My Kind of Church

I recently heard a challenging message that I borrowed the main points from to encourage my church family.  You see, I love my church family.  We have been through so much together and God has seen us through and strengthened us as a result!  So when I heard this message about the kind of church this man wanted to be able to look back and say that his church was... I thought - wow... that is my church!  And that is what I want to see it continue to be! ( I think that he felt the same about his church, too!)
You see - I grew up here.  When I was 13 or so, I came here because of a girlfriend and then ended up marrying her best friend 9 years later!  I went to youth group here, I was engaged while attending here, I got married here, our family has expanded through four kids here, we have raised them here (although I still have a high schooler - we are nearing the Empty Nest stage), I served here for over 16 years as an elder and now I have been on staff for 9 years!   I do not want to go anywhere else but I also have a burning desire for our church to be what God wants it to be!

But  - what I love is that my church is a place that: 

• has a love for lost people - we pray for, welcome, share with and serve lost people so that they may come to know Jesus as Savior!
• has a pioneer spirit - we just hosted a "Back to School Bash" that team us with B100  country music station to see hundreds of people that need to see the love of Jesus - and they CAME!  Was it a stretch?  oh YES!  Did they play some music that was offensive - a little, yes.  But they worked with us and we worked with them and we all had a great chance to see God work!
• love and grace flourish in abundance - we are not without our problems - oh no!  But we have a spirit from our leadership on down that is smothered in the grace and love of God.  When we let God move - He covers over so many of our imperfections and shapes us through His love and grace into the church family that He desires us to be.
• has the WOW! Factor burning bright!   - God has done some amazing things in the past days of our church but the truly incredible thing is that HE IS STILL AT WORK!  We see Him continuing to use Osceola Grace to His glory and we are riding the momentum and trying new things all the time to connect people to God, people to people and to show the love of Christ to the people in our community!

 

This is MY kind of church - Fist Bump to Osceola Grace!