Last Sunday I preached a trial sermon for Shiloh Baptist church in Seymour, TN. Immediately after I preached, the congregation voted unanimously to call me as their pastor. It was a great weekend and a very exciting time for me and my family. My last Sunday here at West End will be September 24th. We will move the following week and begin our ministry at Shiloh on October the 1st.
We are not as fortunate as some to have a palacial mansion for a parsonage, but we were able to locate a nice home to rent for a while until we are able to decide where and what we might want to purchase. We are excited about moving into a little larger house, seeing that the one we are in now is a just a little bigger than a Volkswagen.
I have decided what I will be preaching through first. I am going to begin with 1 John on Sunday mornings, The Sermon on the Mount on Sunday Night, and Selected Psalms on Wednesdays. I have recently taught through 1 John on Wednesday's with my youth and love the practicality of John's epistle. I have preached a couple of times on a few text's from the Sermon on the Mount, but I have never preached from the Psalms.
I am currently determining my goals for this first year at Shiloh. 1st goal of all is to learn the names, this seems kind of like a daunting task. Next, I would like to go through the church role and meet all the families, whether they attend or not. Third, I would like to establish a church covenant that expresses a biblical view of church membership in it. In the future (2-3 years down the road) we would require everyone that wishes to remain a member of Shiloh Baptist to sign the covenant. Please note, I realize this must be done carefully and with great gentleness, but nonetheless, I believe it is essential to ever have integrity in reporting church membership. These things among 100's of other ideas are floating through my head. I look forward to seeing exactly what you guys think and what you suggest.
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2 comments:
Congratualtions Brent.
Just some quick thoughts...
I like the covenant idea. I want to get to a point at Little River where we do the same. It has not worked out so far that I can get to it. It needs some revision in my opinion.
In tandem, reading through the covenant at communion together is a good idea, so that members are reminded of responsibilities.
I am working at contacting every member regardless of whether they are active or not, this has proven to be a massive project, still yet incomplete (not giving up though).
Everything looks sound to me.
Hey Brent,
If you do not have this book already, "Jesus' Sermon on the Mount And His Confrontation with the World" by D.A. Carson would be a helpful resource (very affordable) for your series on the Sermon on the Mount.
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