From the desk of Pastor John Johnston: 7-23-12

Today’s FUNNY===========================
Three little boys were bragging about how tough they were.
"I'm so tough," said the first boy, "that I can wear out a pair of shoes in a week."
"Well," said the second little boy, "I'm so tough, I can wear out a pair of jeans in a day."
"That's nothing," said the third boy. "When my parents take me to see my gramma and grampa, I can wear them out in an hour."

Ah, as we read what the third little boy said I am sure that a lot of us can relate to this. The old question that seems to go around every year is “What do fish and relatives have in common”?

This past week Tina and I took some time off to relax and to get away on a camping trip. It all seems to be innocent and as we began to pack we do so with great anticipation of a week of relaxation. The problem is that innocent, relaxation and 2 boys don’t go together. Jeremy, our oldest is the one with all the answers and the rest of us are clueless. Brandon, the youngest, is an engineer from stem to stern. With Jeremy no conversation went by without an analogy of the good, the bad, and the ugly of it all. With Brandon his brain never rests; you could put him on a jet ski for hours, then take him golfing, go fishing and out to eat, and back to the camper to play games and he would look at you with a serious face and say that this camping trip is boring. His brain is in “process mode” all the time. He does not know how to just down load. So you can imagine how this past week went. There were times when Tina and I looked at each other and either rolled our eyes or just busted out laughing.

All in all we had a good time and will cherish this as our last vacation before Brandon leaves for collage. The Bible talks of our families, of how we should love them and cherish them. After all God did give them to us. Well just in case you are wondering, we do love our boys very much and are not sure how we feel yet of how quite it will be when Brandon is gone off to school.

Extended family is the same. While they are here it can be total chaos one minute and sweet memories later. I can only imagine what Christ must have felt while here on earth.

While in the garden praying He must have been in anguish as the disciples kept falling asleep. Matthew 26: 36-46 “What! Could you not watch with Me for one hour? Watch, pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is week.”  You can imagine how Christ felt as He kept returning and finding His family asleep. I am sure it could have felt as if they did not care of what you were going thru.

As we trudge thru this hot summer let’s remember that Christ is our reason to endure and to love unconditionally. Cherish every moment you have with your family.

 “The Greatest Adventure in Life is seen through the Love of Christ”  

Bro John   501-262-0015

From the desk of Pastor John Johnston: 7-16-12

“Man of few words…”

A gentleman entered a busy florist shop that displayed a large sign that read, "Say It With Flowers."
"Please wrap up one rose," he told the florist.
"Only one?" the florist asked.
"Just one," the customer replied. "I'm a man of few words."

All too often we get very busy and we forget about what is important in life. We rush down that highway at 100 miles per hour not realizing how many opportunities we are missing. A lot of us are like the man in the story above; we are people of few words.

Although our Savior, Jesus Christ, had more than a few words to say He could say just a few and get His point across. Jesus is willing to give us plenty of opportunity to minister for Him but we need to be willing to slow down and look for those opportunities and seize them for His good.

As you may know this past week I was afforded the opportunity to take five young adults to Spring Lake Camp. At the last minute I received a call from a grandmother that wanted her grandson to go to camp. As we went thru the process of cutting the red tape and securing a place for him I wondered if God was in this. As it turned out that young man accepted Christ as his Savior.

 Jesus had a way of making things very clear about whom He was and what His being here was all about. It is our duty to read His word and to use His word to tell His story.

 As a Man of many words He had only a few at the end while on the cross,; John 19:30 “It is finished!” These famous words ring out as a reminder to us that Christ had suffered not only from all that He went through but also that He took on the sins of the world and became the sacrificial Lamb for you and I…

  “The Greatest Adventure in Life is seen through the Love of Christ”  

Bro John   501-262-0015

From the desk of Pastor John Johnston: 7-9-12

“Summer Fun”

Well this week we are taking 5 youth’s to Spring Lake Camp. Please pray for these youth and for a great experience.

Our blog will return next week… In the meantime enjoy this from Chuck Swindoll…thanks and have a blessed week…

July 9, 2012    Paul Was Normal, Like Us by Charles R. Swindoll 2 Corinthians 11:26--28 Funny, we seldom think that a great apostle like Paul ever suffered from insomnia, but he did. He couldn't sleep sometimes because of acute deprivations, like hunger, cold, and exposure . . . and sometimes because of his concern for the many ministries to which he had given himself. "Daily pressure," he calls it. Read his own words: I have been in labor and hardship, through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. Apart from such external things, there is the daily pressure upon me of concern for all the churches. (2 Corinthians 11:27--28) Now that's being under pressure. Paul even mentioned the disillusioning times of mistreatment and imprisonment (see 11:26). There certainly must have been times he did not know where to turn---or to whom. Doubt and questions might well have haunted him with maddening regularity. Here was one of those great men, "too good for this world," being pushed around, threatened, and living on the raw edge of constant danger. If you imagine yourself in those many situations and toss in several imprisonments to boot---you can start to feel beaten down and defeated. Your mind plays tricks on you. You wonder where God is, and you occasionally even doubt God. You get disoriented, "mixed up" inside. And on top of all that is the one most common experience all who have been in prison admit---profound loneliness. Mix all that together . . . and you've got the picture.

 “The Greatest Adventure in Life is seen through the Love of Christ”  

Bro John   501-262-0015

From the desk of Pastor John Johnston: 7-3-12

“Our Independence Day”

I have been thinking a lot about our troops. As a veteran myself, I get teary eyed when I watch video clips about service men and women surprising their loved ones by coming home early, for good or maybe a furlough. I am not sure who said it first but one person wrote that an individual who joined the service basically wrote a blank check to the United States of America. The amount of the check would be determined by their willingness to serve even to the tune of their very life.

These fine folks decided that it was more important to fight for our very freedoms than it was to settle for second best or some other country’s values or lack thereof. For some of us we owe our very lives for their service whether home or abroad. For all of us we owe our very freedom to those that have served.

 
As we are approaching our “Independence Day” we need to pay tribute to those that have fought for the very freedom we enjoy. We can do this by not taking this freedom for granted. So many have died for this country and for the Constitution of our United States, we need to remember that our country was founded on Christian principals. If it weren’t so we would not have the words “One Nation under God…” in our Pledge of Allegiance. If this offends some of you then I feel for you. Our removing God and His Son from public places has offended God, and that should bother all of us.  For us to dishonor or rebuke the Constitution is to tell our troops that we don’t care about what they do, that what they do is in vain. It also tells our For Fathers that we no longer agree with what they did or fought for.
 
Our service here is to exalt the Living God, to tell the good news of His Son and, yes, it is time to show that our service people have not served in vain. 1 Peter 2:20  “For what credit is it if when you are chastened for your sin, that you take it patiently? But when you do well and suffer, if you take it patiently, this is commendable before God.”

It is time for our country to return to God and praise Him for the great servicemen and women that have fought to keep our country safe and to give us the freedom we enjoy.

May God Bless our Troops and our Country…

  “The Greatest Adventure in Life is seen through the Love of Christ”  

Bro John   501-262-0015

VBS Pictures

 

 

 

 

From the desk of Pastor John Johnston: 6-25-12

“How Sweet it is!”

A little boy is telling his Grandma how "everything" is going wrong: School, family problems, health problems, etc. Meanwhile, Grandma is baking a cake.
She asks her grandson if he would like a snack, which of course he does.
"Here, have some cooking oil."
"Yuck" says the boy.
"How about a couple raw eggs? "
"Gross, Grandma!"
"Would you like some flour then? Or maybe baking soda?"
"Grandma, those are all yucky!"
To which Grandma replies: "Yes, all those things seem bad all by themselves. But when they are put together in the right way, they make a wonderfully delicious cake!"
She continued, "God works the same way in our lives."

Isn’t it funny how grandmothers seem to always know what to say??? Since we started Vacation Bible School this week I thought it would be appropriate to talk about the events that lead us to something special.

In John 14:6 Jesus said “I am the Truth the Life and the Way, no one comes to the Father accept thru Me” This in itself sounds simple enough but it can be a difficult road. Nevertheless the reward is sweet in deed…

As we walk thru our lives, life is never too simple. When Tina and I got married, 29 years ago, we thought life would be pretty simple. Well it all started with the wedding plans. Everything seemed to be going fine and then we hit a snag on the wedding day and had to move the time back to accommodate another couple that was getting married on that day, even though we had our name on the list first. Well we survived, of course, but it was a time of great stress for my bride to be. So we moved our time for them and had a great wedding anyway. As life went on we had our fair share of struggles and it would have been easy to just give up. Nevertheless the reward has been sweet in deed…

Our walk with God is the same. As we go thru struggles in our lives satin will throw a lot of things our way. They become obstacles that hinder us from seeing what God is trying to do thru us.  A lot of times we tend to give up and quite church. We sometimes think, “What’s the use”?  Church is hard work. It is not for the faint of heart. It is not all about our comfort zone. It is about our relationship with our Creator. In Matthew Jesus was talking to His disciples. He commissioned them to do a great work. That same commission is given to us as well. 28: 19-20 “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20) teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen.

We as a country are entering an age of rejection of God. It shows in our lack of service, our lack of commitment, our lack of speaking up for Christian principals, and our lack of willingness to accept His call. There are a lot of committed service minded Christian’s out there, but the number is decreasing, for there are many who don’t want to be bothered with that “Church stuff”.

Joshua 24: 15 “And if it seems evil to you  to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served which were on the other side of the river, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house we will serve the Lord.”

My advice to you is to not give up. Don’t forget the prize at the end of the age. The place where Jesus went to prepare for you and I and that He will be returning again to take us there… Ahhh how sweet it will be…

 “The Greatest Adventure in Life is seen through the Love of Christ”  

Bro John   501-262-0015

From the desk of Pastor John Johnston: 6-12-12

A day to Remember:

Since this Sunday is “Fathers Day”, I thought it would be fitting to pay tribute to our fathers.

There are a lot of things I remember about my father. He was a kind man and was gentle. He seemed to be able to make friends wherever he went. He was fair to us but was not afraid to administer discipline when we acted up. (Which was quite often) He was generous to all of us even though we sometimes did not appreciate it. Being a Certified Public Accountant he did book work in several cities. His main office was in Brinkley Arkansas where I grew up. From time to time I would go by the office after school and visit. He always had time to stop and talk to me, no matter who was in his office.

When time permitted he loved to work around the house. He always had a project to do. As I watched him work he would talk to me about what he was doing. He was a good teacher and as I look at my life today I see a lot of what he taught me coming out in the things I try to teach to my boys. One thing that stands out most was that he made the best pork and beans this side of the Mississippi. He would make everyone get out of the kitchen when he made them. No one was to know his secret. My sister Vicki tried and tried to reproduce his beans. Even though she made some pretty good beans I don’t think she ever got it down 100%.  After dad had died even mom tried to make them but did not succeed.

As I look back to those days I can see all that he was teaching me.  He gave me a since of worth and taught me a lot of how to build, construct and to reason. He taught me the importance of being a good father to my children and the importance of our Father in Heaven.  I believe that he passed along to me how important it is to trust in our Savior.   I still can feel the warmth of his arm on my shoulder as he stood next to me when I accepted Christ as my Savior.

As the Psalmist says in Psalm 78:5-74, “5) For He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which He commanded our fathers, That they should make them known to their children; 6) That the generation to come might know them, the children who would be born, that they may arise and declare them to their children,7) That they may set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments;” my father passed on to me what is important in life and now I hope to instill this in my sons.

So the question today is, have you trusted in your Heavenly Father? As a father, it is up to us to send this message on to the generations to come, that they may come to trust in God and His Holy Word.

This father’s day take the time to honor your Father in Heaven and to pay tribute to all the God fearing fathers out there…

 “The Greatest Adventure in Life is seen through the Love of Christ”  

Bro John   501-262-0015