Christmas in Holly Springs

Everyone is invited to this very special evening of fellowship and worship. It all begins with Open House at 4:00 p.m. Why have an open house at FBCHS? Because there are many, even in the church family, who have not seen the work done in renovation. From the new children's rally room to the updated offices and including all the new paint and carpet throughout the main building. We want to put our best foot forward and allow people to see just a bit of the blessing we have received in this great facility.

There will be cookies and other goodies to share in the Fellowship Hall and at 5:00 p.m. we will begin a night of worship in the Worship Center. "Come and see the goodness of the Lord" is how we will begin this time of special Christmas selections as well as familiar carols and worship songs. Featuring our extraordinary Praise Band, Singers and Worship Choir, this night of worship will also feature soloists and lots of congregational singing.

You are welcome...and so is your neighbor. INVITE THEM and don't forget to mention Christmas Eve Family Worship @ 5pm on Christmas Eve. Carols, candlelight, baptism, and a special word from our Pastor.

I can't wait to see you for these special days.

The Impartial Power of God

I have been reading and studying in Hebrews lately. This entry from Oswald Chambers hit so very close to home...

By one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified —Hebrews 10:14

We trample the blood of the Son of God underfoot if we think we are forgiven because we are sorry for our sins. The only reason for the forgiveness of our sins by God, and the infinite depth of His promise to forget them, is the death of Jesus Christ. Our repentance is merely the result of our personal realization of the atonement by the Cross of Christ, which He has provided for us. ". . . Christ Jesus . . . became for us wisdom from God--and righteousness and sanctification and redemption . . ." ( 1 Corinthians 1:30 ). Once we realize that Christ has become all this for us, the limitless joy of God begins in us. And wherever the joy of God is not present, the death sentence is still in effect.

No matter who or what we are, God restores us to right standing with Himself only by means of the death of Jesus Christ. God does this, not because Jesus pleads with Him to do so but because He died. It cannot be earned, just accepted. All the pleading for salvation which deliberately ignores the Cross of Christ is useless. It is knocking at a door other than the one which Jesus has already opened. We protest by saying, "But I don’t want to come that way. It is too humiliating to be received as a sinner." God’s response, through Peter, is, ". . . there is no other name . . . by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12 ). What at first appears to be heartlessness on God’s part is actually the true expression of His heart. There is unlimited entrance His way. "In Him we have redemption through His blood . . ." ( Ephesians 1:7 ). To identify with the death of Jesus Christ means that we must die to everything that was never a part of Him.

God is just in saving bad people only as He makes them good. Our Lord does not pretend we are all right when we are all wrong. The atonement by the Cross of Christ is the propitiation God uses to make unholy people holy.

Stuff Christians Like...I Like this!

A friend of mine in Alpharetta has a website that has developed quite a following. In fact, it has led to a publishing deal with Zondervan that will bring his wit, wisdom and insight to store shelves in the Spring of 2010.

I read today's post and felt led to share it...God is weird...Prayer is weird...Faith is weird...read more: http://stuffchristianslike.net

Today's Oswald Chambers

"When it pleased God . . to reveal His Son in me." Galatians 1:15, 16

If Jesus Christ is to regenerate me, what is the problem He is up against? I have a heredity I had no say in; I am not holy, nor likely to be; and if all Jesus Christ can do is to tell me I must be holy, His teaching plants despair. But if Jesus Christ is a Regenerator, One Who can put into me His own heredity of holiness, then I begin to see what He is driving at when He says that I have to be holy. Redemption means that Jesus Christ can put into any man the hereditary disposition that was in Himself, and all the standards He gives are based on that disposition: His teaching is for the life He puts in. The moral transaction on my part is agreement with God's verdict on sin in the Cross of Jesus Christ.

The New Testament teaching about regeneration is that when a man is struck by a sense of need, God will put the Holy Spirit into his spirit, and his personal spirit will be energized by the Spirit of the Son of God, "until Christ be formed in you." The moral miracle of Redemption is that God can put into me a new disposition whereby I can live a totally new life. When I reach the frontier of need and know my limitations, Jesus says - "Blessed are you." But I have to get there. God cannot put into me, a responsible moral being, the disposition that was in Jesus Christ unless I am conscious I need it.

Just as the disposition of sin entered into the human race by one man, so the Holy Spirit entered the human race by another Man; and Redemption means that I can be delivered from the heredity of sin and through Jesus Christ can receive an unsullied heredity, viz., the Holy Spirit.