Preparations for Brother Jono's coming!
Church family,
As Pastor Chris has mentioned, we are already looking forward to Bro. Jonathan "Jono" Sims of Shelbyville Mills Baptist Church coming to lead us in preaching and teaching from Sunday April 24 through Wednesday April 27th!
Bro. Jono has been instrumental in helping to get GLCB onto an established footing, as he has been a key mentor and friend to our Pastor for a number of years now. I know from personal conversations with Bro. Chris how much Bro. Jono's counsel and encouragement has meant to both him personally, and to our church body.
We know, without doubt, that Bro. Jono will be prepared to meet with us, having labored in the Word in order to bless us with messages from God...messages that we need to hear in order to grow as a local church body and as individual believers...and having labored in prayer for our pastors and for us.
We owe it to Bro. Jono, and to Bro. Chris, to be equally prepared to bless Bro. Jono!
In order to be as prepared as we can be, I encourage you to do the following three things:
Prepare your hearts by beginning to pray now for Bro. Jono, that he would see and hear clearly what the Lord would have him say to us. Pray also for GLCB, that our hearts would be open to the Word, and pray for your own heart especially in that regard.
Prepare to attend each meeting. As Bro. Chris has often said, we know that "things happen." We understand that sometimes you just can't be here. We never want to assume a legalistic posture about your attendance. Having said that, it is important that you be here at every opportunity to hear the Word preached, and it is important that you do so as often as you can when Bro. Jono is here. This we can promise you: if you make the sacrifices necessary to be here, having prepared your hearts beforehand, the Lord will, in turn, bless you through His word.
Prepare your finances so that you can give generously toward offerings for Bro. Jono. Even if Bro. Chris had no history with Bro. Jono....if he was only coming on the recommendation of Pastor Jeff Noblit, for example, we would still want to bless him generously wouldn't we? How much more eager to bless him should we be due to his laboring in prayer for us, his continual availability to Bro. Chris for counsel and encouragement, and for the godly, Biblical wisdom he continually offers our elders? Again, just as we know that for some, certain events might preclude your attendance at every meeting, we also know that for some, money is very tight. We understand that, and would never want you to take money away from vital necessities. Just as with attendance, neither do we ever want to become legalistic about your giving. But we do want to encourage you to think in terms of desiring to bless this godly man in return for his blessing our elders and our church so freely and so often.
So begin now to prepare your hearts, prepare your calendars, and prepare your finances for Bro. Jono's coming, and let's see what the Lord will do both in us and through us!
Thank you!
Tommy Alderman