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Worship Ministry - April 2024

Easter
I am so thankful for the opportunity we had to celebrate Easter together as a church! Good Friday Night of Worship was a great night of worshiping Christ, the one who saves us. It is great when we can focus on the cross and what Christ did for us; the sacrifice He made; to feel and understand the pain He bore. Then, for us to gather on Easter Sunday morning to celebrate His resurrection! He’s alive and working in us still!

Thank you to all those who helped make the Easter weekend happen. All the singers, band members, and tech team, thank you for the hard work and dedication you put in; not only for Easter but every week. Thank you for helping lead our church each week in
worship. I am thankful that I get to serve here at Oakhill!

Matthew 28:5-7
5 The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. 6 He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. 7 Then go quickly and tell his disciples: ‘He has risen from the dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.’ Now I have told you.”

He’s Still Alive
As we come out of Easter, I pray we don’t forget that He’s still alive! Christ is still reigning! Christ is still the Lord! John Piper said, “...if this is true, then nothing is more important in our lives, nothing is more crucial or more urgent or more needful than believing it and becoming a follower of Jesus.”

We know this, we know all these things but it’s easy for us to approach our daily life without this in mind. Seeing God as distant and unreachable, maybe we even forget about Him altogether. We can go a whole day without thinking of Him once. It’s easy to get busy. It’s easy to not worship our God like we should and to become self-consumed. How can we fight against this urge?

We have the great assurance of Matthew 28:6, “He is not here; He has risen…” Believing this should fill us with a desire to draw near to Him and to seek Him! Jesus encourages us in Matthew chapter 7, that if we seek God we will find God. He isn’t trying to hide from us but rather wants us to be close to Him and to know Him. Just as you spend time on the things in life that interest you or the people that you love, spending time with God is necessary to know God.

John Piper also writes, “Seeking the Lord means seeking His presence.” “Presence” is a common translation of the Hebrew word “face.” Literally, we are to seek his “face.” But this is the Hebraic way of having access to God. To be before His face is to be in His presence.”

Seek God’s presence through His word. Seek God’s presence through singing. Seek God’s presence through prayer. Seek Him with your whole life!

Love you and mean it!

Grow & Go - April 2024

In Christ, We Are Called to Give Counsel

Early on as a new Christian, there was much valuable counsel that was given to me by my pastor and others that shaped my theological understanding of what it meant to follow Jesus. Good books were given to me while others were suggested, key doctrines were explained, sound preaching was heard every Sunday, and more importantly, all my questions (and there were many) were answered. All these questions were being answered through the lens of Scripture while in fellowship and discipleship with my brothers and sisters in Christ. We are all giving counsel to others whether we are in our homes with our spouses, while at work, in church, dealing with our children, or even our parents. Each of us is giving counsel all the time in all that we do. The question that we must ask ourselves in Christ is this; is the counsel we are giving informed by and according to the Scriptures?

On one such occasion that I was counseled early on as a believer, my pastor knowing that I was a fisherman, had asked me to meet in his office. He typically had stacks of thumb-tabbed books on his office desk preparing for sermons. On this given day, however, I walked into his office and he had only one book on his desk, the Bible. He said, “There is likely nothing I could probably ask you about a fish that swims around here that you couldn’t tell me. How to catch it, with what bait to use, the best time of year, etc. Am I right”? I answered, “You’re probably right”.  He then grabbed the Bible from lying atop his desk, held it up high, and paused for a moment. My pastor and friend then said, “That Paul, is how you need to know God’s Word”. He then explained how God’s Word is sufficient and that it will provide all we need, all that I needed, that pertains to life and godliness referencing 2 Peter 1:3. I had no idea at the time how valuable this counsel would end up being in my life, and it was the counsel that I needed to hear at the perfect time God ordained. 

Numerous places in Scripture inform us as believers that we are all to be counselors using the Word of God to speak into other people's lives.  Since the beginning of time, our Sovereign Creator and Lord uttered counsel to Adam and Eve in Genesis 2:16-17 “But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” The apostle Paul gives us a picture of what a community of believers giving counsel in action looks like when he said, “Brothers if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted” (Gal 6:1). All Christians are to give the whole counsel of God’s Word and be prepared to share the gospel with others. The Book of Psalms provides us with wisdom and the words to pray and praise back to our Holy God because they are about our Holy God giving glory to the Holy God who created us. All Christians being counselors, are to be counseling others by witnessing “the fruit of the spirit” (Gal 5:22-23) and speaking truth into the lives of believers in the theologies of sin, suffering, salvation, and the Church.

Since all Christians are counseling someone in all that we do, our aim should be what Paul exhorted in Colossians 1:28 exclaiming “Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ”. Four things are communicated by Paul here that we should recognize from this text alone; proclaiming, warning, teaching, and finally, that people would be viewed as mature Christians. The second of these is what stands out when looked at in the Greek, “warning” which means nouthetountes, translating into the word “counseling”. Paul was speaking to ordinary people here that it was his desire for all of God’s people to give
counsel to others for when they stood before God in judgment they would be seen as “mature in Christ” (Col 1:28).

My prayer is that as you have read this, you will be encouraged to know that as Christians, others are looking to you for wisdom and counseling. There are people everywhere in our sphere of influence who are more anxious, hurt, worried, and scared than seemingly ever before. What people need, what I need, is not self-help, self-diagnosis, or
self-medication. We need the Words of our Redeemer who speaks life into every situation. Every person has the ability as a born-again Christian to be the mouthpiece of the Word within this lost and dying world needing biblical counsel.

Let me encourage you that as one who has been indwelt by the Holy Spirit and given power in Christ, you can give counsel from God’s Word. I pray that it be from “the knowledge of God and our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Pet 1:2) and a transformed life this counsel flows from.