Dear Family and Friends,
Merry Christmas! It certainly feels like a strange Christmas, for obvious reasons. But I, for one, am very thankful to be celebrating this season with all of you, as limiting as it may seem.
Most of you know that I am still recovering from Aorta replacement surgery which took place on May 27th. I am so grateful for all the prayers and support that you have given to me and my family. It has been SO overwhelming and SO undeserved. While the process of recovery has come with a number of speed bumps and setbacks, God has graciously allowed me to slowly recover. A couple weeks ago I was even able to go back to work full-time. Woohoo!
I’ll write more in the near future about my recovery and about the things that the Lord has been teaching me. One of the things that has really stuck out to me in all of this is the blessing of time and resources. Specifically, time and resources in this life. None of us know how much more time we have. And when the time is gone, the opportunities to use time and resources to prepare for eternity are also gone.
I have been given the blessing of more time and abundant resources. I certainly don’t want to waste them. This is a topic that the Lord has recently been impressing on me during my daily Bible readings. Today it hit me front and center as I began reading Psalm 41, verse 1.
“Blessed is the one who considers the poor! In the day of trouble the LORD delivers him”
I want to be blessed by the Lord! Don’t you? And so I take this verse to mean that I should use my time and resources to help others. To that end, Susan and I are considering how the Lord might want us to be generous with those who are in need, especially during THIS Christmas season.
We’re thinking of people in our own church family who are struggling with finances. We’re thinking about our neighbors. We’re thinking about our extended families. We’re thinking about various ministries that support the poor and needy.
We’re also thinking about The Bridge Bible Fellowship. Our church has been blessed tremendously by the generosity of our whole church family. This has been especially noticeable during this pandemic when it is actually harder to give, for a myriad of reasons. Though the church offerings have been below our budget by about $74,000, we have still been able to keep all of our staff employed for ministry. So Susan and I want to help by giving more.
We’re going to find ways to be extra generous to all of these different groups of people and organizations because the Lord has blessed us with the time and money to do so. It’s not just a Christmas project, or a Covid project, but it’s a lifestyle we aspire to, of being generous towards others, just like the One who has been so generous to us.
Of course, the greatest blessing we have to share with anyone is the gift of salvation in Jesus Christ. It may be more challenging to give this away in the midst of lockdowns and isolation. So maybe we will need to be a little more creative. Speaking of being creative, you probably have heard about the Drive Thru Christmas event at the church tonight and tomorrow night. You should come! And may the Lord use this creative event to help us celebrate and give away the Good News of Christmas!
In closing, would you pray for us? Please pray that we would make wise decisions as we try to be extra generous with our time and resources? Please pray that we would have opportunities to give away the gift of salvation to those who need it? We will pray for you about these things as well.
And may the Lord bless us all as we continue to make the best use of His generosity towards us.
Merry Christmas!
Pastor Randy