Erik Raymond over at IrishCalvinist posted an article today regarding His own struggle to be faithful in the area of evangelism. In some ways it was quite similar to Piper’s final message at the Resolved Conference we recently attended. I know I can certainly relate to his words and my guess is that you will be able to as well.

Even as you think through this issue, be encouraged- God is growing us as a body in this area- I see it in many of you as we talk. Progress may be slow but press on. Our God is active and by His grace He will use even us.

I have posted the article in its entirety below.

There have been periods of my Christian life where I have, by God’s grace, enjoyed fervent zeal towards evangelism. However, there are other spells of indifference and flat out negligence. To be honest, I really hate the way this fluxes.

I have tried different things to rev myself up and stimulate faithfulness, but at the end of the day it comes down to two things: 1) my view of God, and 2) my view of others

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As you begin to think about planning your summer make sure you get the church camping trip on the calendar-

Wednesday July 18th- Saturday July 21st at Donner Memorial State Park. 

Reservations have been made so make arrangements to come for all or part of the time.  It should be a great time enjoying time enjoying God’s creation and time together as a body. 

Last night was a sweet time of celebrating God’s grace and providence in putting our body together.  In His wisdom He has put the body together as He has seen fit. 

Some of you may have been interested in further details regarding who actually committed to memberhsip.  There were 71 individuals accepted for membership last night.  Since posting people’s names on the web can be a little sketchy we will hand out a list of members next Sunday evening.

Let me take this opportunity to remind all of us that memberhsip is not a mark of spirituality and must never be allowed to feed our self-righteous tendencies.  It is by God’s grace we have been saved, it is by His providential working that we have come to this body, and it is by His grace and for His glory that we commit ourselves to this body. 

If you are interested in membership but were not a part of this round we will have opportunities in the future.  Let us know if you are interested in doing it sooner but I would guess that the next membership class will be hald in the fall.

The audio sermons from the Resolved Conference this last weekend are now up.  It is difficult to recommend a single sermon- they were all biblical, powerful, and soul-stirring.  Best of all they can be downloaded for free. 

Here is the link. You will need to create an account with Grace Community Church (a fairly easy and painless process).  Once you are on the audio messages page for 2007 right click where it says download and select “save as” to save it onto your computer.

If you want to listen to them and are for some reason unable to download them let me know and I will put them on a CD for you. 

On a new blog that Paul Tripp is writing on the following article was posted.  It is a helpful reminder that their are more important things than our preferences, convenience, and desires in interacting with others.  God works in various ways in and through us to accomplish His purposes.  May we be ready and alert. 

I have posted the entire article below.  Enjoy.

We were surprised. We simply didn’t see it coming. We thought things were going well. We thought we’d built a good relationship. We thought that we’d been good neighbors. We lived in a twin house, with our landlady living in the attached home with her adult daughter. For reasons we couldn’t understand, the daughter began to get mad at us. She would yell and curse at our children. She would play her stereo very loudly late at night, waking our children. She did everything she could to make our lives miserable. We didn’t understand what was happening and everything we tried to do to make things better only made things worse.
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In a post on his blog today Mark Lauterbach discussed the kind of people that surround us in our culture.  Do we have hearts to reach a morally diverse people?  Are we ready to embrace, counsel, and disciple people who come from backgrounds which are starkly different than ours? 

May our passion for God’s supremacy and compassion for lost souls drive us to be eager, prepared, and active in bringing the gospel to the people around us of every kind.  I have posted the article in its entirety.

Recent conversations have provoked me with a question. Friends have been telling me of their time with people who are not in Christ and have no relationship to the church. These pictures of modern life helped me see what evangelism would look like today. . . . . 

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Our Group of 15 arrived back in Auburn around 10pm last night from our weekend trip to the Resolved Conference in Long Beach.  The conference was absolutely amazing!  Incredible times of worship in music and powerful preaching.  If you think my enthusiasm is overstated ask someone else who was there (especially if they are in your Grace Group).

What makes it even better for all of the rest of you is that all of the audio for the conference is going to be on the web for free in the next few days (I’ll let you know). 

In the meantime Tim Challies has posted a number of posts on the conference at his blog.  You can find them at this link.  Most of them are thorough summaries of the messages.  Enjoy.