Lakeside Community Presbyterian Church

November is known as the month that we give thanks.

Every year in our nation we pause on Thanksgiving Day, gather around tables with family and friends to give thanks for what we have. Those gatherings may be times where we are thankful for the many blessings that we have experienced, or they may be times when the blessings have been few and far between, but in either case, we give thanks. As people of faith we know that God is with us in both good and difficult times but still we give thanks.

As this month unfolds, I want to say thanks to each of you who call LCPC their family of faith. Thank you for your generous gifts both large and small for they help sustain and move this ministry forward as we seek to be Christ’s light in our community and in our world. You have been faithful in so many ways, generously giving of your time, talent and treasures.

Thank you!

Over the past weeks, during our Sunday morning services, we have been studying and learning from the great prayers of the Old Testament observing and gleaning information on how to pray from heroes like Abraham, Moses, Hannah, David, Solomon and Hezekiah. One of the things that I have learned is that God wants to hear our prayers. His desire is to be in relationship with us and so He wants to hear from us. That conversation is prayer.

This Friday and Saturday, November 1 & 2, we as a church are having conversations with our God. We are going to pray to God about our family and friends, our community and our nation and our world and our church.

Our 24-Hour prayer Vigil starts on Friday at 9am and continues until 9am on Saturday. We are concluding our Vigil with a Prayer Breakfast at 9am followed by praying and putting together the Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes.

So, would you join us in prayer? Whether you signed-up or not, you can pray. A separate eBlast will give you the details on how you might pray at home but let’s together pray to our sovereign God, whose love overflows to us as we humbly come to Him.

Love God, Love People, Make Disciples of Jesus

That is our mission here at LCPC. It is pretty simple. Not very complex and it comes from what Jesus wanted us to do. He wanted us to love God with all of our heart, soul and mind. He also wanted us to love people around us and help to make them disciples.

Sometimes the loving of other people means that we are loving people that our different from us. Jesus used the example of a good Samaritan in Luke 10 (Luke 10:25-37), as a demonstration of loving others. This man, to the Jews, was a person who was not someone who could be loved. He was a misfit, an outcast, who didn’t believe correctly or live in the right neighborhood, yet Jesus used him as the example of how to be a good neighbor.

We want to be a church that is loving the “others” around us intentionally. That may be a person who looks differently than us or believes differently from us. Their lifestyle may be different than ours, but we love just the same. We believe that because we are all created in God’s image.

So, as you go about the rest of your week, seek to love the “others” that you come into contact. Demonstrate your love for Jesus in the way that you love them. It may come from a simple smile, or it may come in some sacrificial way but let’s be God’s kingdom people here in Lakeside by loving others.