To God's Beloved At Cloverdale Baptist Church:
I am certain of God's faithfulness, and God's Word during these uncertain times! I am certain that He can grow us as individuals and as a church, even in a pandemic! I am certain He loves the church, and has a plan for us in His love that accomplishes His mission! I am delighted to be a part of this family, and thankful for Cloverdale Baptist Church!
Does prayer really make any difference? The obvious answer biblically is YES, but so often the answer practically in our lives, especially when life is not going as we would always want, is a careful maybe. So how do we rest assured that prayer matters? Three ways...when we are in the midst of a pandemic to remember that prayer matters (will keep very short). 1. Because God commands it. We are to be a people who ALWAYS PRAY & DON'T GIVE UP. Yes we could go to many other places, but this one is powerful and clear (Luke 18:1). 2. Because God uses prayer to accomplish His will. We could display this well in church history as we reflect on every major revival, but perhaps the best place to go is Jesus life. He often withdrew to pray, and if Jesus did this, modelling to us how we should live, we should follow His pattern to accomplish God's will for God's glory (Luke 5:16, don't forget James 5:16). 3. Because we have experienced it. Although often we feel like giving up, and can be insecure about what God is doing, there are, if we have been Christians for very long experiences of God's rich answers to prayer, that when we reflect on, remind us of the glory of answered prayer. For us as a church, prayer is central to who we are, we are reminded that the early elders were to focus on prayer and preaching, and we want to encourage all of our congregation to be praying together and alone.
Prayer: We are calling for ZOOM PRAYER MEETINGS, on some Tuesday nights, starting tonight. Join us, if you can and help us rely on God and seek His glory during this pandemic! Every Wednesday night we have a church wide Bible Study, and invite you to take part in this as well, as we seek to do our very best to honour God together in prayer before this. If you are like me, sometimes prayer takes a back seat to the urgent, and we want to slow down and get our priorities right, especially now! So take the time to pray, to join us in prayer, and to make this a much needed priority check in your life. God has chosen to use prayer to impact our world, and who knows, maybe your prayers have been chosen by God for such a time as this! PRAY!
Faith Over Fear: We have joined other churches in seeking to minister faithfully to those in our communities who might be in need. To join us, in offering help to others in love, pick up a FAITH OVER FEAR card (or cards), deliver them to your neighbours and minister on God's behalf and our churches. The more we share the love of God, the more they will ask us the reason for the hope we have, and we can share the Gospel with them.
Invite: Each week I am overwhelmed with joy at how many of you are inviting your friends and family, neighbours and co-workers to join us online. This is fantastic, and a wonderful opportunity for us to continue to accomplish the mission God has given us. Because of you, we are increasing our impact, and for that I praise God. We are also seeing our giving increase (how is this possible), and our evangelism growing (truly amazing). I praise God for you, and being a part of this family is amazing, please continue to join us in seeking to be as healthy as we can be during these times.
Communion: Sunday is a communion Sunday again, please make sure to prepare your hearts and minds and take this seriously. It is one of the greatest gifts Jesus has given the LOCAL CHURCH, and we want to continue to participate TOGETHER, even while we are apart. So please join us this Sunday, be READY (notes at the end of this update to help you), and join us in this celebration of remembering and renewing our first love devotion for His glory.
Stay engaged with our congregation! One of the temptations as the length of this continues will be to settle into a comfortable routine. As much as we would all love comfort, please STAY CONNECTED and CONNECTING. Our desire is to not let anyone fall through the cracks during this isolation time, so please help us in this goal. Communicate with the office if you have any concerns, or know of anyone we need to serve. It is essential that each of us who calls this church home reaches out at such a time as this!
Offering: We are praising God for how His people are responding to our time of need. THANK YOU! We are so blessed to belong to a family that continues to give. As this isolation call started we were thinking of what we would need to cut, and how quickly, and your giving has blessed us enough that we can continue to think about ministry and opportunities to accomplish God's mission for His glory through CBC! THANK YOU! If you would like to give above and beyond your priority giving to the local church, our special offering this month is going to the Langley Food Bank, and you can give to this by marking your gift online, or the gift you drop off with special offering! Again, THANK YOU!
Sunday Is Coming
Title: Amazing Love: Even When You Leave The Mountain Top
Text: Romans 8:32-39
- What are some things that you think can separate us from God's love? Or at least threaten this!
- Why do you think that Paul lists off these awful things, with the precious promise of a love that can never be stolen from us?
- Read all of Romans 8.
- What are some things you have learned that you never want to forget from our time in Romans 8? Write them down, and place them in a spot you can review, so that a year from now, should Jesus not return, and you are still alive, you will continue to live in light of!
Pray that God would use this chapter, and these sermons to mark us as His people with confidence, and a deep delight in Him.
A fellow loved by God child of the KING,
Pastor Rob
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Preparing For Communion As A Church Gathered Online:
We want you to be prepared physically, spiritually and mentally for this reverent celebration of unity giving to the LOCAL CHURCH.
Physically:
We would like to have each home prepared using grape juice (the fruit of the vine) and bread (or crackers) for our First Sunday Of The Month service. So please try to avail yourself of these things and have them ready to partake with us on Friday morning. We want this communion to mirror as close as possible our Sunday morning communion service, seeking to maintain the reverence and joy of this event.
Spiritually:
We celebrate what is called an open table, which means we prepare people, but we don’t police the table. We expect each person who participates to be honest to God and with themselves as they prepare in worship to join in.
We celebrate as a local church, so this is something we would request you do with us at the same time we are celebrating so we are unified in our remembrance and devotion.
So, what does it mean to be prepared?
Know what we are doing together.
Remember: We are remembering what Jesus did for us on the cross, and we are celebrating/remembering His life that was perfectly lived in our place, and His death that pays the penalty for our sin, and His resurrection that guarantees our eternal life if we believe in Him. (1 Corinthians 11:24; 2 Corinthians 5:21)
Repent: The Lord’s table is an opportunity to get right with God. This is one of the commanded church family experiences that calls us to align our lives with God’s Word. So it is a time of reflecting on our lives and confessing any known sin, and seeking God’s forgiveness. (1 John 1:9)
Renew: This is an opportunity to offer your life to Him again, and renew your first love relationship with Him, declaring that all that you are and all that you have belong to Him. This is a declaration that you want your relationship with Him to drive and define everything about you! (Romans 12:1-2; 1 Corinthians 6:19-20)
Rejoice: What a Saviour! In all of life we can rejoice in His love and rest in His care. He is amazing, His love overwhelming and worth responding to. (Ephesians 3:14-21; Romans 8:32-39)
Preparing so that we can partake together in a healthy way:
As a church we celebrate what is called an open table. This means that all who are gathered can participate as long as they meet two qualifications…
- They are authentic Christians.
- They are willing to confess all known sin and experience forgiveness and renewal of willingness to fully obey (they are not currently under church discipline).
It is dangerous to participate in communion without discernment, (1 Corinthians 11:29) and we want all who join us as a church family online to treat this seriously!
You don’t have to be a member of our church, or even a regular attender to join us in this, but you do have to be a committed follower of Jesus willing to confess all known sin, and seek to choose to live today forward for Him.
Please prepare your hearts as you get ready to join us in this corporate act of remembrance and recommitment.
Parents please guide your children, make sure they have met the qualifications and if they participate, do so in obedience to God. Our practice is that baptism (or a willingness to be baptized) precedes participation in communion.
Mentally:
There has been some debate among spiritual leaders over whether we should partake or not during this pandemic and the isolation it has demanded that we observe. This struggle is an overflow of the belief that communion is a gift and command to the local church and not the individual believer. We affirm this belief that communion is a gift to the local church.
Our view as an elders board of Cloverdale Baptist Church is that the local church is still gathering together online, and as such we believe we are a local church gathering as best we can together online with all of the privileges and responsibilities that come with this.
This is not the norm, and in that our hearts ache for the time that we can gather together again for physical closeness, even as we celebrate our spiritual unity in Christ as we gather together online. We know that this is not ideal, and some of our people will struggle whether it is right or wrong to participate in an online celebration of this sort.
If you are struggling, please join us in remembering Jesus death, but do not go against your conscience. Take the time when others are participating in the elements, to focus on your own walk with God and desire to have your relationship with Him drive and define you! We don’t want anyone to participate with us who is struggling with this theologically, and want all to have the freedom in faith to submit to their consciousness.
Our statement of faith declares…
We believe that, …the observance of the Lord's supper (is that) in which members of the church, by the use of bread and wine after solemn self-examination, are to commemorate together the death of Christ
We believe we can commemorate together this great celebration, and that the spiritual benefit from this time of remembering in relationship to Jesus is not only commanded, it has tremendous spiritual benefit to those who are partaking in obedience to God as a part of a local church.
One of the most unifying and significant things that we do together is this celebration of the Lord’s table, and as you join us isolated, and yet unified in our devotion to Jesus, may we experience a new depth of love for the Saviour and one another!
We believe that in God’s Sovereign care, this pandemic can grow us deeper in intimacy with God, and wider in impact, and so we trust Him as we creatively seek to grow together.
Other:
If you would like to participate in our monthly benevolent offering, above your regular giving, please mark your online giving, or what you drop off clearly, and we will use it to minister to those in our community and church family who are in need.