Category Church

May 2 2007

God, the Gulf Coast, and you…


roycetina.jpg Last Wednesday my wife Carol and I drove to Bayou La Batre, Alabama to join others in working for the kingdom. Several folks from the Cox Blvd church in Sheffield, Alabama, 2 couples from Sumerset church in Ohio, and others handed out flyers, knocked on doors and shared the gospel with about 60 people. Of those, 19 responded in faith to Christ and were baptised. Then yesterday, two more were baptised. Russ Blackwell from Cox Blvd and Don Hudson from Tenn. were the leaders in the evangelistic effort. We met many wonderful people and loved the fellowship.

We visited New Orleans on Thursday and there visited with two brothers who are doing great works of service, laying the ground work for a harvest in East New Orleans. God has done amazing things all along the Gulf Coast but more is yet to be done.

Wed through Saturday nights we had services withe the BLB congregation. My dear friend John McCord, minister from El Campo church spoke on Wed, the minister from Cox Blvd spoke on Thursday, the minister from nearby Creekwood church spoke on Friday, and I spoke on Saturday. It was a blessed event and much good was accomplished.

The infant church in Bayou La Batre has been faithfully serving in the face of many obstacles and they continue to work night and day serving through the Bayou Recovery Project and the church. Many of those who became Christians last week were people who had been loved by this little group for many months, one plants, one waters, but God gives the increase.

In the next several hours the congregation will have a building under contract and they need help making the many repairs and at least $80k to pay for it. I have confidence God will provide. They will be assisted this summer by the Hilltop Relief and Rescue group who will set up a work camp in mid June. Many other groups have committed to come and help as well. Our congregation, Whites Ferry Road, West Monroe, La, has had a strong presence since the outset and plan to continue. We have repaired, cooked, cleaned up, preached, prayed, taught, and gladly loved this wonderful group of believers in Jesus.

I was delighted to be asked to baptise one of the converts. The picture is the site every day on the main street where passing motorists witnessed people being baptised. What a thrilling thing!

Congregations and individuals all across the country are helping in this needy area. Why don’t you consider helping too? If you have questions, call the church office and ask for Carol with WFR Relief or contact me through the blog and we will provide any information  you request. There are many needs all across the hard hit areas of the coast but this one has stolen our hearts and I felt I must share the need and the harvest with you.

Grace to you,
Royce

Feb 5 2007

Evangelize or Die


This morning I watched the TV broadcast, “In Search of the Lord’s Way”. This program has long been hosted my Mack Lyon who is also usually the preacher on the program. This day however, there was a guest speaker, a minister from Brentwood, Tenn. He was just exactly like a younger Mack Lyon, with the same delivery, the same awkward turns every few moments to face the different cameras, and the exact same message. The congregation sang the songs a cappella looking only at their songbooks, with solemn faces and not a hint of joy or happiness. If I knew my church helped pay to keep this program on air I would be disappointed. What struck me most was the age of the congregation. It appeared that at least 85 to 90% had hair like my own, gray. These dear folks were largely “Baby Boomers” who in 15 or 20 years will be dead or in a nursing home. My shock was to realize how few young people are in most of the traditional churches. I can view that broadcast and understand why the young couples with children are someplace else. It is bland, boring, and poorly done. 

It seems to me that if something doesn’t change in the next few years that many of our oldest churches will be down to a few members when most of the boomers are gone. The lost are not being won where the church is mostly older people who have been in the church for several decades, and their children and everyone else’s children are some place else on Sunday. My guess is that they have moved on to churches with some signs of life, where folks seem glad to be saved. 

 Aggressive evangelistic outreach is the cure to most of the problems churches face. When we fail to do what Christ commanded, and the apostles modeled, we tend to start slowly eroding away. Not many years ago the British Isles were a hot bed for the gospel with thousands being saved in meetings that lasted for several weeks or months. Today a Bible preaching church in that part of the world is rare. 

We must evangelize or our congregations will die.

Grace and Peace,Royce Ogle