Taking steps of faith

This was the theme for this year’s TOAM Conference. As we journeyed through the lives of people in Hebrews chapter 11 our faith was built up. Indeed the Heroes of faith listed in that magnificent chapter still speak to us today beginning with, our father Abraham, and ending with nameless heroes and of course our greatest Hero of all time – the Lord Jesus Christ himself. The call was very clear, to fix our eyes on Him – the author and finisher of our faith, as we take huge steps of faith. The encouragement to embrace & emulate these heroes came ever so clearly as well as the things these men had to reject & refuse in order to fulfill their call. Sin, fear & discouragement are daily things we have to refuse in order to grow up in our faith.

Great time of worship & good prophetic words brought a sense of God being in our midst. The prayer & share evening was very envisioning with 7 churches being added to us this year with new possibilities of planting in many states. Another encouragement was the call to serve the poor. It was encouraging to note the different works among the poor that many churches are involved.

The outstanding offering of 16, 00,000/- proved our commitment as a people to this vision. Let us persevere in God to lay hold of that for which He has taken hold of us.

On A Mission

We have been going through the book of Acts and Franco more than preached a brilliant sermon on the Sunday before some of us went to Guwahati on mission. It was a ‘now word’ for us – a wake-up call.

He said that as Peter entered his house and Cornelius greeted him, it was a giant leap for mankind. In Acts 9:32, Peter was available and obedient to the leading of the Holy Spirit. And the unexpected happened. So it is with mission. So is it for us who are led by the Holy Spirit. Are we excited about the unexpected? With the suddenlies and the surprisinglies?

He reminded us of Esther, who laid her life on the line for her people.  David, who was suddenly called out of the pasture into an unprecedented battle which changed the history of the Israelites. And Mary the mother of Jesus. Greeted by the Angel Gabriel and given a message from God which was totally unprecedented and unexpected yet she responded positively, saying “Be it done unto me according to your word”. He challenged us to be part of an end time revival which is coming, by being available, and being led by the Holy Spirit as sons of God.  Don’t be parochial, he said.  But be available and be overcomers of barriers such as 1. Food, 2. Culture, 3. Social
4. Mental i.e.  preconceived notions.

We as a church took steps that can become a giant leaps into Orissa, Chhattisgarh, Silliguri, and Guwahati which is the gateway to the North East. And on the first day of our time together in Guwahati we were told that since 1842 when there was revival in Assam there has not been anything till now when we are sensing that there is something happening again and God is about something unprecedented. This kind of confirmed the message Franco quoted Hudson Taylor of mainland China Mission fame, who said there are three stages for every Christian: First it is Impossible, then it is difficult, and then it is done. It looks impossible but when we are available to come out of our comfort zone and take action the difficult gets done. So where are you? 1^st, 2^nd or 3^rd stage?  Wherever you are, God wants  to take you to the next level of faith and works.

John Piper said in his book ‘Let the Nations be glad’, that at the heart of God is worship ( Jn 4:23) but the means is Mission. Have we in any small way incorporated this Mission, or our own TLC’s mission into our lives? Let’s go out and take the harvest for the Lord!     – Pat

We as a church endeavored to actualize this scripture during the last 21 days, meeting morning, noon and evening at a home despite heavy rains and traffic delays. We worshipped, sang and prayed. Some prayed softly, some whispered, some expressed passionate pleas and still others were loud enough to possibly provoke even the neighbors to at least think of praying!

Young children, seniors, widows, married couples, singles, all prayed each according to their faith. It was a special joy to hear the passionate worship of some new believers as they sang to the Lord in Hindi.

Numerous petitions surrounded us and realizing their enormity people of little faith may have wondered if God could or would respond. But for our Omnipotent God all our petitions a million times over are like a mere drop in the ocean.

At the close of this endeavor, we may ask ‘Has a good thing come to an end’? No! For us this is a new beginning. Someone said, ‘Prayer is the door to God’s treasury and Faith, the key’.

We have the key in our hand, let’s use it!

Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God. 2 Corinthians 5:20 (KJV)

Dwell London – Ed Stetzer Interviews Terry Virgo from Ed Stetzer on Vimeo.

This is a praphrased post originally written by Ed Stetzer http://ow.ly/1P0CC

We all long for breakthroughs in our life, marriage & in children. Jesus is called the Prince of Peace! Anyone who is against peace is sinning against Jesus. If you are for Jesus then you have an enemy. (Mat 24:9)(John 15:18) The enemy wants to shut the Church’s mouth because we are the only people who are speaking about peace, joy, life, salvation, unity, harmony.

How do we re-ignite our passion to see the lost saved? How do we increase our excitement  to do these things? In short how do we regain our pulse?

PULSE (Acts 4:23-37)

P = Prayer

U = Unity

L = Leadership/Lordship of Christ

S = Sharing – (Possessions/ Faith/ Life)

E = Encouragement

Great prayer will bring great increase of God’s power to meet your need. How does one PRAY…

A- Adoration

C- Confession

T- Thanksgiving

S- Supplication

One can also use the Lords’ prayer for praying as a pattern .

John 17 tells about unity. Where there is unity – God commands a blessing. There is something about God He cannot keep quiet or stop but bless when he sees unity.

When we are united we are portraying the Triune God that we worship. ‘FATHER’, ‘SON’ & the ‘HOLY SPIRIT’ Christians can be at three stages concerning unity:

A. United – Hot

B. Indifferent – Lukewarm

C. Disunited – Cold.

Are you united person? Do you have a spirit of unity? Where are you, concerning the church?

The book of Joshua records (Joshua 5:13-15), Jesus coming to take charge of Jericho, to give it to the Israelites. He won the battle for them. Jesus is our leader. He is the Head of the Church. He is the Lion of the Tribe of Judah.

We all want Jesus to help us in our problems. He doesn’t want to just help instead He wants to take over the driver’s seat. Are you looking for a solution to your problems? Let the Holy Spirit take the centre stage.

The apostles shared their possessions, faith & their lives. They had great fellowship and their pulse was increasing. They were like little children who were excited about Jesus.

Another most thing is that they were encouraging each other. Act 11:23 tells how Barnabas encouraged the church. Our God is a God of eternal encouragement, so speak positive affirmation into one another life.

May be your pulse has gone down. Pray for the Holy Spirit’s grace to see it increase

Newest members of our family

At the end of last year, the church welcomed 10 new members in to its family:

Shriram & Chandrakala, Ashim & Ivy, Sunny & Deepina, Venkatesh & Annu, Hetal and finally, Shivprasad.

They are now officially members of TLC.  They were prayed upon and blessed as they were welcomed by the church. God has taken our church from a small gathering to more than 100 members now. The kingdom of God is expanding and the church is as well!

Quite often, the whole area of membership remains in doubt. Once someone is saved he becomes part of the Universal Church of Christ. But because of Individual constraints of a person, the LOCAL CHURCH is more effective in achieving the objective of Christ in our lives. That is the why, we have membership.

Every Christian is most welcome to worship with us at the Tree of Life Church. However, there are some who clearly want to identify specifically with the vision, mission, leadership and family of Tree of life Church. To so identify with this church and to become a member involves the following commitments:

You are committing yourself…

1. To the overseeing of the church’s Leadership.

2. To contribute fully to the life of your ‘Connect’ group.

3. To be involved in the corporate worship, word and prayer life of the church

4. To serve in an area of church life by mutual agreement with the church’s leadership.

5. To support the vision, mission and ministry of the church by regular financial giving.

6. To be discipled to become more like Jesus.

If you are not a member, or would like to reaffirm this commitment, we have a course called ’Discovering Membership’ that will be taken by one of our leaders. Please do contact the leadership to get details of the course. Have a blessed month!

Many of us are very busy with Life. The common complaint is that we have no time for people, family, personal growth and sadly often we have not time for God. We are called by god to bear fruit in abundance. So how then with our busy schedules should we do that? There are five ways.

1.  You need to spend time with God in prayer, quiet times and communicate with the Lord. He’s our friend and guide and shepherd and loves us. He loves to hear from us.

2. Read the word and savor it. It is your spiritual food. Let the word cut you and prune you in areas of your life that need change.

3. Be dependent on the Lord because the only currency of heaven is desperation.

4. Enjoy God’s love and grace that he gives so generously. He’s not after us with a cane, but he in fact helps us.

5. Finally, you can abide in the Lord by being obedient. Nothing compares to the excitement of knowing that God loves you and you are at peace with Him!

Be Secure in the Lord (By www.gettyimages.com)

This year the Goal of the church is that each one of us would bear much fruit and bring many to the knowledge of the word. Let’s tell our brother’s and sisters around about the truth about the gospel and the consequences of death. As Rick Warren said, “Eternity is a long time to repent for being wrong”. Put the past behind you, and look toward a new year, filled with opportunities. May you have a blessed and fruitful year! God bless you.