiative to complete Phase I of our building process) and we are HALFWAY there!

When we started Crossing Together, $1.44 million seemed insurmountable to raise in one year. Incredibly, gift by gift, given family by family over five months, has gotten us halfway there.

Hopefully from here, we will gain new energy and be encouraged to finish strong by next June!

So, I say,…let’s celebrate! To commemorate where we are as a congregation, we are going to have another Crossing Together celebration during worship to give praise to our God who continues to lead us! Mark the weekend of December 18/19 as we will cheer the halfway mark!

Branson

(1) Marriage is awful! Delay it as long as you can. Get educated and established while you’re still free. Have fun while you can, because one day you may saddled in this pitiable state called marriage; Or,

(2) Marriage is wonderful. Your mother and I want to do all we can to prepare you for the best season of your life. We want to come alongside you as you get ready to partner with your spouse and raise a God-honoring family. We want to help you find a husband or wife who loves the Lord with all their heart!

It is number one isn’t it? Don’t believe it? Listen to how people in our culture talk about marriage, how it is belittled at every turn, and you will understand why children are growing up not looking forward to participating in it.

What is a parent’s responsibility in preparing children for marriage?

A few weeks ago, I talked about guarding the hearts of our children and protecting them as they begin to think about looking for a mate. I also mentioned a resource for parents, a book called, What He Must Be …If He Wants to Marry My Daughter. I am challenging every parent at Covenant to read Voddie Baucham’s book. As I have been preaching in the “Sound the Alarm” series, we simply cannot leave the raising of our children to chance. I would say that taking an active role in our sons’ and daughters’ dating lives is included in that discipleship training.

Do you care who your children marry? Of course you do! When I asked two weeks ago how many in the congregation want their children to grow up and marry Christians, it was unanimous. We want our sons and daughters-in-law to be followers of Christ, committed spouses and parents, men and women who honor and respect parents, and people with outstanding values that mirror Christ. If we want that for our children, we are going to have begin building those values into them, praying for their spouses, and spending lots of time with potential suitors in our homes.

What He Must Be… is a book for parents (and grandparents) of all ages! Young parents will begin to lay a solid foundation with a healthy view of marriage. Parents of elementary school children will wake up in a cold sweat as they realize their children are just a few years away from bringing boys and girls home to meet them! Parents of teenagers will get practical in a hurry as they realize the time for them to become mother and father “bears” is upon them. Parents of college-aged students and young singles will get great ideas about how to relate to boyfriends and girlfriends in a healthy way that partners with their sons and daughters. Others (grandparents, singles, aunt and uncles) will read Dr. Baucham’s words and be able to encourage our parents to stand and lead their families.

The subject is very hard to talk about. Parents often walk a fine line between meddling and helping.  But, this book will be invaluable to the process! What He Must Be …If He Wants to Marry My Daughter. None of us can afford not to read it!

Many of you were here for my opening message in the new series called, “Sound the Alarm!” As you know, I presented the alarming fact that the Church in North America has lost (and is continuing to lose) an entire generation of its young people. Something has to be done, and it’s really up to us. If you weren’t here last weekend, click here to listen to the message: http://connect2covenant.com/media

For many of us, the problem seems so daunting and wide-spread, and we’re tempted to believe that there is not much that any of us can do. Don’t believe it! Nothing will happen until people like us decide that we are determined NOT to lose our children, and that our families will NOT look like the culture around us. It’s got to start somewhere, why not with a few of us?

A great example of an entire culture being transformed is the story of John Wesley. The efforts of one man not only fueled a great revival in England, but those efforts eventually brought about the transformation of whole nations.

18th century England was a grim place to live. The Industrial Revolution drew thousands of people to the large cities, but poor working and living conditions actually produced a miserable existence for many of those workers. Rampant disease, alcoholism, starvation, unsafe working conditions, child labor that was closer to slavery than anything else, and hopelessness were the norms. The Church of England was a place for the affluent to gather rather than the body to carry out the work of Christ, so the status quo was simply perpetuated generation after generation.

Then along came one man, John Wesley, who got converted and set out to (as he described it) spread scriptural holiness over the whole land. They began to preach to the poor and broken people of England, and it lit a fire that became one of the largest and most radical social movements of all time. By the end of his life, there were hundreds of thousands of people who called themselves Methodists (for their counter-cultural methods!) who were not only living for Jesus but also changing the culture in which they lived. Wesley’s work was not just preaching about Jesus. He put living for Jesus into practice by opening a medicine shop to serve poor people, providing free education for the children of factory and mine workers, starting a number of orphanages and homes for the elderly, and working for change in conditions that exploited people. Eventually, some of these Methodists went to other places (Australia, India, and the 13 colonies), and continued to live their lives in a way that changed the culture around them.

Change like that is possible today even in the culture in which we live. It will start when some regular people like us make the decision that we are going to live differently and raise our children to love God with all their heart, soul and strength. The more that happens, the more Covenant will impact everyone and everything around us. It could get very exciting, or even dangerous!

So, what about you? What do you think would make it dangerous for us? What excites you most when thinking about cultural shifts like this?

See you this weekend!
Branson

I did not share it at the Saturday night service, so those of you who attended worship on Saturday may also like to hear what I said. I encourage you to click here to listen to it.

Please hear my heart about why I spoke. I have been trying to discern for some time now why there seems to be something missing in the area of unity at Covenant. As I said Sunday, I believe that I have heard from the depths of people’s hearts (certainly not everyone, but a good number) that they felt disconnected in the area of worship on Sundays. After praying and asking God for clarity over a period of time, I believed that God would have me apologize to people who were feeling hurt and disconnected. I believed that I needed to speak that word publicly and humble myself as the leader of our church. I believed God was nudging me to speak this message on Sunday, so that’s exactly what I did. It turns out, His timing was impeccable.

I believe that the message was received loud and clear to those who have felt a sense of loss in worship. They heard me say that we really want everyone to be able to worship. They sensed that we care about our choir and want to help them be able to use their gifts to bring joy to God’s heart as well as value to our experience together.

Listen, I love everyone in this church. I look at the “big picture” and want to help all of us accomplish our vision of intentionally following Jesus. My pledge Sunday to the congregation was to help us all move forward in the unity of the Holy Spirit.

I also want all of you to know that I am so proud of where we are with Saturday Night Worship. That service continues to grow and have amazing energy. Three hundred or more are there each week, and we have no intention of changing a good thing!

I also want to be clear about our Sunday worship experiences. I believe that we need a tweak and not an overhaul. We have hundreds of people who have not experienced any disconnectedness on Sundays. Please know that all I want is for all of the dear people that I pastor be able to come along with us!

So, don’t be confused at all. We are and always will be a worshipping congregation. We want God to receive great glory and for everyone to help sing His praise! Please pray for our Creative Arts team as we craft worship that “connects” everyone with our Great God!

See you this weekend,
Branson

First off, were you here this past weekend? Did you sense the excitement, the buzz of Rally Weekend for small groups? Did you notice how many people lingered in our crowded Main Street, all searching for a place to connect? How about those new faces? Several people who entered our doors for the first time this weekend declared, “This is where I want to be!” and signed up for a small group. Now, that’s something to celebrate! In case you missed it, check out our small groups catalog and get plugged in yourself.

Rounding out the weekend, our Sunday night, Four:Twelve [FX] Family Experience was quite a hit as well. Games, contests, giveaways, worship, drama and a house full of Covenant folks of all ages laid the groundwork for speaker and family pastor, Monte Slaver. [FX] is all a part of a new culture we’re trying to shape here, a culture encouraging powerful moments when families gather, when kids and adults engage, when all who call themselves a part of our church body get involved in a dynamic, multigenerational, authentic FAMILY experience. Check out a few of the pictures here, watch for video highlights to come, and prepare for the next Covenant [FX]!

Next up here at Covenant is our annual Lake Kristi Baptism celebration this Saturday at 1pm. A couple of dozen people are publicly professing, through baptism, that Jesus will be Lord of their lives. What an honor it will be to observe those pivotal moments! So, whether you know them or not, as a part of our family, as a body of believers, come out to Lake Kristi for worship and to witness the power and transformation of the baptism experience. Click here for directions and further information.

So, with some key events behind us and ahead, let’s continue our momentum in hitting a grandslam, in Intentionally Following Jesus…

I will have to admit, however, that a lot of the buzz this past week was not about Crossing Together…it was about the first ever addition of a tuba to our band.

Yep, if you weren’t here, we had a tuba this past week. Dave Johnston asked me some time ago if I thought there was room for him to join the band. He told me he used to march in the band in high school and college, and he was thinking about picking his instrument back up. When I heard he played the tuba, I was thrilled. I’m brass player, but you can never have enough LOW brass. I encouraged him to pull out the old mouthpiece and start practicing.

At Covenant, the process for helping lead worship is not all that complicated, but it is intentional. We ask people like Dave who would like to sing, play, or even work in the tech areas during worship to join us for a two-part Creative Arts Orientation. As important as it is that a person be able to sing, play or understand tech equipment, our team believes a person’s heart must first be right before taking the lead. We talk a lot about humble service, and about worshipful living not just on Sundays, but on Mondays through Saturdays, too. Our emphasis is on character first. Then, once a person has completed the orientation and interview, we start talking about skill and abilities.

Dave and his wife have been regulars at Covenant for several years now. This past weekend was the first time he’s been on the platform during worship, and boy did he add to the powerful sounds of worship. One person told me, when the opening song began to play, he heard the trumpets and guitar and then a “WAHHHHH!” He asked the person he was with, “What was that?” The person answered, “THAT was a TUBA!”

I wonder…do you play an instrument? I actually had two people tell me that seeing Dave up there made them want to pull out their old instrument and try to play it for the Lord.

In the last few weeks, we’ve also had a new guitarist and a new drummer, and we’re always looking for people who would like to sing. We have a number people trying their hand at the lighting board, the cameras, and backstage computers as well. You should know that our worship DNA is to have people leading other people in praise during worship. It’s not a performance. We’re not looking for professionals. We’re just looking for people who can lend us some passion for worshipping our Lord and Savior.

Maybe you’re the next Dave. Why don’t you email Ashley Quinn about the next Creative Arts Orientation?

Anybody else have a, “Way to go TUBA!!” story to add?

But God just ignores me. I think He appreciates the effort, but He is proving time and time again that even my greatest plans pale in comparison to what He wants to do. And, like the loving father He is, I’m sure He just pats me on the head, smiles, and says, “Thanks, but I’ve got this one covered.”

Nine months ago, our family received a very clear leading from God about some major next steps in our life. But with that leading and sensing came all sorts of questions and thoughts. “When? How? What about…? Are we crazy? Was that really God? We must be crazy!” What has also continued to happen all throughout this journey is that with each new piece of the puzzle becoming clearer, I try to figure out all the next steps, the perfect timing, and all of the other details. And each time, God reminds me that I neither can nor need to figure everything out on my own.

Why do we try to figure it all out? Is it just me, or do you do the same thing?

I am reminded once again of the psalmist’s words in Proverbs 3:5-6 “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.”

Maybe it’s human nature, or maybe it’s just how I’m wired, but even though I am accustomed to living by faith, and desiring to do that at even deeper levels, I still try to make plans that I am confident would make God the most famous. I am simply leaning on my own understanding, and I am evidently a fool for doing so.

I am learning a lot about miracles right now. We are in the midst of one as we are in process of selling our house in a buyer’s market with very slow selling rates. Just the other night, I was thinking about miracles in the Bible, and the Holy Spirit very clearly reminded me that each of those miracles was PRECEDED by obedience. Like you, I want to see miracles happen, but miracles don’t just “happen.” Obedience and faith are still prerequisites for the miraculous.

So, what about you? Perhaps you’re trying to figure out how it’s all going to work before you step out in faith. I promise you; that’s a dead end! Do you try to figure it all out? Do you need to just relax and know that God’s got it? Or do you need to just be willing to take some steps of obedience first? Where are you in this journey?

In June, we had a team of students and adults who returned to the Dominican Republic to provide medical assistance and children’s ministry, while helping to move our facilities in the DR forward. During the first part of July, Covenant Student Ministries also had two student teams reach out to the Appalachian community of Milligan, Tennessee, by restoring the outside of a home while allowing God to deepen their relationship with Him. And during the second part of July, the adult and student servants of Covenant Children’s Ministries joined together to provide a Vacation Bible School that convinced children that God’s word is true, surprising, and comforting.

When it’s all said and done, many of our summer memories will fade like the t-shirts we bought at the beach. But what doesn’t fade is the shift that happens in the kingdom of God when people lean in and reach out to others. It’s during those times when God reveals a side of His nature to us in a way that never fades or is forgotten.

In the book of James, God reminds us how temporal summer vacation is in a culture that constantly keeps saying, “man these years sure do go by fast.”

“How do you know what your life will be like tomorrow? Your life is like the morning fog—it’s here a little while, then it’s gone.” James 4:14 NLT

If you feel like life is going by too fast and you have little to show for it, watch for the next opportunity where you can lean in and reach out to someone through an outreach ministry at Covenant. If you do, God may give you something that will not fade, can’t be vacuumed up, or refuses to be thrown out.

Joe Cox
Director of Next Generation Ministries
Executive Director of Ministry

Jesus stopped everything and went to Jerusalem for EVERY Jewish feast.

It could not have been easy or convenient to drop your work and travel by foot several days to stay in Jerusalem for a week and then turn around and come home, but that’s exactly what Jesus did. It sounds strange to us, but Jesus was only following the tradition of sacred feasts from the Old Testament.

God instituted feasts to commemorate a past event in Israel’s history (and thus celebrate what God had done) or to commemorate God’s faithfulness at harvest (and thus celebrate how good God is). Both kinds of feasts called for jubilant celebration. The Law even required that all Jewish males go to at least one feast per year. Also, every Jew within a certain number of miles was required to attend each feast every year. Several times a year, the pattern was:

Stop what you’re doing; join others in Jerusalem, and then have a joyful celebration together to honor the Lord!

Well, Covenant, we’re getting ready to do just that! This special year of Crossing Together is going to give us several “excuses” to celebrate how good our God is, and we are about to come upon our first of several opportunities. Next weekend, we will cross the “quarter mark” toward our destination of $1.44M! So, we’re planning a celebration on August 14/15 to commemorate the achievement and to give lots of praise to our God who has been faithful to us. Please don’t miss that weekend, as we’re going celebrate big time during our worship services. I invite you to stand and cheer when I announce our accomplishment and we take a moment to celebrate.

Let me also congratulate you in advance. We’re going to reach the quarter mark of Crossing Together in just two months since we began! That’s $350,000! I believe we should do a little “whooping and hollering!”

Spread the word…August 14 and 15…we are going to CELEBRATE.

Branson