Pastor Crawford emphasizes the central theme of this gathering: "following in his steps," which serves as the guiding principle for the upcoming year. This episode outlines the significance of the new theme derived from 1 Peter 2:21, where believers are called to emulate Christ’s example in their daily lives. He discusses the importance of understanding what it truly means to be a Christian, underscoring that it involves imitating Christ in both character and conduct, especially during times of adversity. Additionally, Pastor Crawford introduces various church initiatives, including the nomination of officers and the distribution of calendars that will help guide the congregation through the year. Through a blend of scriptural insights and practical applications, he encourages the community to engage deeply in their faith and actively participate in church activities.

The 2025 Vision Night presented by Pastor Crawford emphasizes the church's commitment to its new theme, 'In His Steps', which serves as a guiding principle for the upcoming year. The Pastor outlines key objectives for the evening, including the nomination of church officers, the distribution of calendars, and a sermon based on the teachings from 1 Peter chapter 2. He reflects on the profound impact of Charles Sheldon’s book, 'In His Steps', which inspires Christians to examine what it truly means to follow Jesus. The Pastor asserts that this theme will encourage the congregation to live lives that are reflective of Christ’s character, especially in times of adversity. As he discusses the practical applications of following Jesus, he emphasizes the importance of maintaining a righteous character amidst challenges, and the necessity of a proper view of God in order to navigate life’s difficulties with faith and grace. The evening culminates in a call to action for the church members to engage more deeply in their spiritual journeys, aligning their lives with the example set by Christ as they strive for personal and communal growth in faith.

Takeaways:

• Pastor Crawford emphasizes the importance of following Jesus' steps as a central theme for the year, urging congregants to reflect on their Christian walk and how they embody Christ's teachings in daily life.
• In his sermon, Pastor Crawford highlights the significance of the book 'In His Steps' by Charles Sheldon, which inspires believers to consider the practical implications of living as Christ would.
• The call to imitate Christ is not just about personal conduct but also extends to how Christians should evangelize and interact with the world, reinforcing their identity as followers of Jesus.
• Pastor Crawford discusses the challenges of facing adversity, encouraging believers to keep their focus on Jesus as the ultimate example of strength and grace in difficult times.
• The sermon outlines the theme for the year, 'In His Steps', and connects it with biblical teachings from 1 Peter, emphasizing the need for Christians to maintain Christ-like character amidst suffering.
• Pastor Crawford concludes by reminding the congregation that they cannot follow in Jesus' footsteps without the empowerment of the Holy Spirit, underscoring the necessity of divine grace in the Christian journey.

Two or three things to accomplish tonight.

One of those is nomination of officers and we'll do that at the very end of the service.

And then tonight, of course, giving you the new theme and where we're headed for the year.

And so the calendars are back there.

Y' all don't have the calendars, do you?

No.

So we'll pass those out here in a little bit.

So actually we'll pass the calendars out for ushers.

Not now.

It'll be a little bit.

It'll be about 10 minutes or so and I'm going to preach first for a little bit and then we'll pass calendars out and then the nomination forms will be at the very end of the service.

I didn't get a chance to talk to Brother Gentry before, so I'm kind of doing it from the pulpit.

All right, If you win your Bibles Tonight, turn to 1 Peter chapter 2.

1 Peter chapter 2.

The book has been, if not the most sold book besides the Bible.

The Bible is the number one best selling book in the world and sold the most copies.

Pilgrim's Progress is probably second, though this book would claim that it has more in circulation than Pilgrim's Progress, but there are over 30 million that have been published throughout the last hundred years.

It's an amazing book called In His Steps, Charles Sheldon.

And we will have it in the library or in the bookstore by next Sunday.

We have some copies already, but you won't be able to buy them tonight.

But we'll have them ready by Sunday for you to purchase some.

And I would encourage you to get it, purchase it, read it, you can order it on Amazon.

That's where we're going to order them from.

But we're going to have them available for you.

And they're, you know, seven or eight dollars.

And it is a, and can be honestly a life changing book as far as inspiring and encouraging you as you follow the Lord Jesus Christ.

This is a long time ago and I still believe that it was the most I had ever seen of our membership come to the altar after I preached.

Now we've had revival meetings and other things that we have seen, you know, large, large crowds come to the altar.

But it wasn't my preaching.

I'm just telling you that book along with the scriptures, of course, the scriptures convicted me so much it would just it just came out.

I mean, it just came out.

It is really that kind of.

Because it is biblically based.

I want to make sure you understand that other books other than the Bible don't change lives, but if they contain the word of God, they do.

And Charles Sheldon as a pastor wrote these sermons out for his congregation.

And so much so as he wrote the sermon, the first one, it was well attended, but after the first one, they packed the place out and within a couple of weeks, 100,000 books had been published already.

And there was a copyright mess up.

And 16 publishers got ahold of it and started publishing it.

And Charles Sheldon, the pastor, never received really a dime for the book.

And he said of his own self, he said, I'm glad, he said, because I did not, because the copyright was messed up.

That meant not just one publisher was publishing it.

Sixteen were publishing it around the world.

It got, you know, translated into other languages.

And again, the Lord just used this book as he's used the Pilgrim's Progress.

If you've never read Pilgrim's Progress and you say, well, it's old English, it's hard to understand.

I'm telling.

I know you can probably buy one that's got the updated language.

I like reading the old version.

I like reading the old, you know.

And so I encourage you read Pilgrim's Progress, the best book besides the Bible ever written.

I mean, it really is.

It's an allegory.

You'll have to put yourself and maybe do a little bit of hard thinking, but it is really a good book.

So he published these sermons, but as he preached them, he just packed his church out.

And really, as far as we can tell in publishing, it's the first time what Would Jesus Do?

Was published in writing.

Right?

We know that that's used all over the place now.

But back in that day, you know, somebody had to come up with it.

And I'm sure there was others who were using the term, but it was the first time it was published.

What would Jesus Do?

When I was a teenager, it was very popular to wear.

I never wore it.

I don't.

I have an issue wearing anyway.

But you could wear a little bracelet with what would Jesus do on it and all those things.

And so his point was, ready.

Charles Sheldon's point was we say we follow in his steps.

We say we follow Jesus, but what does that really look like?

Do we really do that?

And I'm telling you, the book puts it in a very practical manner and applies it specifically to certain.

It's individual stories.

But they're all connected.

And you could say they're moral stories connected to everyday events that will convict you.

It's one thing for me to get up here and say we shouldn't drink, right?

It's another thing for me to get up and say you shouldn't drink.

Sometimes preachers will dance around the subject and just always use the word we.

I think it's important for a pastor every once in a while to say, hey, you should not drink alcohol.

The Bible is against it.

You know, it's wrong.

It's wrong to drink alcohol, period.

Biblically, period.

Everybody good?

Alright.

So you okay with your preacher saying that?

Because it's in the Bible, don't look upon the wine when it's red.

If you drink it, you had looked on it.

Okay?

But that's what it does.

That's what the book does.

It takes things.

And I'm telling you, it's not done in a bad spirit at all.

I'm just telling you, please read the book.

It'll be a blessing to you, I promise you.

But he practically applied in everyday life what it is to follow Jesus.

What it is to follow and walk in his steps.

And it's just a really good book.

First Peter, chapter two.

Let's read verse 21.

Verse 21 is our theme verse.

For even hereunto were ye called because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that ye should what?

Follow in his steps.

So our theme this year is in his steps, in his steps, following in the footsteps of Jesus.

How are we as Christians to live?

Well, we're to be imitators of Christ.

That's what Christian means.

The word Christian means imitators of Jesus Christ.

They were called Christians first at Antioch.

Why were they called Christians?

Because they were following Jesus.

They were following his teachings.

They did not act to a certain point.

Didn't look like those around them.

They were different.

They were different.

They were different than everybody else.

They didn't go places other people went.

And they didn't do things that other people did.

They lived moral lives.

They lived like Jesus.

And they started being called Christians.

Christians, Christ followers, imitators of Christ.

Because again, they were obedient to the teachings of Christ, the faith and love.

So what does it mean that we are to be Christians?

It means we are to be imitators of Christ.

Look back there with me again.

Let's read the rest of that chapter, verse 22. Who did no sin, Neither was any guile found in his mouth.

Who when he was reviled, reviled not again.

When he suffered, he threatened not, but committed himself, but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously.

So you can already get from first Peter where Peter is heading with this in the whole chapter.

And we'll go back and we'll study the whole chapter this year.

He's giving you what it is practically to follow in the footsteps of Jesus, to follow in his steps.

Peter helps us to understand what it means to live a righteous life in the midst of adversity, but keep the character and conduct of Christ in view.

In the midst of adversity, we are to keep the character and the conduct of Christ in focus.

When I face sufferings, when I face adversity, I am to keep my eyes on Jesus.

I am to follow in his steps.

How would he conduct himself?

How would he?

What would he say?

What would he do?

And that's how I'm to conduct myself.

Jesus Christ is our example of how we should respond to adversity.

Christians ought to respond different to adversity than the world because we have the promise that God cares for us, that Christ loves us, that he will be with us, that he will strengthen us, that he will give us the grace that we need.

Again, when it comes to adversity and things that we face in life, it really does come down to what is your view of Jesus?

What is your view of God?

Is your God big enough to handle the adversity that you're facing?

Amen.

It'll make you.

It'll help you make a right decision when you have the proper view of Jesus Christ.

Again, I know I repeat of tozer all the time, and I do the same quote all the time.

But what you think about God is the most important thing about you.

A.W.

tozer.

Knowledge of the holy.

It's a good book.

Knowledge of the holy.

And because it's going to impact every decision you make, what you think of Jesus as an example of how we should evangelize of the lost.

So not only is He Christ an example of how we should face adversity, and that's the context here found in 1 Peter, chapter 2.

But also he is the example of how we should evangelize and reach the lost and reach unbelievers.

We are to follow in his steps.

How did Jesus do it?

What did Jesus do?

And we know that Jesus came to seek and to save that which is lost.

Amen.

That's why he came.

We're to follow in his steps.

In Peter, we are called first Peter, we are called to victory.

How are we called to Victory.

How are we challenged to have victory?

Well, by remembering our position in Christ, by remembering what we have in Jesus Christ.

Chapter one.

By remembering that Jesus Christ was the lamb slain before the foundation of the world.

That God didn't wake up or God wasn't surprised when Adam sinned, you know, he wasn't surprised.

Redemption has always been God's plan.

Sending Jesus into the world was always God's plan.

We are called to victory because of our position in Christ.

Remembering that we are in Christ, that we are children of God, that we are sons of God, and all the benefits that come from that.

Now, book of Ephesians covers that very implicitly, very detailed.

But I know.

And I know.

I know that.

I know that I'm saved.

And I know because I'm saved and because I'm a child of God, that all the tools that I need to face adversity, all the tools I need to make right decisions, have been given to me by the Lord because of my position in Christ.

Again, how are we called to victory?

Remembering that Jesus Christ was slain again, he gave his life for us.

Remembering the blood that Jesus shed for us, the precious blood.

Chapter one says, the incorruptible blood of Jesus Christ.

How are we to follow Jesus?

We are to submit to him.

We're to follow in his steps.

Why are we to follow in his steps?

Because we have an incorruptible inheritance.

Just kind of what I've just said.

In other words, we've been giving all the benefits of being a son of God.

Jesus biblically, is our big brother.

We are co heirs with him, joint heirs with him.

Amen.

What a wonderful benefit.

We are to submit and follow Jesus because of his incorruptible blood that he shed for us.

We are to follow in his steps because of the incorruptible word of God.

I love.

Look at chapter one and look there with me in verse 23.

Being born again, not of incorruptible seed, but of incorruptible.

Let's read it again.

Being born again not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible by the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever.

I don't know how many times I've heard Dr. Barber quote this.

For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass.

The grass withereth, the flower thereof falleth away.

But the word of the Lord endureth forever.

And this is the word which by the Gospel is preached unto you.

We are to submit and follow in the footsteps of Jesus because of the word that he's given us, the incorruptible word that is forever.

We're to follow in his steps because in chapter two and three speaks about the suffering that Christ, not only the suffering he did for us, but also the suffering that we would face, that we are partakers of that suffering.

And if we are partakers of that suffering and he would give us grace, enabling power to go through that suffering, and because of that we ought to follow in his steps, then chapter three, verse 13 through the end of the book, speaks about we should follow him because he's coming again.

This has come up a lot lately, hasn't it?

He's coming again.

He's going to rule and reign.

Remember, God is still on the throne.

He will not forget his own.

God rules in the affairs of men whether they Venezuela is toppled or our government does, makes wrong or good decisions.

I mean, again, God is on the throne.

You can't put your trust in the United States of America.

You put your trust in the Lord.

He is coming again.

So if you kind of get the big picture of First Peter, the big picture is we should follow in Christ's steps because of what we have in Jesus, what Christ did for us, and that in turn gives us the rights as children of God, our citizenships in heaven.

Then understanding that he suffered for us and we will suffer and he will give us the grace we need to go through those things as we follow in his steps.

And we should react to suffering as he reacted.

That's a hard one.

In other words, we should follow in his steps when it comes to how the world sees us react to suffering.

Do you do that?

It's a great witness when you can go through adversity depending upon God and faith in him and people see that in you.

We are to follow in his steps.

We're to live disciplined, dutiful lives, but disciplined lives that are, you know, we submit to duty, we do what we're supposed to do as Christians does not make one spiritual.

Following a set of rules does not make one spiritual.

All the do's and the don'ts in the Bible which are there for our good does not necessarily make us spiritual.

It only puts us in a position for God to make us spiritual.

And so it's good to be reminded of that.

In other words, my performance does not necessarily make me spiritual.

My performance based even on the Word of God and what the Word of God tells me to do does not necessarily make me spiritual.

The Pharisees and Sadducees, they follow the rules.

They outwardly follow the rules.

But Jesus looked at him and said, you outwardly clean the cup, but on the inside your cup is dirty.

You outwardly wash the sepulcher, but on the inside you're full of dead men's bones.

Hypocrites.

He called them snakes, vipers.

We can follow the rules and we can memorize the Scripture and we can do our due diligence when it comes to how we dress and what we do and all those things.

And we could still be pious, hypocritical human beings that, that call themselves Christians.

I was telling, we were talking a while ago about, with the men, about just Christians as a whole and how that in the ministry, if you're not careful, you can become jaded because people don't necessarily react the way you think a Christian should react, or people don't make decisions like you think a Christian should make.

And that happens a lot.

That's why from the pulpit, we've said many, many times, if you're in it just to please people and just to get a pat on the back, you're going to get hurt.

You are.

People will disappoint you.

Your pastor will disappoint you, but Jesus Christ never will.

It's the love of Christ that should constrain us.

It's the love of Christ that should be our motivator.

And again, Hudson Taylor in China, one of his famous quotes is, you know, hey, send me a thousand missionaries.

We need a thousand missionaries.

But as they began to send some, he wrote back at some point, he wrote back and said, if you are coming over here because people need a Savior, people need to be saved.

If that is your only motivator is people, then don't come because they wouldn't stay.

He said, we need people with a heart for Jesus Christ, who's motivated by their love for Jesus and would do what Jesus wants them to do.

Not looking necessarily at people in their actions or their inaction, but only Jesus.

That's it.

Follow in his steps.

Focus on Jesus.

Keep your eyes on him.

I don't know how many times we preach that from the pulpit.

Turn your eyes upon Jesus.

Look full in his wonderful face.

The things of the earth will glow strangely dim in the light of his glory and his grace.

We need to keep our eyes on the Lord.

You really can live by the principle of what would Jesus do?

You can actually live by that principle in everything.

Would Jesus go where I'm going?

Would Jesus say, what I'm Saying, would Jesus act the way that I'm acting?

Hello.

I mean, you really can live by the principle.

You can live by that principle.

And the closer you walk with Jesus, the closer you are intimate with him and create that and have that personal relationship with him.

The more you know who he is is, the greater an opportunity you have and the greater you will walk like him.

The more you know about a person, the more you can respond and act as they act.

Hello.

I've used the illustration many times about Abraham Lincoln.

Abraham Lincoln is a fascinating character.

Not just because he was a great president, but he was just a neat guy.

You read about him, he was a big guy, he was tall.

A lot of the pictures, I told you, a lot of the pictures don't do him justice.

They kind of have him looks like he's pale faced and, you know, sickly looking.

That was not the case maybe in his older years, maybe, but man, as a young man, he was the wrestling champion of like two or three counties.

He was known for his physicalness, his ability bodily to do things that others could not do.

And then of course, he had a wonderful mother who taught him right?

And I mean, just raised in a godly home and he was Abraham Lincoln, you know, the truth teller.

He just good man.

The more I learn about him, the more I like him.

And I can learn about Abraham Lincoln and try to be like him, But he will.

Any character is always going to let you down.

He wasn't perfect, but Jesus Christ was.

The more you learn about him, the more you can follow in his steps.

We're to follow in his steps.

Amen.

All right, so the splash is up on the screen.

In his steps is our theme.

We'll wait.

They can get the calendars on their way out, but the new calendar encourage you.

There's a new Bible reading schedule as well in your bulletin.

Now, the Bible reading schedule this year is going from Genesis to Revelation.

And I'd encourage you maybe if you're a new Christian and you've gotten saved, maybe this year read the Book of John, maybe read the Gospels through first but then go back and read from Genesis to Revelation.

The Bible was meant to be read from Genesis 1 to Revelation, not Genesis 1 and then Matthew 1, Genesis.

It was meant to be read from beginning to end.

That's how it was meant to be read.

Now once you've done that a couple of times, then you can vary it up and you could read Genesis chapter 1, 2 and 3, maybe Matthew chapter 1, 2 and 3, whatever the case is, but it was meant to be read from beginning to end.

Everybody with me and don't pogo, stick around, don't go like Monday morning and just go, I'm going to read this.

You know, don't do that.

It is meant to be read from beginning to end.

Again, if you want to read the New Testament, read the New Testament, the Gospels, the four Gospels, then go back and read Genesis all the way through the river of Revelation again.

The New Testament writers wrote in light of that.

You already know your Old Testament, encourage you to read your Bible.

Maybe it'll take you a couple of years to read through it, but encourage you to read your Bible.

Basically you can read three chapters a day and you can read your Bible through in a year and so encourage you to do that on Sunday morning.

We're looking forward to preaching on First Peter.

We won't preach the whole book, but we will preach several passages and several.

We'll start in first Peter 1, get a good idea of where Peter was headed and get the context for chapter two and then we'll give you a summary of the rest of the book.

So there'll be several messages in First Peter and then we'll go back to John.

We didn't do that this year.

You said go back to John.

I don't even.

I wasn't here when you preached some of the messages from John.

Maybe you weren't, but we're going to go back and pick up some of John.

And I planned on doing that this year and I got carried away with Joshua.

So we'll see.

We'll see if we get carried away with First Peter.

But John speaking about following in his steps, following the life of Jesus out of the Book of John.

The Gospel of John on pm I am going to start as soon as we're finished with Daniel.

We got a couple more chapters in Daniel.

As soon as we're finished with that, I'm going to preach the Sermon on the Mount.

I know that Brother Stone just went through that here recently in his class and it won't matter, honestly.

And I've been wanting to preach the Sermon on the Mount forever and ever and ever.

Brother Zellner just put out a book here recently on.

I do have that book, but I have many others.

It is truly going to school with Jesus is what it is.

It's setting down and it's going to school with Jesus.

The disciples, as they sat down, Jesus taught them and so look forward to following in his steps, his teachings there.

And then again we'll finish Daniel on Wednesday Nights, we're going to do the Book of Galatians.

We have preached it before, years and years ago.

We've taught some out of it.

We've taught the walking in the Spirit and we've talked about the fruit of the Spirit and many of those things.

We're going to go back though, from beginning and walk through the Book of Galatians this year.

And there'll be intermittent this summer at some point I'm going to preach on the five musts of the Bible, M U S T and we'll do that.

So we'll take a break because I have add and we'll take a little break somewhere in there and preach a little short series on something else.

So that's the place we're going to be headed with the preaching, of course, with special days and special people coming in and preaching for us.

We'll look forward to some diversity there.

And then we think about loving God.

We think about again, the preaching and the teaching from your Sunday school class or wherever it may be.

Also about giving as we look at the purposes of the church of loving God again, corporately giving, giving your tithes.

By the way, the tithe belongs to the Lord.

That's just it.

It belongs to the Lord.

The offering is above that.

And so offerings include giving to missions.

And I can't just encourage you enough, be faithful in your missions giving.

Our missionaries depend upon that.

And our church has continued over the years to be blessed to support almost 100 foreign missionaries.

And we would support 100 foreign missionaries.

But it is kind of sad to think that we have enough coming off that.

It's hard to keep 100 unless we just took a bunch of new ones on.

And we'll take on a few more new ones this year, but.

And our church plants Brother Jonathan Moore down in College Station and then Brother Zach Doty there in Nocona, praying for these campus development as we continue to go forward in the offerings there and giving offerings and the bridge building.

And don't think I forgot about the triplex.

Some of you are going, well, what happened with the triplex?

Well, that was a city issue.

And someday, someday, Billy, someday we'll have a triplex.

We do know how and what to do now, or at least we've been told what to do now to get that accomplished with the city.

But we get the bridge building up and done, we'll come back and revisit that.

We are going to be putting in some other things.

I'll talk about that in a moment.

And then prayer meetings.

We're moving our deacons prayer meeting to 8:45 on Sunday mornings.

We used to have the deacons prayer meeting at 8:30.

And when Covid happened, we switched it the prayer meeting to happen between Sunday school and church.

And it's really just.

Just not enough time.

And because again, I talk too much.

And so we're going to move that back to 8:45 with our deacons, but also including our pastoral staff.

And so just pray for us as we pray for y'.

All.

And it's important that we take time.

Especially that prayer meeting is meant primarily to pray for the service on Sunday mornings.

And I hope that you are doing so in your home.

And then worshiping together, the corporate worship again, we're learning some more new hymns and we sang that new hymn this morning that we've been singing for a couple years.

Man, I love that the blood of Jesus speaks for me.

And there's other again, God hasn't stopped inspiring music, especially hymns.

And there are some new hymns.

And here's what I told somebody that again, there's new music coming out.

80% of it's just terrible.

And you got to find the 20% that actually is good.

By the way, that's in Southern gospel now too.

And it's crazy the way that Christian music has gone.

You got to be selective in what you're listening to.

Be careful what you're listening to.

And so again, singing out loud encourage you.

You're supposed to be singing to the audience of one.

And we as a church ought to be singing out loud.

Visitors come in and sit around.

You teenagers need to sing louder.

I came over there, I. I actually can sing louder than every.

All the teenagers together.

I was doing it this morning and I had a family look over at me like I was weird.

I just told that family, I said, I just have a big mouth.

So anyway, but encourage it.

Sing out.

Sing out.

An audience of one.

Singing to the Lord and singing out.

I appreciate again, our adult choir.

You have a voice you ought to be singing.

We'll talk about that next Sunday night in our ministry involvement night, but kids choir or youth choir.

It's an amazing thing.

So again, worshiping the Lord together is such an important part of our Christian life.

Amen.

Not only loving God in our private devotional time and taking that time, but also collectively, corporately together as a church family and then growing together the adult Sunday school classes.

Reminding you that our theme for our adult classes for all the Sunday school is reach, teach and keep.

The Sunday school was always meant to Be evangelistic.

It was meant to reach people.

To reach people.

And I remind our teachers all the time that you think you're only there to teach, and that's not the case.

You're there to reach, teach and keep.

To help people to continue and be a part of a smaller community, a small group connected to their age group.

Primarily, though some of you like to just used to love being with another group, which is fine.

You're an adult.

You can go to any Sunday school class that you want.

Adult Sunday school class.

You want going to a kid's class, it might be a problem.

We had to do a background check on you.

And so being a part of those things again, fellowships are important.

And I know our classes have did a better job of that towards the end of the year and visiting and doing all those things.

Conferences this year, normal conferences.

I asked a few years ago about, hey, do we want to cut out a conference?

And I had a unanimous decision from everybody.

We don't want to.

We still.

We enjoy the conferences and the revival meetings.

And a lot of churches have done away with them and I don't want to do away with them either.

And I know it's hard to get here on a Monday night and Tuesday night.

And you guys do such a wonderful job of showing up.

Thank you.

Commend you for that.

And so our stewardship conference this year will be with Brother Wetherby and a retired pastor.

Love him.

He has the most melodious voice.

Melodious voice.

And he'd be singing for us and preaching to us.

And then Monday night and Tuesday night, we are still going to continue our suppers that we have.

Some of y' all call that dinner but supper.

And so you'll sign up for one of the nights, Monday or Tuesday night.

So it's the same sermon each night.

Brother Weatherby will speak and preach a little more than normal like we did last year.

And then I'll just have 10 or 15 minutes to talk to you about campus development and where we're headed in that area.

I do want to continue to do that.

I think it's important.

Love to show you the final layout of the new building.

Some of y' all haven't seen that.

And so we'll be presenting that to you.

Let you see that.

And as we go forward.

So stewardship conference and then Bible conference with Brother Stewart and then revival meeting this year is with Dave McCracken, one of our favorites and I think our church's favorite probably of all the people we have in.

And then Our missions conference this year is.

Yes, it's on the dealer.

It's Folger, Kevin Folger.

And so.

And y' all liked him, if you may not remember him.

But you guys, again, I think he was Yalls favorite mission speaker as well.

And so we look forward to brother Folger being with us for that family conference coming up again with brother Dan Knickerbocker this year.

And he'll be preaching on that Sunday, which is the second Sunday in February.

And then couples retreat again and men and boys camp out.

We did that last year.

We're going to give the men and boys camp out a little longer this time where if you want to come on Thursday, it'll be available on Thursday or you could come early on Friday.

So some of us will go out on Thursday.

So you can kind of have an open invitation to come earlier if you want.

A lot of you wanted that option.

So we're going to offer that option this year.

And we had a great time out there in East Texas.

And then the men and women's of heritage, I just want to encourage you to get back involved.

If you haven't come to one in a while, jump in some of your new people.

Just jump in, be a part of that.

And the men's advance vacation Bible School Ladies conference will be a Ladies conference this year.

Discipleship on Wednesday nights.

Brother Cox handles that.

I'm just talking about again, Growing Together.

Master clubs, the Heritage Bible Institute and all the things that we do to try and do our very best to learn more about Jesus.

Amen.

Amen.

Y' all help me out.

I'll just sit here and talk forever.

Soul Winning Kickoff.

Serving others.

So now we're on the third purpose.

Serving others again.

Loving God.

Growing together.

Serving others.

Soul winning Kickoff this year will be March 10th and September 12th.

And it's about a 10 week time period where we really concentrate on our community.

Do door hangers and promoting Anniversary Sunday, Easter Sunday and then the fall promoting the Fall Fest and Friend Day.

So we look forward to that.

And then again, New move ins and I had them raise their hands this morning.

Who all was a part and who got here the first time from New move ins.

I'll never forget.

And they haven't been able to come in a while and I went by and got to see them here recently is the Gibsons.

And so in speaking with them I'm reminded that they came the very first time because they got egged.

Their house got egged years ago for Easter we put advertisements in a Plastic egg.

And we put them on the porches of every house instead of doing door hangers.

And they came for the very first time because of an egg.

Their house got egged.

And so.

And that's the case again, just many hooks in the water to reach our community, whether it's the Spring Fling or VBS Fall Fest.

And again we'll look again at the option of doing Wallfield Bethlehem this year and community events again, Fourth of July events with the city of Haslett, National Night Out, Christmas in the park and all those things help to again fish for men.

We're fishing, we're just fishing.

We're putting as many hooks in the water as we can and then we're serving our community by the road cleanup.

And I appreciate some of you signed up this morning and being a part of this little two mile stretch here of taking care and picking up trash.

Don't take very long, especially if we more people we can get the merrier, right?

Somebody brought us a bunch of these little claw thingies where you don't have to bend down.

They brought a whole stack of them.

And so if you don't, if you want to take the little claw thingy, I wish they had the little dinosaur heads on them though.

I think that would be cool.

But they don't.

They're just a regular pickup thing.

So didn't have to bend down to pick up the trash.

And so that'll be this Saturday.

But just things like that.

I know some of you don't know, but we do also do Meals on Wheels here and we don't have right now any church members who are, who have volunteered for that, but maybe that is an area you would like to volunteer in.

It's not necessarily again, connected to the church, but they meet here, they, they coordinate from here and they use our coffee shop to do that.

It is an opportunity if you would like to volunteer for something like that.

And then now the Mid Cities Women's Clinic.

So the Women's clinic here in Haslett, some of you have already volunteering, some of you volunteered but wanted to wait till they got out here.

They're here now, building's up and running.

So I encourage you to reach out to Ms. Rachel James.

Ms. Rachel James, raise your hand, reach out to Ms. Rachel James.

Reach out to whomever if you would like to be a part of that and encourage you to do that.

I appreciate those who are helping already in the women's clinic here in town.

It's a great ministry and they're doing a fine job so those are areas in our community that we can help in the projects going forward, of course is the bridge building.

And we'll talk more about this at the yearly administrative meeting here in a couple of weeks.

But the bridge building, we're so close.

We got the second driveway in.

All the parking in the dirt, work's done.

So it's a matter of just getting the permit.

And we're this close to getting the, the site plan to pnz.

Site plan has to go to PNC and then it had to go to city council.

So we're, we're a month away because it'll take at least a month to get all that done.

And so maybe four to six weeks.

I'm praying and hoping.

But the loan has been approved and that will be funded sometime this month.

And so we can go ahead and order the steel.

The steel takes a long time for that to get in.

There'll be some things we can do to expedite and get this building up.

I'm praying and hoping we're in it by sometime the end of the year.

I really do.

I think it is doable.

You pray about it.

Not saying that's going to happen, but we pray about it and we'll work towards that.

It's going to be a beautiful building.

It's going to be a great, great tool to use to reach our community.

And we got playgrounds going in, new playgrounds going to be on this side for ages.

You know, the four and down, five and down.

We've had some kids hurt on this bigger one because that's really not made for the little bitty, itty bitty ones.

And there's going to be a big playground over here for the, for the daycare and it will be undercover.

And we're gonna, we plan on covering this one too at the same time.

So this one will be covered.

And then this big dirt area.

We have finally come to the conclusion what we were gonna do there.

We're just gonna put artificial grass down or do something like that.

But then it just, it just dawned on us and it's gonna be covered.

We are gonna do a half court basketball there.

So we're gonna put cement there.

But some of you who like the other sport that I will not name, pickleball, it will be a pickleball court.

It will be set up for a pickleball court and it will also be half basketball court.

So if you come here, you can play half court basketball.

You don't have a key to get in the gym.

I'm Just kidding.

You can call us, by the way, but the pickleball.

And again, it'll have a cover.

And our plan is, at this point, a cover with lights on this side.

This side may not have lights under the COVID Everybody, everybody listen closely.

What I'm trying to.

What I'm saying, so I don't want somebody to say something.

I'm not saying the new playground will have a cover over it.

It's going to be awesome.

But it probably won't have lights under the COVID This cover.

We hope to put lights under the COVID So literally, you could flip the lights on and you could play basketball at night.

That's the undercover.

Under.

Under.

You know, you could potentially play it in the rain.

I don't know if you want to or not, or when it's snowing or something.

I spent more time on that pickleball court.

I will move on.

It costs as much.

I'm telling you to do what we're talking about doing now as it does to do the other.

So the cement guy's like, well, won't we just do this?

It's within a few hundred dollars of the other, so why wouldn't we?

Anyway?

Okay, because some of you are going to go, well, preacher, that's a lot of money.

Well, the other way is a lot of money, too.

And I think the church as a whole will get a lot more out of it.

The basketball and pickleball.

How many y'?

All?

No vote.

No vote.

We're not going to start voting on color carpet and stuff like that.

We're not going there.

And then there's some refreshing needs to be done in the activity center.

I know some of y' all pointed that out, and there is some refreshing there that needs to be done.

And so this summer we'll do some work on staircases and just some other things over there that did not get hit during the refresh when we did this building.

Some lighting.

We have started the new lighting in the gym itself, if you haven't noticed.

So it looks really good and, boy, it brightened it up.

And so we lack a few more lights on the other side.

And so all that'll get done this year.

Some restroom issues there also.

We'll work on those things.

So in conclusion, I got six minutes.

Every member ought to be a minister.

We ought to serve one another.

Amen.

Working together, the pastoral staff's goal is to recruit you to volunteer.

I think the success of any staff member is how many volunteers are following you.

It really is.

I appreciate those of you who do volunteer and do help, most of you do.

A staff run church is a staff ruined church.

By that I mean does not mean that the staff doesn't head it up, whatever activity it is.

But again, if there's not people working under him, church members involved, then we haven't done our job.

We need to be a good steward of the community.

By the way, we're in a growing community.

It's amazing.

It's amazing how this community is growing and we need to be a good steward of that.

Jesus came to seek and to say that was just lost and we ought to follow in his steps.

By the way, those are big shoes to fill.

Remember one of your kids or whatever when they were little, trying to put your shoes on just doesn't work, does it?

We cannot follow in the footsteps of Jesus in the flesh on our own.

As I said this morning, you cannot abide in the vine.

You can't live in the rest.

R E S T. You cannot live in that abundant life without the power, strength and grace of the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

The Christian life is impossible without the grace of God.

Amen.

All right, we'll take a few minutes here.

If.