No Condemnation

Romans 8:1 ESV “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. “

Our pastor this Sunday preached on this one passage this Sunday. It is such a powerful proclamation of what the gospel means for us who believe in Christ. Even though we still struggle with sin on a daily basis, there is now no condemnation for it. No matter our failings in parenting, marriage, work, ministry, whatever – if we believe in Christ, we are children of God, washed clean by his pure blood, and renewed by the Holy Spirit as new creations in Christ. As verse 2 says: the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. We are free from guilt and shame and do not need to live in it. We are free to live a life of faith and joy, knowing at this very moment we are his beloved children and have eternal life. Even though we still struggle with sin, it has no hold or mastery of us.

It explains this further in Romans 8:14-17: ¹⁴ For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. ¹⁵ For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” ¹⁶ The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, ¹⁷ and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.“

While we deal with suffering in this world broken by sin and our own struggles, we have the Helper, the Holy Spirit who intercedes for us even when we do not know what to pray. We are being transformed more and more into his image as we behold the glory of Christ and look to His return when we will be glorified.

Romans 8:28-30: ²⁸ And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. ²⁹ For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. ³⁰ And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.

Bracketology

Matthew 24:36
36 “But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.

Pastors, it’s a great day for this opportunity.

How’s you bracket doing? I didn’t do one this year, but I feel like I’d have been in a similar situation as many of the other people, but it is still fun to play along sometimes.

The NCAA tournament has a lot of life lessons we can learn if we choose to. Among others, we can find David and Goliath, but the main lesson is that we simply don’t know what tomorrow holds. We don’t even know what today holds.

Each day, have your heart in the right place and make sure we’re prioritizing our relationship with Jesus. Just like the schools that had Final Four plans, but got upset, our plans aren’t really what matter. The scripture tells us not to attempt to predict the future so let’s make the most of the present.

Make it a great week in the trenches. Be exceptional at being you.

Love,

Yancey

We All Work Together

Ephesians 4:16
16 From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.

One of my the assignments I gave my class out of the book that has to do with nature. They gave presentations on various insects, etc., that we wouldn’t necessarily see as important to life.

If you have never looked into this or heard about it, bees are incredibly important to human life. They do amazing things.

The entire time I was listening, I just kept coming back to how perfectly it all works together. Insects, plant life, and then us.

Those things didn’t happen by accident and sometimes it is nice to get a friendly reminder of that.

Make it a great day in the trenches. Be exceptional at being you.

Love,

Yancey

Family Friday 3/18: Believe

Good morning, men!

Today at breakfast a buddy and I shared a similar concern. We both have young sons who attend church and genuinely enjoy being there. They are both good kids and can tell you honestly what they have learned from a sermon or at youth group. Neither are baptized and neither seem interested at the time.

After breakfast, I sat at my desk and read my Tony Dungy book. The passage today talked about belief. It discussed how we have to BELIEVE that God has a plan for us and ours. Knowing God is omniscient and believing that he is good are two different things.

It was a great reminder that God is in control when it comes to our sons.

Have a blessed day and a restful weekend!

M.I.T.T. ~ Runyan

March Madness

Good morning men. This week starts march madness, for sports junkies, one of the best weeks in all of sports. There will be Cinderella stories and games which are decided before they are won. Young men and Womens athletic careers will end this week as others will continue on to the professional level. Ultimately, only one team will prevail. That leaves 63 others teams with season ending loses. That’s 63 teams full of players with an opportunity to take and learn a life lesson. When we are defeated, we have two options. Pick ourselves up, or stay down. Men, we have Christ with us. Even at our lowest low, he is still with us. I pray that on each of those 63 teams that end up losing, there is one individual who can use the opportunity to talk about how it’s just the beginning of the next chapter Christ has opened for them. He brings us to a point in life to take us to the next stop. It’s never the end, just the beginning of the next chapter of his plan. Have a blessed day men.

Prayer request and a praise

A family in our church, and next door neighbor to one of our pastors was the Blue Springs family that got hit by an F4 tornado in Iowa on 3/5/22. An awful tragedy hit the Bulgers. Mike, the husband, and their 2 youngest children Kinlee and Owen lost their lives. Please be in prayer for their family as the young mother Kuri and her oldest son Brysen survived that storm. Kuri also lost her mother to that tornado. Such a horrific tragedy but God is good and there has been a huge outpouring of support.

Here is the link to a go fund me page that is raising support for them since Mike was the primary breadwinner. Praise be to the Lord, the fund raiser already hit over their goal.

https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-the-bolgers-during-a-time-in-need?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=p_cp%20share-sheet&fbclid=IwAR2pS5JyTmtpf9Lf6eSVNVdn-ERIuYZd6DxcPFBuUF8a3W2e3QtooDtU6Yc

An Opportunity for Reflection

Hebrews 10:26
26 If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left

Pastors, I apologize, I bet you were exceptional today.

What happens when the laundry gets done? More laundry. What happens when the dishes get done? More dishes. These are two things that are never done. They could even be considered to be on repeat.

We can’t just treat our cleanliness like the dishes or the laundry and keep getting dirty again, even though or debt is paid.

Make it a great week in the trenches. Be exceptional at being you.

Love,

Yancey

Long Range Plan

Proverbs 13:11
11 Dishonest money dwindles away,
but whoever gathers money little by little makes it grow.

I give some basketball lessons to several young kids in the area. I will say that watching those young kids prosper and get better is a really neat thing to watch.

It is fulfilling to work with kids who want to get better and who understand that this is the process of success for the future.

I feel like our faith is the same way. Let’s just get a little better each day. If you have children, make sure that their faith is growing day by day, as well.

Make it a great day in the trenches. Be exceptional at being you.

Love,

Yancey

Family Friday 3/11: Be Patient

Good morning, men!

This week I was at work when I got a text from my wife. It had a picture of a house that had gone up for sell in the last hour. Understand….we are NOT house shopping. We love our house. Well, within 8 hours we had set up an appointment, looked at it, and I was convinced we needed to move.

Work is starting to turn a corner, our kids are getting older and we need more space, there was a basement for storms (which have been bad up here lately)….it all lined up. Until we prayed about it.

Sarah wasn’t comfortable with the financial part of it. Our kids love our current neighborhood. The neighbor kids would be really upset if our boys left and took the wiffle ball field with them. I was the only one wanting to move, and I realized through prayer and God’s wisdom that now wasn’t the time.

My overall posture this week, and the message I received from The Spirit was this: “Slow down. Be patient. What you want, and what I need for you isn’t the same.”

I hope you all have a great day and a restful weekend!

M.I.T.T. ~ Runyan