I want to thank you for visiting River City Church today. It was refreshing to meet with you. I know you’ve visited before, but it seems that it has been a while. I know many of us truly appreciated your presence during the service today. It seems that whenever You show up, lives are changed and we leave different than when we came. You always seem to point us towards Jesus, and for that I am thankful. I would like to extend an invitation for you to consider making RCC your home. We would welcome your presence and ministry not only every Sunday, but in our lives every day of the week. Please consider my request. I know I am not alone in my desire for more of You. And once again…thank you!
Sincerely,
Brian
Oh by the way, you can listen to the sermon below….
This is something that Abby came up with all on her own. She probably doesn’t know it, but I think she’s on to something. First, she understands how much God loves her. She understands she is precious in His sight. Then, born out of her understanding of how God views and loves her, she desires to do her part of the Great Commission and share the love of God with the entire world. WOW!
I’m sure she didn’t think this all through before she wrote it, and I probably ruined it for you by getting all technical. But the bottom line is this: We all need to have faith like Abigail in order to enter the Kingdom of God. Isn’t that what Jesus said in Luke 18:17?
Crazy day this morning. The building was a disaster from an event last night. Helpers showed up late. I wasn’t feeling well. Nothing insurmountable, just adds a level of stress that I’d rather not have on Sunday mornings.
We had a few visitors today. Great meeting some new people. Thanks for coming to RCC!
Worship was simple today but good. Just keys, drums, and acoustic guitar. Sometimes simple is better.
I’m excited about our new series. I preached one of my favorite messages today on Benaiah. 2 Samuel 23:20-23 says that he did many exploits, including chasing a lion into a pit on a snowy day and killing it. Ultimately, he became head of King David’s bodyguard unit. Then, King Solomon made him commander over one of his army divisions.
Who wouldn’t promote someone who had the guts to chase down and kill a lion with a spear?
All of us have lions in our lives. Are your lions problems or opportunities?
God opportunities often come disguised as lions.
Are you going to face, and even chase your lion, or just curl up and play dead?
What’s a pastor to do when he can’t find his bible and sermon notes right before the service? Thank you Bryce for finding it in the nick of time! Thought I was gonna have to wing it!
We continued talking about getting our game on by getting involved in small groups.
Small groups are to the church as special teams are to football. Some of the biggest plays of the game are made in small groups. In fact, the game is often won or lost depending on whether special teams get in the game or not.
Small groups are where we get to run up the score on our opponent.
We had a meeting with potential small group leaders after the service. We’re going to start a “Turbo Group” with those interested as a way to train them up in a short period of time. Then we’re going to release them to lead their own groups starting the week of January 24th.
Sorry for the late update. I left on a hunting trip right after church on Sunday and didn’t get back until Wed eve. If you’re an animal lover, don’t worry. The elk are safe and sound with me in the woods.
I believe that RCC is at a pivotal moment right now. Over the last year, we have worked hard at building RCC, based on relationships. Relationship with God, relationship with others.
Although some spiritual growth has come out of the relationships that have been built, I am realizing that if we are not intentional about spiritual growth, then it won’t happen for everyone.
The primary purpose of the church, and of RCC is to make disciples who are making disciples. In other words, we exist to help people grow spiritually to the point where they can help people grow spiritually.
So, we are purposing to become more intentional about spiritual growth through small groups.
We’ve even changed our Mission Statement. The new part is underlined and italicized: Doing whatever it takes to reach people who are far from God,and helping them become genuine followers of Jesus Christ.
Contrary to what has been ingrained in most of us, a genuine follower of Jesus Christ is not someone who faithfully attends Sunday services. Although that is a part of spiritual growth, and it is important, it is only the tip of the iceberg so to speak.
A genuine follower of Jesus Christ, according to Jesus in Matthew 4:19, is someone who lays down their life to follow Him, is continuously being transformed by His resurrection power, and who is doing their best to help others along in the same journey. If you’re wondering how I got all that out of this one verse, then listen to the sermon below. It will all make sense.
Really, we’re not changing direction or redefining who we are at all. We are just taking spiritual growth to the next level for RCC.
If RCC fails to make true followers of Jesus Christ, then we will have failed in our mission altogether.
Turns out, discipleship doesn’t happen by accident. You may think that is obvious, but I was under the illusion for some time that if we created a relational environment, discipleship would happen. Well, some discipleship happens that way, because a relational environment is one key ingredient to discipleship. However, there are 2 other ingredients that must be present for discipleship to occur: 1) intentional leaders, and 2) a reproducible process. Turns out we have some work to do in these other 2 areas.
THE PRIMARY MISSION of the church is to produce disciples who in turn produce disciples. In order for RCC to accomplish its mission, we must have all 3 of the above ingredients. The good news is that we’ve done a great job at creating a relational environment. Now, we just need to add the other 2 ingredients, stir gently, and see what happens when we unleash a church of disciple makers into Missoula.
God’s stirring things up at RCC. Can’t wait to see how it turns out.
We kicked off Love Missoula month by talking about being missionaries to our city.
All of us are missionaries.
I believe that in Acts 1:8 Jesus called us to go and be witnesses to our city first, our region next, and then the ends of the earth.
If we are making an impact in the cities God has placed us in, we have no business going anywhere else.
The primary way we will take our cities for the Kingdom of God is through prayer.
Anybody can serve, but only God’s people can serve through the power of the Holy Spirit. We need to be filled up each and every day.
Jesus’ disciples were very ordinary people until the day the Holy Spirit came down upon them. They were never the same again.
From that day on they were filled with dunamis power that resulted in the lame walking, the blind seeing, the dead living, and THOUSANDS of people coming to place their faith in Jesus Christ.
If we want to see revival in Missoula, we have to pray it in.
We also talked about the need for the church to be the most generous people on this planet. I doubt we’d be accused of that right now. We have some work to do.
Generosity opens doors to hearts and cities. We need to be the most generous people our city has ever seen, both with our time and finances.
When the church of Missoula comes together in prayer and generosity, we’ll see this city turned upside down for Jesus.
