Lakeside Community Presbyterian Church

What part of God’s Kingdom are you building?

I was asked that question once and pondered what my answer should be. I wanted to answer that I am planning on building something big, something that God and I would be proud of. I would want to build something that stood out and people would notice.

But as I thought about it for a few minutes, my grand thoughts turned. As I thought about what part of God’s Kingdom would He want me to build, it turned to the things that are right in front of me. I want to invest in the people that are a part of my life – my wife, my children, my friends, the people I know at church. These are the part of God’s Kingdom that I want to build, that I want to invest in. I want to build God’s Kingdom in the way that I treat others. The way that I am loving them.

I think that is what Jesus would want me to do. Big buildings, great acts of generosity, fabulous sermons aren’t necessarily what God wants in building His Kingdom. What He wants is for each of us to be faithful with what He has given to us and to treat others with love.

Jesus wanted to make sure that His people knew that the way that others would know about Him would be in the way that His followers treated each other, the way that we love others.

God’s Kingdom is built, it grows when someone we meet sees Jesus and they want to know more. I think that is what Jesus wants from us. It isn’t knowing more (although that is important), it isn’t in giving more (although that too is important), it isn’t in serving more (although that is another important part of God’s Kingdom). What Jesus wants is for us to love God and love others and point others to Him. When we do that faithfully, with those that are around us, God’s kingdom grows.

Our sermon series in John’s letters is helping us to do that. We are learning from the pen of John what a follower of Jesus should do in helping to build His Kingdom.

I hope that you can join us this Sunday as we learn a bit more of the basics in how we can build God’s Kingdom together from John’s first letter.

A Day for Prayer

“He who forms the mountains, creates the wind, and reveals His thoughts to man,

 He who turns dawn to darkness, and treads the high places of the earth—

the LORD God Almighty is His Name.” 
—Amos 4:13 NIV

Thursday, May 4 is a day designated as the National Day of Prayer. It is a day that many across the United States will set aside for prayer and here at Lakeside Community Presbyterian Church we are going to take time to pray for our needs here in Lakeside, in our Nation and in our World.

Let me invite you to two different events:

“That which was from the beginning, 

which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, 

which we have looked at and our hands have touched—

this we proclaim concerning the Word of life.”

1 John 1:1 (NIV)

Knowing what we believe is an important part of being a disciple of Jesus. We need to know what we believe, what are the fundamentals, the basics.

This Sunday we begin a new sermon series entitled, The Basics, that will explore the basics of the Christian faith as we look at the letter that the Apostle John wrote and learn what are the basics of being a disciple of Jesus.

I hope that you can attend (or watch online) as we learn what are the basics of the Christian faith and how that will help us to live as Christ followers in our world.

Have a great rest of the week.