Pastor Billy Burch reflects on a question he received in response to the opening message of our 4-week series, Time Trials: The Love of the Father. Audio of our weekly Sunday messages is available at http://messages.visitccc.com/ We continue our series this Sunday, May 26 at 9 and 10:30am. Hope to see you there!
A Local Ministry Partner can use help with the following things:
Contact Barbara at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), if you can help with any of the following (any day except Sunday)....
- Painting the outside windows and back stairwell - Finishing cutting and laying in ceiling tiles - Gluing on the vinyl base molding - Laying carpet - Drywall patching and caulking/fire foaming some holes in the basement ceiling and walls - Putting hardware on a few doors - Hanging and trimming out four closet doors
County Corrections Gospel Mission(CCGM), located in Coatesville, tangibly effects lives impacted by crime and imprisonment in Chester County. CCGM Current Needs: Contact Sharon at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) if you are able to help at Camp of the Old Mill the week of June 24-28; if you can donate an infant or toddler car seat or booster; or if you are interested in helping towards the cost of replacing their present collection of ‘wounded, leaking canoes’ (total need is $3,000.00).
Bridge Academy and Community Center (BACC) uses the creative arts, education, and community projects as a means to build relationships with their community of Coatesville. They will be starting their summer programs July 8th. They need volunteers for their weekly programs that will run Tues-Thurs from 9:30-12:00pm. If you can volunteer any of those days/hours during the summer, contact Jordan at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
REST Ministries desires to make God real to people who are emotionally hurting, abused, addicted, or incarcerated. They are looking for people to help them on Saturday, June 22 in Coatesville to help pack up the thrift store Tabitha's Treasure Chest. If you are able to help contact Tim at 1-717-859-4777.
The Salvation Army is having their 1st Annual Fundraising Concert Saturday, May 25 at 6:30pm at thieir Coatesville location, 669 East Lincoln Highway. The money raised (freewill offering) will go towards sending local community kids to camps this summer. As you can imagine, most of these children never have the ability to experience a week away from home exposed to all of the many holistic and outdoor activities as well as learning about Jesus and his teachings. For many ~ this kind of a venue is a life changer. Contact Cathy with any questions at catbird710@gmail.com
Our current HomePointe campaign is called, Inspire. This follows our Christ Community 2013 vision statement - Inspire & Invite. With this campaign, we are asking everyone to simply "inspire one person in one way each day".
The plan explains the campaign, lists Inspire and Invite resources and suggests 11 practical ideas for living out this biblical core value of inspiring others.
Click here to listen to the message series on Philemon that I presented associated with this campaign. Or, click here to view and/or print out the campaign plan.
Recently, we have reformatted our previous "college and young adult" ministry, CrossRoads, into a separate "college-age" ministry for those 18-24. This new venue, led by college-age students, is called, recharge.
The summer version of recharge will begin on Monday, May 13. We'll have volleyball at 6:30pm on CCC's sand courts, followed by worship and teaching at 7:30pm. CCC's new college intern, Josh Evans, will oversee this group.
SUMMER CAMPS 2013! Get ready for a summer to remember! Sign ups for our summer camps have officially begun!
Get ready to explore God's Kingdom with our 3 age specific camps including:
(click pictures below for more info)
Helpers Wanted: If you are interested in sharing your gift(s) of leading, decorating, organizing, etc. with us this summer, you might want to consider serving for our summer camps!
SUMMER SUNDAY TEACHERS NEEDED:
Looking for a way to impact a child in a big way this summer? Please consider volunteering to teach during the summer. We request summer volunteers to try and sign up for two consecutive Sundays. If you're interested please visit our Sunday tables in the main lobby. Your help is greatly appreciated. We're looking forward to a FANTASTIC summer!
Threads is an enjoyable, easy reading, true story of one family’s unlikely adventure in business, mission and church planting. The author, Arlene Richardson, writes in a way that makes one feel they are sitting across the table hearing the amazing details first hand.
“Threads” is a very appropriate title. The business God dropped in their lap (literally through a handmade quilt) includes countless threads have been, and continue to be, sewn together into beautiful masterpieces/quilts. Arlene tells of finding fabric scraps in her grandmother’s attic. A group of supporters from the Carolinas then stitched the pieces together and shipped the pleasing result overseas, to Arlene’s new home on the field. No one would have predicted the bud of an idea as her friend and helper was exposed to this new concept. Before long, she and others began imitating it and creating new designs of their own.
This book covers a 10 year journey of not just literal threads, but also God’s threads weaving their way, connecting lives and cultures, giving purpose and new life, as He goes about His bigger plan, His master quilt.
Grab a cup of coffee and “listen” to Arlene yourself as you open this book and read. Maybe God has an unforeseen story in your own life just waiting to be unraveled as you too step out in obedience to his call.
I received the following story from one of our members concerning the impact of the Good Friday service on their family. They gave me permission to share it with you...
"This past Good Friday service was another example of God working through the staff and body to reach so many people. It was truly a wonderful service Friday night! I especially appreciated all the effort to make it a family event. It perfectly reached all ages. Again, my "Mom heart" was overflowing as I watched my kids learn about each "station". We talked as a family about our sins as we each wrote ours on the rock. I know you meant for it to be one rock per person, but the overwhelming response of people limiting us to one per family was a God thing because we had to talk openly with the kids and as a family. Finally, it was extra special for me to have communion for the first time as a family. The children had never received communion and we were able to explain the significance. We all knelt at the cross to place our rock and it is an image that will stay with me....the four of us, kneeling at the cross, as individuals all saved by grace, and as a family moving forward in Christ. It was also an image of all of us one day kneeling in heaven."
Special thanks to the CCC Children's and Worship staff working together to make this happen - as well as so many volunteers - thank you!
Well after almost a month of audition meetings and a wonderful Easter season, I can finally finish my series on how I pick new worship songs. The first three criteria I use are accessibility, theology and artistry (which you can read about below). After looking at those elements of a potential song I finish by assessing its particularity.
By particularity I'm talking about how unique the song is among all the other songs in our church repertoire.
Six times in the Psalms we are instructed to sing a "new song" to the Lord. This idea of a new song, a new melody, new lyrics is an important response to the reality of God as a living, active, saving God. More often than not the worship songs recorded in the Old Testament were written in direct response to some powerful, saving act of God. For example, the songs of Moses and Miriam in Exodus 15 were in response to God's victory over the Egyptian army at the Red Sea and the salvation of his people. When scripture commands us to sing a new song to God, it's basically instructing us to tell the new stories of the way God is working in the here and now in a new way.
One of my all time favorite hymns is "The Love of God" by Frederick Lehman. It contains one of the greatest final verses to any song I've heard:
Could we with ink the ocean fill, and were the skies of parchment made
Were every stalk on earth a quill, and every man a scribe by trade
To write the love of God above, would drain the oceans dry
Nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretched from sky to sky
Years ago I was speaking with Mark Beazley about this hymn and was remarking how incredible it was that we could spend all eternity proclaiming the love of God and never scratch the surface. To which Mark replied, "And we'd never have to repeat ourselves." The call to sing a new song is to declare that the works that God has done, is doing, and will do are so great and awesome that in singing about them we will never have to repeat ourselves.
That's why when I look for new songs to add to our repertoire, I look for songs that are unique. Perhaps the lyrics give a new wording to an old concept, or musically they bridge barriers of genre or style. Maybe the song structure itself is fresh and invigorating, or maybe it brings something ancient and true into our modern context. Whatever it is my goal is to have a repertoire of songs that are each unique in the way they lead us to God. Unfortunately many of the worship songs released today sound very similar to each other and often repeat phrases or rhyming schemes that are on the verge of being cliche. But every once in a while a new song shows up that breaks out of the repetitious cycle. Those are the songs that I choose.
So as you come to worship this week, my encouragement to you is to sing a new song. Let the freshness of the words and music lead you to God in a new way, so you can marvel at his amazing works and enter his presence in a new way.
If you are interested in, or want to find out more about, this year's GPS (Global Partnership Service) Opportunities, please attend a meeting this Sunday, April 7, 10:30am in Room 214.
Global Partnership Service (GPS) Opportunities
INDIA
Madurai, India – July 2013
This team will potentially conduct some Vacation Bible Schools in schools and some villages, spend time with orphans, connect and minister to elderly women, could conduct medical camps, work with crafts, work with music, and spend time in prayer.
BOSNIA
Banja Luka, Bosnia – Tenitively Fall 2013
This team will primarily construct a themed playground at a pre-school, promote activities for the pre-school, perhaps host an event in the towns main park and possibly hold a day camp comparable to Vacation Bible School.
“‘When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field
or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Leave them for the poor and for the foreigner
residing among you. I am the Lord your God.’”
Each summer our middle school students are given a great opportunity to serve their community by gleaning or collecting vegetables at local farms to benefit the Chester County Food Bank.
Save the Date, Sign-ups starting soon:
When: Monday July 25th - 8:00am - 12:00pm
Where: Meet us at Church right outside the Student Center
For more info or questions contact Juliette via email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or call 610-431-0300 x 123.
