Reminder: Bring In Food This Sunday

This Sunday is the last Sunday to bring in your non-perishable food for the local food banks.

Enjoy Life

Preacher Ramblings

You know as I preached last Sunday about being ready for the end no matter if it be Jesus’ return or death I could not stop thinking of how blessed I am. Of course I want to live a few more years for my wife and kids sake but if God chose to take me home tomorrow I would have had a great and blessed life. I am blessed with a wonderful wife that I love and two awesome kids the make me smile a lot. I get to live out any preacher’s dream of ministering in a church that is blessed by God and is growing in every way. God is good. I try to remember that during life’s hard times.

King's Kids & Their New (Temporary) Space

The kids moved into their new, but temporary, space. They will stay here until construction is finished on the permanent Children's Ministry area.

Photos by Glenda.

A Picture Of A Monkey

36 Years Ago Today

Roe v. Wade was decided 36 years ago today.

This is a note my friend Jared posted on his Facebook page. I don't think he would mind a reprint of it here.

Millions murdered each year.

We've got to get rid of the false dichotomy that you can either work on a grassroots level to bring kingdom healing to the social ills that give rise to abortion or you can work politically, legally to overturn Roe v. Wade.

Who says we can't do both?

If slavery were still legal, would you settle for false dichotomies? Thank God the abolitionist movement did not.
Would you agree we shouldn't make slavery illegal but just work on hearts and minds? Is that what you would say to an African who asked why it was okay for someone else to legally own him and force servitude from him? Would you tell him we can't legislate morality, to just sit tight while you work on changing hearts?

Abortion is the civil rights crisis of the 21st century and the new holocaust all rolled into one. We should do what we can -- lovingly and peacefully, but persistently and stubbornly and militantly -- to turn the tide. We're talking babies, here.

John Piper:
"Abortion remains a moral issue of such huge consequence that, I believe, our grandchildren will look back in a hundred years and condemn us. Me, they'll condemn me. 'Why didn't you do more?' Just like we look back now on all the complicit involvement with slavery.
We think we're doing the best we can, but we're probably not. We are so incapable of mounting a full-blown conscientious resistance to the greatest evil in our culture, that all of our strategizing to do political, educational, and crisis pregnancy things will all look inadequate a hundred years from now. They'll just say, 'You were killing babies!'"

Candy at the Inauguration

CCJ's own Candy Neal was at the inauguration yesterday. I'll give her blog one more promo today. (Darrel's brother Jarrod, mother Judy and niece Kiersten were also at the big event).

The blog has some great/very close shots from where she was sitting, be sure to check it out. Very few people had the view she did.

Also, as a shameless plug, pick up today's (Wednesday) Herald for some personal reflections from Candy and a whole lot more on the event.


1 Timothy 2:1–3: “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior.”

Inauguration

Inauguration Day is almost here. No matter what you think of the incoming or outgoing president, it's cool to be able to see a peaceful transfer of power.

Candy Neal, a co-worker of mine (and fellow member of CCJ) is headed to the inauguration with press pass in hand. You can follow her adventure here.

Note: Candy is also traveling with Darrel's mom, brother and niece.

Help Wanted: WINGS Meal Ministry

CCJ’s WINGS group (Women in God's Service) sponsors a meal ministry that provides people with meals after the birth of a child, a surgery, funerals or other special occasions where this service would be appreciated.

WINGS would be pleased to hear from anyone who would be interested in helping with this ministry. On January 18 and 25, you will have the opportunity to fill out a form if you would like to help.

Completed forms can be placed in the basket at the welcome desk within the next few weeks. Someone from WINGS will contact you as soon as they process all of the information.

If you have any questions you may contact Hillory Werner at 481-2827 or Paula Muller at 367-1735.


(NOTE: We are now using the blog for volunteer needs. If you'd like to find other areas of service, click on the label below "Help Wanted" or contact the CCJ office - 481-2410 - to get plugged in to a ministry.)

Tim Tebow & Biblical Illiteracy

Tim Tebow, above, quarterback for the University of Florida Gators football team, played in the national championship game last week with eye-black on his face. The eye-black had "John" on one strip and "3:16" on another.

There, of course, is all manner of debate over this move from whether or not he should be proselytizing in a football game to 'whatever happened to the rainbow man?' I ran across this article today though that takes on a different controversy, biblical illiteracy.

Biblical Literacy Reaches New Low: Why "John 3:16" being the top Google search isn't something to celebrate.

It seems that the morning after the game, the number on search on Google was "John 3:16." What exactly does that mean for biblical literacy in the world?

The author says this:

So what does it mean? We've talked about biblical illiteracy before. Entire books have been written about it, all for the sake of new ministry methodology and even a new homiletic. But I suspect most methodologies and theories still had a working presupposition—whether they would admit or not—that there was a line of understanding and knowledge that most people had already crossed—one that thought, Well, they don't know the complexity of soteriology and ecclesiology and pneumatology, but they probably know Noah and Moses and of course, Jesus. And surely they at least know Genesis 1–3 and Psalm 23 and John 3:16. But the line has moved. Again. And that's something to consider on this Friday, January 9, 2009, the day John 3:16 was the top search item at 8:00am.

Music: 'Image of the Invisible'

Once again, thought I'd post a song for you guys.

Since this is an original song and unavailable for you to learn on your own, I thought I'd post a soundboard recording of the song from services today so that readers of the blog could be familiar with the song when we sing it again. Keep in mind, this is not the highest quality but simply something for you to learn the song by.

Get the mp3 "Image of the Invisible".


Below are the lyrics:

1:
By Him everything was made
Things in heaven and on earth
He is the One who saves
He is the last and the first.

Pre-Chorus:
Every creature proclaims
All of heaven does sing
Every creature proclaims
All of heaven does sing

Chorus:
Jesus is King over all
Image of the invisible God
Jesus is King over all
Image of the invisible God

2:
Making peace through His blood
Shed for us on the cross
Free of blemish, free of stain
No longer foes or fatherless

Help Wanted: Child Care

We are again in need of people to help out in the nursery for Sunday nights (6 to 7:30 p.m.) and Tuesday mornings (9:30 to 11 a.m.), if you are interested, please call the church office (481-2410) or e-mail Charlotte (charlotte@ccjasper.com).

Thank you.

(NOTE: We will begin utilizing the blog for volunteer needs)

By The Numbers 2008

Some statistics from 2008 (for those of you who enjoy examining some things):

31,425: Number of visits to ccjasper.com in 2008
19,483: Visits to this blog in 2008.
9,077: Number of unique visitors to ccjasper.com in 2008.
1,892: Number of ccjasper.com pages loaded in Spain in 2008.
1,605: Number of times the 04-20-08 sermon, "Be Certain" was hit (not necessarily fully downloaded, but hit. The most for a sermon in 2008).
1,206: Highest number of unique visitors in a single month in 2008 (November)
965: Number of CDs sold or given away for Narrow Path's "Far As The Curse Is Found" in 2008. A huge success, in my mind.
869: Number of times the "How Deep The Father's Love For Us" video has been hit in 2008 (the most viewed video).
683: Number of times people linked to ccjasper.com from this site (I don't have ANY idea what this site is, BTW. it is a foreign site, obviously: http://202.108.23.172/index.html) Anyway, this is the highest referring page.
662: Number of ccjasper.com pages loaded in South Korea in 2008.
587: Number of ccjasper.com pages loaded in China in 2008.
437: Number of times the song "God's Gonna Cut Your Down" was hit in 2008 (most hit music file on the site).
306: Number of times blog tribute to Dr. Phil Dawkins was viewed as a single page (meaning not as a part of the overall blog. This was the most viewed blog post of the year).
3: Number of ccjasper.com pages loaded in Iran in 2008.

Searches that led to ccjasper.com:
"christian church of jasper": 526
"jasper christian church": 184
"ccjasper": 105
"pandora sphinx moth": 39 (Glenda, do you remember this post?) :-)
"dr. phil dawkins": 33

Other interesting search terms:
"spider monkey": 10
"roadies needed": 3
"god sandwich": 3
"what does far as the curse is found mean?": 2
"job description for church drummers": 1
"why does dubois county have the highest gas prices?": 1

Other Search Notes:
- There were a TREMENDOUS amount of searches done on Dr. Dawkins (with varying search terms) that led to the church site.
- There are also a large number of people who search for CCJ attenders by name and end up on the ccjasper.com site (i.e. someone gets to the church site by doing a Google search for 'kevin chastain' for instance). So, we all might want to be mindful of how we live. ;-)
- I don't have high or average attendance numbers or any such thing. Maybe those with access to those could add them in the comments.

UPDATE 09JAN2009: Here some attendance averages and numbers for 2008.
Monthly Averages
Jan.: 518
Feb.: 510
March: 531
April: 525
May: 556
June: 565
July: 530
Aug.: 533
Sept.: 556
Oct.: 531
Nov.: 601
Dec.: 591
Average Attendance for 2008: 546
High Attendance Times 2008
June 22: 640
Carnival on June 8: 1,000+

These numbers are simply because I'm a geek and are in no way an attempt to say numbers are the most important thing in the body of a church.

Music: 'We Are Called'

We have written a few songs for the CCJ congregation and I thought I'd start something new on the blog since one of the goals of congregational singing is for everyone to, you know, sing along with the band..

The new song we introduced today ("We Are Called") was written for you, the CCJ congregation, to go along with our study of I Peter (the main theme of the lyrics is from I Peter 2).

Since this is an original song and unavailable for you to learn on your own, I thought I'd post a soundboard recording of the song from services today so that readers of the blog could be familiar with the song when we sing it again. Keep in mind, this is not the highest quality but simply something for you to learn the song by.

Get the mp3 "We Are Called".


Below are the lyrics:

1:
Ransomed by blood
from futile ways
By the one the wind and seas obey
With sober minds and the
hope of grace
Let us turn our hearts to His face

Chorus:
A chosen people, we are called
A holy nation, we are called
A people belonging to God
We sing the praise of
The only One who saves us
By His mercy we are called

2:
We do not fear what they fear
Though trials will come, He is near
When suffering comes we won't
be ashamed
But through the blood
we bear His name


Bridge:
And to the God of grace
To Him be the glory forever

New

Happy New Year, everyone!

I'm not a big New Year's resolutions kind of guy but I do like the feeling of getting to start all over again. So, I'm not going to make any major pronouncements of what I'm going to do or try to do in 2009. I am thankful for what I have and there will always be things in my life that I need to change. Most of all, I am thankful for the grace of God given to me each new moment of my days.