Month: February 2017

March through Lent

by laurelhillumcMissions / Upcoming Event

lentAs we begin the season of Lent on March 1st here at Laurel Hill UMC at 7:00 PM, I encourage you to make these days “a time of refreshing from the presence of the Lord”. (Acts 3: 19) Be immediate and active in your obedience and “let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.” (Hebrews 10: 24 – 25)

 

To help you with this, here is our March newsletter and calendar! Don’t forget to get your tickets for our final Mission Auction and Dinner, set for March 11th. Craft rooms open at 4:30 PM. Dinner begins being served at 5:00 PM. Live Auction starts at 6:30 PM.

March 12th, the Kean University Choir will be our special guests during the 11:00 AM service.

The Virginia Choristers will be with us during the 11:00 AM service on March 26th and share a concert with us after lunch that day at 1:30 PM.

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Love Constrains Us

by laurelhillumcBible study / Uncategorized

compeledThe Bible speaks of how the love of God draws everything and everyone in our lives down to a singular relationship with Jesus. We don’t live for ourselves. We live so that others would know what the crucifixion and resurrection means for them. But, the Apostle Paul says their is something more ontological that we need to know that shapes our faith and witness as an ambassador for Jesus Christ and that raises the dead to life.

It comes from reading 2 Corinthians 5: 14. “For the love of Christ constrains us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead.”

What are the implications of all being dead? What has to happen for all (or anyone) to go from being dead to being alive? For that, we’re going to tell the story of love from John 3: 13 – 21.

State the Facts: “No one has ever gone (ascended) into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man.”There are two groups of humanity. The first group is ‘the all’ who cannot ascend into heaven. The second group consists of the One who can.

Share the Faith: “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.”

See the Future: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

Show a Singular Focus: “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.”

Start the Funnel: “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.”

The Simple Framework: “This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that the works they have done that they are wrought in God.”

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