Hello everyone!

Trust that you are enjoying your 40 Days of Love small group! To our friends who log on to see what we are doing, we began our second Purpose Driven Life small group campaign(the first being in 2008) and are in the middle of the campaign(DAY 18 of 40) Pastor Rick Warren of Saddleback Valley Community Church in Mission Vallejo, California developed this material called the 40 Days of Love.

This fits perfectly with our discipleship process of moving everyone from our Sunday morning worship(8AM & 10:30AM) to the SS or even better a small group. We began on Kickoff Sunday(09/17/10) with 25 small groups. We have learned that to grow stronger, we must grow smaller, deepening our love for one another through small groups, amen?

Jesus taught us His Greatest Commandment(found in Mark 12 & Matthew 22): “You shall love the Lord Your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself.” We want to become better lovers of God and of people. Our Vision Statement says it simply: Kinoole Baptist Church exists to Love God, Love People and Serve. Like the song that goes: “They will know we are Christians by our love.” In addition to the Sunday morning sermon, we are enjoying Rick’s teachings each week as he teaches from 1 Corinthians 13, called by many “the Love Chapter”. His brother-in-law Tom Holladay, teaching pastor at Saddleback wrote a book called the “Relationship Principles of Jesus” and we are using this book, which is broken down into 40 chapters as the primary daily devotional reading for our campaign.

We truly have been blessed! For example, in Day 17: The Connection between Mouth and Heart (pages 157-158), he writes “The only path to a change of heart is to take off the fake and paltry crown you’ve fashioned for yourself. Your heart changes whenever and wherever you recognize that God is the only rightful wearer of the crown. He is the only King.” Amen and Amen! I always get into trouble when I focus on myself more than God, when I yank the steering wheel of my life away from Jesus instead of letting Him drive.

Have a safe week everyone and let Jesus drive! Pray that I will do the same! Love God, Love People and Serve! See you this Sunday!

Jesus died, Jesus was buried, Jesus was raised from the dead, Jesus appeared to many!

Hello everyone! What an incredible display of God gathering His people all over Hilo last weekend from Good Friday meditations, Easter Sunrise services, baptisms, multiple Sunday morning services to celebrate the resurrection of our Lord! God brought almost 200(191 to be exact) to our two services that we offered. What a wonderful testimony: "I serve a risen Savior!" was emphatically declared in every church, in every household all across our world. Millions of people celebrating Resurrection Sunday! The shouts of "He is risen! He is risen indeed!" rang out to declare our joy and gratitude to our God who made Jesus His Son to be our substitute. The prophet Isaiah said: "But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities, the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. " (Isaiah 53:5-6)
Last Sunday, we began looking at the historical record of Jesus being seen by many in the 40 days before He ascended into heaven to one day return to gather those who remain to be with Him forever. We will continue this Sunday with "A Look Back to the Resurrection", Randy Drake will be preaching on the 25th and I will conclude the "Life After the Resurrection" series on May 4th with "Believing Is Living". We will observe the Lord's Supper on that Sunday. "Soon, and very soon, we are going to see the King! Hallelujah, hallelujah, Hallelujah! Have a great week in the Lord! See you this Sunday!