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Bishop Phil Whipple is preaching at tonight’s General Conference service in La Ceiba, Honduras. The service will be held at one of the local churches. He’s been having some stomach problems, so you might say a prayer that he’ll be just fine tonight.
Phyllis Cherry, wife of retired UB minister, Herb Cherry, passed away on Tuesday, January 5, 2010. Her funeral arrangements are as follows:
Visitation: Friday, January 8, 5-8 pm
Location: Chas. J. Burden & Son Funeral Home, 1806 E Michigan Ave, Jackson, MI 49202-3646 (517) 784-3104 www.dignitymemorial.com
Funeral: Saturday, January 9, 11 am. Visitation 10-11 am
Location: Eden UB Church, 1938 Eden Road, Mason, MI 48854 (517) 676-1376
Herb Cherry’s address is: 3913 Sage Court, Bloomington, IN 47401
Last Thursday, Dec. 3, Bishop Phil Whipple was a guest on the popular Mid-Morning show on WBCL, a Christian radio station in Fort Wayne, Ind. He was joined by two Huntington University graduate school professors, Mike Cook and Jerry Davis, along with another Fort Wayne pastor. The topic: “Healthy Church, Healthy Pastor.”
We received word that Thelma Sommers, wife of Pastor Walter Sommers, passed away on November 9, 2009.
A group of six persons from Mount Pleasant UB (Chambersburg, Pa.) will fly to Mexico tomorrow, December 9. Youth pastor Bobby Culler, his wife, and four other persons will meet up with Bishop Denis Casco of the Mexico National Conference. They are looking for a UB church with which to partner. Mount Pleasant has partnered with one UB church in Mexico for the past five years, but has released those reigns and are looking for a different church.
Rick Warren got into the Twitter game a couple months ago, and I’ve been following him. His tweets are some of the more interesting and redeeming ones. Lots of fluff and nonsense out there, but Warren sends out very useful and sometimes provocative tidbits.
Last week, Warren sent out this tweet:
Finding time to read the great spiritual classics is no mystery. Turn off the TV. Nothing on TV today will matter in 10 years.
Then, to drive home the point, he sent this tweet:
“A wise person is hungry for truth, while the fool feeds on trash.” Proverbs 15:14 (NLT)
All I can say is: touche.
At Anchor Community Church, we’re always on the prowl for new worship songs. Most new songs we learn from Christian radio. When we attend Christian events, we’re not particularly interested in hearing songs we already know. We want to hear new stuff. It’s disappointing to leave an event having heard the same ol’ songs.
We brought back two songs from last summer’s US National Conference, which we’ve incorporated into our repertoire: “Revelation Song” and “Let Me Sing.” Thanks, Mainstreet worship team!
A Willow Creek conference taught us “Lord I Will.” A Promise Keepers convention provided “I Am Free,” “Strong Tower,” and “How Great is Our God.” MinistryCOM introduced me to “Yes You Have” and Michael Neale’s “More and More.” All of these are now regular songs at Anchor, songs our people enjoy. The latest batch of “possibles” includes two songs I heard at this year’s MinistryCOM.
I’m no music expert. I’ve been playing on worship teams for 20 years, but I’m still basically a keyboard hacker with a rock-and-roll bent. But I see a lot of wonderful music being written today, music that connects with me and with our congregation.
And it’s not necessarily fluff or repetitive (as too many people stereotype contemporary Christian music). We’re talking songs with multiple verses, plus a bridge (which you don’t find in hymns). Songs that, if written in another era, would have been included in a hymnal and revered today.
Too many churches still fight music wars, with parishioners who have sung the exact same hymns for 60 years resisting the introduction of any new music. That always makes me sad…and very grateful for the wide-open attitude at Anchor.
Bishop Phil and Sandy Whipple left today on a 12-day trip that will take them to churches in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York. The trip includes a consultation weekend at Bethel Temple of Praise in Yonkers, N.Y. It culminates with the Mid-Atlantic Pastoral Resource Day November 8-9 at Rhodes Grove Camp (Chambersburg, Pa.). Bishop Whipple will speak during the opening service on Sunday night, November 8, and lead devotions the next day.
Mattru Hospital in Sierra Leone is undergoing a renovation, which is expected to be completed in October. Funds are being provided by the United Nations Population Fund, through the office of the First Lady of Sierra Leone, Mrs. Sia Nyama Koroma.
On a visit to the hospital, Mrs. Koroma lamented the poor conditions, and included Mattru Hospital in her vision to establish hospitals of excellence.
In a special service on October 3, the hospital was handed over to the contractor to be refurbished. Bishop Billy Simbo, who also chairs the hospital board, thanked the First Lady, and admonished the people of Mattru Jong to monitor the progress of the project and not engage in stealing building materials.
The mission that Jesus gave to us was quite clear and simple.
You have heard it before, but the beauty of it to me has never changed.
It was my privilege to attend a conference with about 55 denominational executives who are on the same page about the mission. We met September 14-16 in Nashville, where we:
The one thing that we did NOT talk about was changing the mission.
So I want to encourage each of you to stay focused on the mission Christ has placed before us. Let’s recognize the opportunities to push back the darkness and bring the light of Christ into a broken and hurting world. Let’s together assault the gates of hell.
