Church Essentials
May 22, 2016
Roger Paynter
Senior Pastor, First Baptist Church Decatur
Church Essentials: Growth
Acts: 10:1-35
“Then Peter began to speak to them: “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him."
Acts 10:34-35
Sermon Meditation
“Thank you for all we forget are gifts,
not rights.
Forgive us for all the grievances
we remember too well.
Save us from the self-pity,
the self-seeking,
which is true poverty.
Make us wide-eyed for beauty,
and for my neighbor's need and goodness;
Wide-hearted for love
and for the unloved,
who are the hardest to touch
and need it the most.
Dull the envy in me
which criticizes and complains life
into a thousand ugly bits.
Keep me honest and tender enough to heal,
tough enough to be healed of my hypocrisies.
Match my appetite for privilege
with the stomach for commitment."
~Adaptation of "Breathe into Me the Courage to Make Something New" by Ted Loder in Guerrillas of Grace”
May 29, 2016
Roger Paynter
Senior Pastor, First Baptist Church Decatur
Church Essentials: Community
Acts 4:32-37
“With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all."
Acts 4:33
Sermon Meditation
“Faith is like firewood. A single stick is hardly a fire. It takes a gathering of wood. Faith IS like firewood. It burns in the plural…the community of Christ.” - Robert Raines
June 5, 2016
Roger Paynter
Senior Pastor, First Baptist Church Decatur
Church Essentials: Call
Matthew 16:24-26
“Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?”
Matthew 16:24-26
Sermon Meditation
“A Call from God will almost always be something impossible to do under your own power if it is authentic. ‘Free my people, Israel’…that’s all God wanted Moses to do….just that!
As if that was the easiest thing in the whole world to do…” - Gordon Cosby
June 12, 2016
Roger Paynter
Senior Pastor, First Baptist Church Decatur
Church Essentials: Sight
Mark 10:46-52
“Then Jesus said to him, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ The blind man said to him, ‘My teacher, let me see again.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Go; your faith has made you well.’ Immediately he regained his sight and followed him on the way.”
Mark 10:51-52
Sermon Meditation
“Is it any surprise that the number one illness that Jesus healed (with leprosy being a distant second) ... is blindness?” - Barry Harvey