January 28, 2024, service. The congregation was welcomed by Pastor Bonnie Higgins at 9:30 a.m. to begin the service. The Invocation/Lord’s Prayer were recited. The hymns that were sung were “Since I Have Been Redeemed”, “Blessed Assurance”, and “Without Him”. The service ended with “Go Now in Peace”. Linda Lyman is the organist each week. Lew Lyman leads the music for the congregation each week.

The sermon, titled “Are You Ready to Change?” and scriptures from 2 Corinthians 5:17-21. Pastor Bonnie began by asking the question “How can I change my life for Christ?” Scriptures tell us the answer to that question. First, we must seek the truth. If we believe in lies, we will never change or grow in our faith. Secondly, if we make the decision to follow Jesus, we must be willing to change our lives and live for Him and not for this world. We must believe in the hope that the gospel of Jesus gives to each of us. Next, we should examine ourselves about the lifestyle we are living daily. Are we living to have hope, love, forgiveness, peace, encourage one another, and to be reconciled with God? Or are we still living in the world of division, condemnation, bitterness, and discouragement? When we don’t live according to God’s Word, we need to come clean and ask for forgiveness from God because Jesus provided all the atonement we need when He died on the Cross. We should be asking ourselves; how can I change to glorify God? We need to discover what God has for our lives and not what we want from our life.

God will always place opportunities in our lives to show Him and others our commitment to Him. To do that we need to choose our words and actions wisely; we need to think before we speak and only speak like Jesus would. We cannot give Satan an opportunity to lead us into a temptation that won’t glorify God.

We need to be willing to change. When we accepted Jesus as our personal Savior, we became a new person in Christ. What that means is that our old self is gone, and a new person has been born in Christ. Our old self-serving life is gone and our new life to live for Jesus and His Kingdom has begun. God has already started to change us when we became one of His children. Our past mistakes were cancelled, never more to be held against us. When Jesus said, “it is finished” He meant that everything is forgiven. Also, as we became children of God, God gave us the power to conquer our problems. It doesn’t mean they will go away, but He has given us a way to overcome them. Jesus overcame death, giving us the power to overcome anything in our life. Before becoming a child of God, we had nowhere to turn for help, but now, we can go to God and He will listen and help us go through it with Him. God is preparing us for our future with Him as we live in this world.

In Christ, we have a new start, a new beginning. God has given us a new direction, a new purpose for our lives. Living for Him. God wants us to watch where we are going and not just exist in this world, He has given us great opportunity to follow Him and to enhance the Kingdom of God. We need to spend our time wisely for Him and not for this world. There is trouble in our lives and God doesn’t want us to take our eyes off Him, He wants us to trust in Him going through this world. God has given His children a new outlook on our life, we should take advantage of it.

Announcements listed in the bulletin are that the congregation will be collecting canned carrots for the Food Pantry in February. Bible Study: Tuesday at 1 p.m.

You can email the church at nlbcmaine@gmail.com. Pastor Bonnie’s office hours are Tuesday’s from 9 a.m. to noon.

Copy the Story Link

Comments are not available on this story.