Church Requel Blog - Writings of Mark Pierce

This Week at CR: Godficiency

Good morning Church Requel!

Wedding bells are ringing at the Pierce household as we are now just one day away from giving our daughter away in marriage. Jessica and Dave are planning to exchange their vows tomorrow afternoon.  Those of you who have attended
Church Requel for awhile will recognize Jessica in this photo on the left.  However, as I walk her down the aisle, the photo on the right gives you an idea of who I will be remembering. As every father who has ever walked his daughter to the altar can attest: 'How did she grow up so fast?' I am so thrilled for both Dave and Jess.  After a recent pre-marriage counseling session with my good friend, Pastor Tony Pingitore, Dave told me this: "If it's possible, I'm even more excited about our marriage now!"

Todd Pierce at Church Requel - We will have an outstanding worship experience at Church Requel this Sunday morning.  Since I knew I might be slightly distracted this week, long ago I asked my  

Mark's brother Todd

brother, Todd, to step into the CR pulpit Sunday morning. The photo on the left is one of my favorites of Todd on a mission trip to Central America. Todd is now retired from the ministry, but he was a pastor for 28 years. Todd was also a church planter. In fact, I received my inspiration to start Church Requel by watching Todd in action. We often attended church planting conferences together. I remember thinking, 'Some day I'd love to be able to do this!' Be careful what you wish for! Seriously - I believe that 15 years ago God began working in my life and preparing my heart to become a pastor of a new church.  We can all be thankful of Todd's influence in my life.

Godficiency Sunday Morning - Wednesday I got my first peek at Todd's sermon for Sunday. It's a good one folks! He even made up a new word just for us: "Godficiency." You'll have to come Sunday to hear all about it. We will consider Jesus' prayers of thanksgiving and 3 false illusions that he exposes in our lives. Knowing Todd like I do, there will probably be at least one embarrassing 'brother' story peppered in as well. 

Even More On Sunday! Sunday's 11am service will be awesome on so many levels. Cindy and Sharma will sing with me on the praise team. Pastor Steve has prepared a special "magic key" children's sermon. And my youngest daughter, Jillian, and her husband, Tim - both in town for the wedding weekend - have agreed to sing a special song called, "Nothing Is Wasted." (Do you want to get ready for an incredible worship experience? Watch this music video of "Nothing Is Wasted" by Elevation Worship.) We will also share communion and pray together.

Stressbusters - New Sermon Series This Summer at CR

This summer at Church Requel, we’re going to look at our seven greatest sources of stress. They are all found in Psalm 23. The antidotes are also found in Psalm 23, the most beloved psalm of the Bible. It tells us what God is really like. The more we understand God, the easier it will be for us to trust Him!

May 26th - God’s Antidote to Worry. Worry is unhelpful, unreasonable and unhealthy. The antidote is to believe God will take care of me. God is the Shepherd who provides, protects, guides and corrects. We’ll learn 3 ways to make God the good Shepherd of our lives.

June 2nd - God’s Antidote to Busyness. Are you always in a hurry? Is your “To Do” list always unrealistically long? God is interested in your rest and relaxation. He wants you to live a whole, balanced and complete life. We’ll learn the prescription for pressured people - to R.E.L.A.X.

June 9th - God’s Antidote to Damaged Emotions. We all need to have our souls restored sometimes. We get hurt. Life’s tough. God wants to take out our emotional garbage. He wants to restore our souls. How? We’ll learn to make 3 changes about our guilt, grief and grudges.

June 16th - God’s Antidote to Indecision. Life is a series of choices. Success is a matter of making wise decisions. We make decisions and then our decisions make us! How do we know God’s will? We’ll learn 4 things we must do to let God guide us in the right path.

June 23rd - God’s Antidote for Dark Valleys. All sunshine and no rain makes a desert. It’s the dark valleys of our lives that give us depth and maturity. Even in our darkest days, God is there. We’ll learn 5 facts about the dark valleys and then what to do when we’re in those valleys.

June 30th - God’s Antidote to Your Hurt. Relationships are our greatest blessing and joy, but also the greatest source of stress in our lives. How should we respond when we are hurt by someone we love? We’ll learn what not to do, and then how God overflows us with healing.

July 7th - God’s Antidote to Fearing the Future. Do you never enjoy today because you don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow? We’ll learn to gain the confidence that God is watching over us, that His grace is working in us, and that Heaven is waiting for us.

#057: Wedding Week [Podcast]

We are in high wedding mode this week at the Pierce household. I invite my daughters Jessica and Jennifer to share a little bit about this week's plans. Also, we added two new people to our leadership team at Church Requel this week. I talk about that decision. Finally, we include last week's Mother's Day sermon, "6 Characterstics of a Mother's Faith."

Click to Listen!

Podcast: Subscribe in iTunes | Play or Download in new window.

Music for this week's podcast is "Get Me To The Church On  Time" by Nat King Cole.

6 Characteristics of a Mom's Faith [Sermon Notes]

Every week I publish my sermon notes so that you may read them for yourselves.  For my parishioners, this could be a good review from the weekend before.  And it gives you a chance to see what I intended to say!  For other pastors and ministers, feel free to borrow and use any of this material.  I'd love for God to be glorified by you incorporating these notes into your own worship.

A Mother’s Faith - 05.12.13

Scripture: 2 Timothy 1:5-7 / Video: In Her Steps [1:40]

Challenge of Mothers Day - for some of us, it’s a great day of celebration. Great moms. New moms. Most kids (grandkids) moms. Longest moms. But for others, Mother’s Day brings sorrows. Lost moms. Almost moms. Wish they could be moms. Not good moms.

Illustration: conversation with woman who couldn’t have children. “Lots of different kinds of moms.” Here’s the question we want to be asking today - Do you have influence over others? Greatest task of any mom - or of any person - is to possess a true Christian faith and instill into another person’s life (child or otherwise).

What does a mother’s faith look like? (Read 2 Tim. 1:5-7 / p. 832)

6 Characteristics of a Mother’s Faith:

1. A faith that is ___SINCERE___ .

“I have been reminded of your sincere faith.” 2 Timothy 1:5a

Sincere = ἀνυπόκριτος anupókritos  = “not hypocritical,” not an act, genuine. Where we get the word actor. A child watching Mom knows if the way she acts in public is the same as the way she acts in private. Sometimes we get “sincere” wrong... George Burns used to say, “Sincerity is everything. If you can fake that, you’ve got it made.” To pass the “sincere” faith test, we need to do 3 things:

1.  Make sure our faith is genuine. Need times of examination.
2.  Need to allow protege close enough to see the authentic me
3.  Accept my failures. Don’t hide my mistakes.

What always impressed me about my own mom’s faith, was not the perfection of her faith, but the direction of her faith. I knew that her prayers (along with her struggles) were genuine.

Transition: The best sermons are lived and not preached.

This Week at CR: Mother's Day!

Good Friday morning everyone!

Pastor Mark here with all your week's Church Requel news. Things have really been shaping up around here lately. You'll notice lots of cool changes when you come to church Sunday morning. (Like what else is new, right?)

Our new "Stressbusters" sign!

First off, when you cross the street from the parking lot, you'll notice our new sign promoting the summer sermon series, "Stressbusters." We've had these two sign boxes, one on the Marion Avenue side and another on the Park Avenue side, just sitting empty. From now on we will use these signs to promote what's going on at CR!

One cool story - as Steve and I was installing this sign a lady across the street yelled out to us that it was so nice seeing the church active again. Of course we invited her to attend Sunday! She said "I just might do that!" If nothing else our new sign attracted one newcomer!

Pastor Paul has been busy outside. You'll notice the front door has been painted what he calls a bright "Reformation Red!" Paul also has been busy with the new Veteran's Park outside our front door on the point where Marion meets P.A.W. We now have a new flagpole, where the Stars and Stripes will fly proudly high. Thanks, Paul, for being such a great partner with us!

Once again, Pastor Steve has put all of us to shame with his continuing efforts on our new tech booth. I took 3 pictures to share with you in this newsletter. The first picture shows the new steps installed up to the tech booth. Steve came up with a great idea to put a hinged floor on top of the steps. That way, once the tech team is up in the booth, they can close the floor down on top of the steps to give them a lot more space to work in. Brilliant!

Also while Steve was working on putting in the drywall to the tech booth this week, he came up with another great idea. 'Why not put a hole in one side of the tech booth?' he thought to himself. Do you have any idea why Steve thinks we should have a hole in the side of our tech booth? I won't tell you here. You'll have to guess by emailing me. I'll give out the answer in next week's newsletter. The first one to guess the right answer will win a $5 coupon to Dairy Queen! Let's have some fun!

Sunday is Mother's Day! It's not too late to be buying Mom a card and maybe a gift. You dads out there also need to be figuring out a nice Mother's Day gesture for your wife. I learned a long time ago not to fall back on the "It's the kid's job to honor Mom" defense. 

We plan to have an awesome Mother's Day worship service at Church Requel this Sunday. This will be our very first Mother's Day at the Point of Grace and we aim to make it special. In addition to some great singing (we picked all our mom's favorite songs), we have some cool videos along with a brand new sermon I've written about the six characteristics of a Mom's faith. I'm looking forward to celebrating with you Sunday morning.

In other news...

#056:This Is The Day [Podcast]

This is the only day we have so let's celebrate today. We can't change our yesterdays. We have no guarantee of tomorrow. Join me for this very special podcast as I remember my friend Michael, who died suddenly last month. In this talk we learn how to make the most of each and every day. At the beginning of the podcast, I bring you up to speed with all the great things happening at Church Requel. 

Music for this week's podcast is "Today Is The Day" by Lincoln Brewster.

Click to Listen!

Podcast: Subscribe in iTunes | Play or Download in new window.

"Today Is The Day" [Sermon Notes]

Every week I publish my sermon notes so that you may read them for yourselves.  For my parishioners, this could be a good review from the weekend before.  And it gives you a chance to see what I intended to say!  For other pastors and ministers, feel free to borrow and use any of this material.  I'd love for God to be glorified by you incorporating these notes into your own worship.

Today Is The Day - 05.05.13

Intro: Talk about my friend Michael, who died unexpectedly. I have been reminded anew of the truth of James:

 “Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, ‘If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that’.”  James 4:13-15 NIV (p. 852)

This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t make plans. It means that we always need to recognize that we are not in control of our own futures. Compared to the eternal God, our mortal life is like a mist. Like a fog.

Illustration - Tuesday morning fog before breakfast. Gone completely afterward. 

 1. ___TODAY___ is the only day I have.

I can’t change ___YESTERDAY___.

I have no guarantee of ___TOMORROW___.

May not be a new lesson, but one worth reminding myself of daily. Otherwise I squander the day and lose opportunity. Today is all we have. This is why the psalmist...

 “Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” Psalm 90:12 NIV (p. 413)

Illustration of $86,400 a day. What if each day you were given $86,400 to spend on anything you wanted. But anything you didn’t spend you lost. NO SAVINGS! NO BORROWING! How hard would you work to spend every last dime? This is what our lives are. Each day we have 86,400 seconds, no more, no less. We use them or we lose them.

The more we live in each moment, the more we become like God:

God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you’.” Exodus 3:14 NIV (p. 40)

Isn’t this fascinating, because if there is anyone Who has the power to change yesterday and Who has the guarantee of tomorrow, it the Almighty! Yet He more than anyone identifies Himself as the “I Am.” Always in this present moment - for all eternity!

So how do we make the most of this moment? How do we best live in today?