Amen. Amen. Good morning church. Good morning. Good morning. I know things are a little bit different today, and that's okay, right? That's okay. Um, we, um, on Fifth Sundays, what we try to do is we try to celebrate family. We try to celebrate individuals, and we try to just

celebrate the fact that God's called us to be a church that has a take take our middle name very

seriously community and we're really about the community and serving the community and being the

community and we try to have some families that give some testimony about how they maybe got

connected here with our church and so you can hear a little bit maybe about their story maybe

you see their faces and so we we've asked some some I've asked some folks who would come in to

share and I know Shannon's on call today right and so we're going to have you guys if you guys

Steve and Shannon if you guys will come forward and you guys can arm wrestle over who does most

of the talking because I know both of you and it could be a it could be a tight one there so there

you go good morning I'm Steve Hemingway this is my wife Shannon our daughter Jenna hiding back there

where I'm sure I won't be able to come up here and AJ in the back hiding also so yeah as soon as we

were getting ready to come up you know last night I said hey what are you going to talk about or you

know do you want to go first and Shannon said yeah I'll go first and she told me what she was going

to talk about and she looks over me you're going first right okay so here I am so a couple things

Curtis asked us to talk I said well what do you want us to talk about whatever the Lord

lays on your heart you know I know typically talk about what does Rhema mean to us and I said well

how long and Kurt said well don't worry about that because I don't have a sermon plan I said oh

okay so you're not going to talk no I'm going to get up and talk I just don't have a sermon plan

so we know what that means so when I go like this it means mute Steve's mic so that means I get to

preach today so amen and you know these things are always challenging because I'm not nervous to get up

and talk in front of people I actually do that you know for my job but but you know you always want

to be open to what what does the Lord want me to say and and you know you want to come up here with

some idea so you don't just stand up there going oh I have nothing you know nothing to do nothing to

say um so uh I'll start out by you know we're talking about church what and this is going to be

interactive because again I'm not I don't really like getting up and just talking you know at people

I like having a conversation with people okay so uh what you know my first question would be

is so you know we're talking about rhema and and what what is church anyway what what is the church

how about that anybody heard the term the church is that this building here so what is that it's the

body of Christ okay so we the body of Christ what else is it called how about the bride of Christ

right as the Bible refer to that so when we talk about you know who I'm looking out at right now

I'm looking at the body of Christ I'm looking at the bride of Christ that's the believers right

if you have named the name of Jesus Christ if he has written your name in the lamb's book of life

for all of eternity then you are the body of Christ you are the church right and you are the bride of

Christ in waiting right um so so then the next question be okay so then this building is a church

right we call this a church and we have church fellowships if you will i.e. rhema community church

so if the church is the body it's the people it's the people I'm looking out at right now

then my question my first question I want to start with this is then then why church why do this

and that's an open-ended question which means that I'm waiting for a response and I've got all day

because Curtis isn't going to preach so so he says but anyway so what why church well I want to hear

give me somebody why church why do we come here sunday mornings to strengthen one another okay give

me an example somebody give me an example where you've seen in this body where somebody has

strengthened somebody else and encouraged somebody else how okay so praying over someone good praying

over the life of a child very good why else do we do church worship corporate worship there you go

so we can can we worship on our own individually yes but what's one thing we can't do until we gather

as like believers we can't corporately worship right we can't bring the worship together in numbers

okay uh somebody give me an example where we've done that within rhema community what he already

is she like reaching for the mic or something okay but she give me a I mean I'm gonna come down

I'm gonna start walking the aisles in a second um so uh so worship where where we see that

you

there you go all right why else what's that equipping so that we can grow and how do we do that what are some examples how do we grow

home groups that's right home groups so even outside of this sunday morning that's right going out and getting in home groups who's involved in home group all right if you're not right maybe you should start thinking about that all right so there's your plug home groups um and then how else what does curtis do every every day or every sunday well he does every day

in preparation but in particular sunday how else do we grow through hearing of the word right the teaching of the word okay one thing i'm waiting for what else can we do here what should we be doing what's that serving thank you tom very good we serve that's another thing we do is we bring tom bring tom a cookie

and all of those are good and i was kind of waiting to get that one right so now we talk about service right so the question b is you know how do you serve

women Rhema community church and there's a lot of avenues to do that uh so i'll only just quickly give

kind of how i got into you know one thing i do obviously you see me on sunday mornings up here playing guitar some people know i didn't grow up playing guitar i didn't start playing guitar till the age of 35 which was like just last year

not really so hard to believe 15 years ago now but anyways but you know later in my adult life you know 35 years old i i my wife and i were down in the florida

keys going to a small little small church there and we decided to get involved in the music ministry which i had never done in my life other than singing in the shower

okay but it was such a small church you know everybody had to get involved so we decided okay we'll start swinging their little choir and then they asked us to start singing in the praise team

and i was like you know what i'm going to learn to play guitar i've always wanted to learn to play guitar so i bought a guitar electric guitar started playing i knew about three chords

and the pastor's wife said great now you can start playing in church i said no wait a second okay i've never done this before i just bought a guitar i know how to play like three chords

she said i don't care you know get up and do it so it was like oh okay so um i gotta tell you do you think that i felt comfortable getting up there and playing do you think

i felt comfortable in the service that god had just called me to do absolutely not it was i was not comfortable

at all okay i was nervous i'd get up there you know sunday morning especially early and shannon will tell

you i mean i've practiced and probably stay up till two o'clock in the morning practicing just because i

wanted to be able to get up there and do what i was called to do and and so i worked hard and god blessed

it but man i was not comfortable and i did not feel equipped to do what god had called me to do

so has anybody ever been there where god is calling you to do something you're like i'm not comfortable

doing this and i don't feel equipped to do it yep okay and how many people have said but you know what

i'm going to be faithful anyways and i'm going to trust you lord and i'm going to do it okay and that's

what i did and it was not comfortable i was not equipped to do it but god because he called me and i knew

he called me to do that and i was obedient and i worked then he blessed it and now you know 15 years

later and i've been playing in the church since that day you know since the first day i got up

there i'm a little bit better now than i was that was for rob probably like now not much but anyway

but um not a little bit better you know why because i worked hard at it and and um you know the last

thing i'm going to leave and i really will pass the the mic over to my wife at some point here but

um you know i was i don't know why and this is kind of disjointed but i was thinking about this

you know my wife and i we took our family to see aladdin uh a few weeks ago right the movie and

what's the idea of aladdin you know they find the uh lamp and you rub the lamp and then the genie

comes out and grants you what three wishes right so we saw the movie it's a good movie and then

on the ride home i thought you know what an opportunity to have a conversation with my family

and in particular with my children to kind of see where they're at right so i said okay so if you

had three wishes what would your wishes be so that was a really good opportunity to kind

of see where my kids minds were and everybody and and i let them go let my wife go my daughter

my son and then i thought about it and i said you know um i thought this this might sound kind

of mean everything else but i'm like you know maybe the end of the world like maybe jesus returning

you know like is that what we should be wishing for i mean the bible says to live is christ to die

is gain right and so there are many things here on this earth that we yeah i want to see my kids grow

in raiment community sure get involved in the things that god has called you to do all those things that we said that we can do here in church because guess what i mean it could be today could be tomorrow we don't know but we should be anticipating that and i could actually go on and on and on ask my wife anybody else knows me um but i'm gonna pass the mic so amen everybody says amen so i'm i'm shannon i'm afraid of feedback if i step down there but anyway so

i remember about nine years ago my first trip to haiti my friend emory wilson who some of you guys may know and has been involved down in haiti for a long time had us up on the rooftop we're talking about our day and he says you know this whole thing like this whole thing of life is all about relationships and i was like okay just give me that mango smoothie you just made for us i'm like you know i was born to my mango smoothie i really like didn't get it but slowly and gradually over the years uh it takes me a long time to learn some things i really realized

that this what we're here for what god created us for why we're here our purpose is relationship right really our restored relationship with him but also our relationship with other people so um this year i'm hoping to focus a little bit more on just developing and growing relationships especially close relationships with family and friends and um also that kind of leads into why we're so grateful to be here is i really do feel

that there is a huge emphasis on relationship here whether it be within just on sunday morning especially getting to know people more home groups um the development the development of relationships within the worship team just really grateful for um those relationships and so i just really encourage you guys wherever you are wherever god's planted you um just really dig deeper in your relationship with god and also in your relationships with those around you because you won't regret it it's what we're here for it's what we're made to do

and the people that maybe you don't like so much that are your brothers and sisters in christ we're going to be with them in eternity so we probably should start working on our relationship with them now but you know just saying but we have a great a beautiful thing here and just appreciate the pastors and elders and everyone here that really does um that do encourage us to um have strengthen our relationship with christ and one another and um we love you guys and are grateful to be here amen

amen oh and one more thing miss dina as miss dina comes up this morning as well i just um piggyback on steve and shannon as well i mentioned this at our wednesday prayer service and one of the things that just as i'll try to say this without being emotional as well too that just blesses me is i was standing at outside with bobby henderson last sunday

talking to him as in the truck where he's feeding the twins before he brings them in and we're watching everyone come in and he said curtis look at how god has orchestrated and just blessed the ministry that's taking place at 154 cornerstone called rhema community church look at the diversity that's taking place here on sunday mornings you don't get that in a lot of places on sunday mornings that's not just uh not just a racial uh diversity as well too you have you have blended

families you have grandparents raising raising raising their children their grandchildren i mean you have all this stuff you have foster fostering going on you have adoption going on and just a place where everyone can come and just develop relationship and just be be the church it's such a blessing and i don't ever want to miss that and take that for granted i'm grateful for that here in the life of this church miss dina introduce yourself and share with us please i'm miss dina void

and some folks call me moth so i answer to both and um i am out of my comfort zone up here i'd rather be in the back doing serving and um so y'all just bear with me but uh i came to rhema to be my children my children i came with them and i'm grateful for for being here and the opportunities to serve

is and to fellowship like you said um getting to know folks and getting to love them sunday morning i love the the word if you if you're hungry for the word it's preached here

to serve there's lots of little places rooms in the back with a heart that needs love lots of hearts that need love i've enjoyed it

uh i even my words are not very elegant and they don't flow very smoothly and sometimes i i um i was looking for a verse and i had to email or text pastor curtis yesterday where is it where is it i can't find it i can't find what what i was looking for but you never get too old for to serve the lord you never get too old to worship the father and to be loved by him

amen and i just am thankful for this place for this community wednesday night we have the sweetest service and we absolutely is a close-knit um little community and i thank god for the opportunity of being here i thank god for each one of you and by the grace of god i love you amen amen

amen thank you miss dina if you have a small one you know how miss dina uh loves on yours as uh they pass through the the uh nursery back there as well too joe and casey come on up

you're running traffic for someone so thank you so

um hi i'm casey williamson this is my husband joe um i told curtis it's not really a good idea to give me a microphone because you just don't know what will come out

um but each time that we have the fifth sunday i hear people stand up and talk about what rama has done

for them their relationships um that they've built the love that they feel when they come in

um and what a welcoming fellowship it is um but i have a little bit different perspective because

i also work here um so i wanted to just take a minute to give a little bit of credit where credit is due

and kind of tell you why rama is the welcoming fellowship that it is and why everyone is so loving

and so open um and why we really do look live and love beyond ourself and that is because

what you see up here on sunday morning from our worship team what you what you get on sunday morning

from pastor curtis um when you hear our elders speak when they tell you they're going to pray for you

when they lay hands on you on sunday morning for um whatever your needs may be that

is genuine um these are things that they live out day in and day out i work with with the staff here

every day i'm with pastor curtis every day your elders they love and shepherd us with a christ-like

love which in turn overflows from us from him if that makes makes any sense so it's not just a show

that goes on on sunday morning when our worship team is is crying and pouring their hearts out to

the lord that is genuine that is honest they do that monday through sunday i mean it's every day it's

not just something that's done here so when you come in and you say i can really feel the love here

people are so kind and so welcoming and so open this is the most genuine fellowship that i've ever been

a part of um and that all flows from the people who are are shepherding us and teaching us how to do

those things are are genuine and where that love and and is coming from so i just want to kind of give

a little bit of credit to the elders and to staff and to pastor curtis for um for teaching us how to

love beyond ourselves um genuinely amen good job girl um curtis was asking us to say when how long

we've been here how did we get here and i looked at casey because i always looked at her for especially

answers on like remembering dates and stuff because i have a hard time with that don't laugh because i

know some of you do too um and she said well it was before this surgery but it was after this surgery

that we came so she she she dates things to what kind of surgery she's had on her body so i'm thankful

for that because that's a forever record you know um but we've been here six years we've been here six

six years and i remember prior to coming

you

and also open the door for where we both can serve because where we were at it was coming to an end and i'm not going to get into any more detail than that it was coming to an end and that's that we were okay with that but we were wanting to go somewhere unlike we've ever been before and i've i was born i've been i'm born and raised right here in brunswick as as casey and i'm going to tell you this this is the first true authentic church i've ever been a part of

where you walk in and number one you see diversity like she's already that's already been mentioned this morning and number two you see people who actually love you actually love you they're not going through motions they're not going through routine they're not just putting on a face or a show there's they actually love you and that's including the staff as well so i echo what has already been said and also have the privilege of serving as children's pastor here and also

now youth pastor and so i count that as a privilege as a privilege as a privilege as a huge responsibility and i'm so thankful that god has opened answered my prayer and opened the door for for my family to come into to not only serve but also be a part of a true church body and i don't count it as accident

i claim what scripture says in first corinthians 12 that god put composed he put the pieces together

it's not by accident it's not because it's five minutes from our house which is good

but uh but god placed us here god brought us here god has put each and one of each and every one of us here

and we all serve a purpose here at this church and i am deeply deeply thankful for this church and for

the members of this church not only for what you've done in my life my wife's life but also

my two boys lives thank you amen

thank you love you guys

thank you to everyone who come and share this morning and uh and no i will not preach the sermon

this morning i do have a couple of things i just want to go over with you very quickly and we'll do

that and we'll kind of wrap things up today we'll have the worship team if you are visiting with us

want to give you an opportunity to uh read ahead and we will be continuing our study in genesis and

we will tackle chapter 30 and next week we will get all of chapter 30 under our belt but i just have a

couple of uh quick things i want to just bring to your uh attention this morning uh i think angela

violet did angela go out to help in someone in the nursery just a second ago angela miller has

been brought on she is on uh she is now the the preschool and nursery director here in our church

and she's doing a phenomenal job helping taylor out with the whole children's ministry as a whole

she has some great ideas and and i just want you to know she's she's doing some things back there she's

actually uh praying over your kids uh not that they weren't before but just there's a there's a

greater focus on what's taking place behind those walls back there and it's not babysitting

and we love that that uh i'm grateful for angela and violet being a part of uh and you got to meet

them a few several months back when fifth sunday when they were able to share their testimony but i

wanted you to know that that we're moving in that direction as well too um i wanted to in the spirit of

transparency we needed to uh just kind of give you an update vision 21 if you're if you're new here

uh there's some brochures over on the information table there's some on the back it's on our it's

on our website this is our three-year ministry plan and vision 21 is all about taking a three-year look

at what we can do as far as a church giving us spiritual and ministry goals and where we are

going in the days ahead it gives you an insight as far as all the who we are as a church what we

believe kind of where we were founded all that kind of good stuff in there but also a lot of the

ministries that we're involved in in our community as well too but i as part of it in the spirit of

transparency i also want to give you kind of a financial picture and finances are always a boring

part of church but it's a part of we don't vote on budgets we have a a finance committee that puts

together budgets for us and we either trust the leadership spell the the elders bring about spiritual

leadership and direction and the finance committee puts budgets together and you either trust leadership

or you

you

you

is doing in and through through you guys but that's part of a part of who we are I did do a three-week stewardship we I was talking some of the staff this morning on three week series on stewardship as we kicked off vision 21 but we probably need to maybe revisit it on a couple weeks session on giving as well to but a couple times a year but I wanted to give you some numbers as to where we stand in in the 2019 budget and I hate kind of bringing all this down to

to an end at the close

because this is such a great day

of celebration and I want it to continue

to be a great day of celebration

but again in the spirit of transparency

we're right at the six month

mark, six month mark

of 2019, again it's a

three year window and six month

mark we should be right about to

in order for us to make budget we need to be

at $157,000

okay

that's our 2019

that's half of what we need for 2019

to do our budget and all that we're

called to do, currently

right now we are $12,000

behind in our

giving, okay

and that tells us a few things

that this is a, you know

even just within a microcosm of

our five elders, we see

within our family units

we see that things are tight

I get it, things are tight with

everyone, but we're so

we're, I want you to know that our elders

are going to begin, we're going to meet today

after church

and we're asking God to just

show us that there's some things we need to just

reevaluate and re-look at

and to, kind of

kind of, everything's on the table

what do we need to do to make things

to make things work

we're all about trusting God

I'm all about trusting God

I believe that the scriptures tell us

that God owns a cattle on a thousand hills

and so we are not in panic mode

hear me that, we are not in panic mode

we have money in the bank

we are okay, okay

but we, and the

the 2019 budget

was only increased

seven percent

seven percent

so it's not like we were

had these astronomical goals

I don't believe that's astronomical

I believe that's a good faith number

seven is a

I believe that was a Lord

biblical number

so that's why we chose seven percent

I'm totally kidding

it just worked out that way

so anyway

we're not in panic mode

but as my wife always encourages me

she says, honey, sometimes people just need to know

so if you've been sitting on that $10,000 check

this would be a good Sunday

to throw it in

okay

but also if you

if you have not been faithful

you know, every

every hundred dollars matters

amen

and so we have some things

that we know that God has called us to do

and we're just asking you to be faithful to the Lord

so, again, in the spirit of transparency

that's where we are financially

again, we're not pressing the panic button

we're not, you know, running down the road

the sky is falling

things are good

we're going to be okay

because God has this

God has got it

and, you know, we saw early on

first part of the year we were behind

and all of a sudden, two weeks

everything got caught up

but then a summer happens

and a lot of people go AWOL

and some people go AWOL mentally

and some people go AWOL whatever

and so, again, just as a reminder

of where we are

we'll give you another update

in the next few months

as well

but, again, I want you to know

that your elders are going to be meeting today

about this

and begin a time of prayer and fasting

asking God what we need to do

and maybe have to press the reset button

on a few things

and we're open to that

we've always said that

we're always open to whatever

and however the Lord is leading

in this manner

one of the things that has

that has affected

it hasn't been the old

the end all be all

as to why

but one of the things

that has happened here

in the life of our church

this year

is that team effort

is not here

team effort is not here

and that has

that has

had a slight impact

on us a little bit financially

just because

this was actually the first year

we were going to take

some of those funds

and actually include it

in the budget

because in the years past

we've used those funds

that have come in

to build the basketball court

for the kids out there

in the community

and get the acreage

we've taken some of those funds

it's not an exorbitant

amount of funds

we don't host team effort

for financial windfall

we do it because of ministry

but let me tell you

why team effort

is not here

and it seems to be

a situation

that's going across

with

and it's an exorbitant

signing up kids don't want students don't want to do outreach anymore to where you go a week long and you serve they want to do the whole big camp thing where there's a big concert and you have a big speaker and you break out into small groups and you do some fun stuff and maybe there's a day where you go and do that they seem like the days of old where it's just not a priority for some and so what's happened in the life of the church is that a lot of times the young people don't understand the value of serving and what it really means to serve and so they grow

up in the church and the churches don't really instill that in them and they end up coming up and they end up taking a position in there and they get to be 25 28 years old and now all of a sudden they're serving as the youth pastor well that was never a priority for them when they grew up so guess what that same dynamic takes place in their life as well too and they don't they don't think about leading their kids to serve now I'm not saying all you who are in high school middle school you need to go on a mission trip tomorrow

but I am saying there's ways you can serve there's way and there's great value in serving but anyway team effort is is has felt the crunch on that and so they only had two weeks of the eight that they were that they had sign up enough for camp here this past summer and so they they had to say look we have to take it off the board for you guys the plan is they're doing some reworking on some of the work sites here in brunswick but they are going to advertise and they want to come back next year we want to have them

but it's also one of the things we're praying about too because we have a tremendous mission wing over there that we have built out and we are trusting and we know that God is calling us to use it for some form and fashion of ministry and I want you to know that your elders are prayerfully looking at how we do this and how we serve the community whether it's temporary housing whatever we're looking we're we're exploring some opportunities but we want to use it we don't we could we could take that mission wing and bust the wall

wall down okay in between the units and make a big old children's area children's space would the kids love it yeah but we don't need that we said we wanted to have a place where we can serve the community and be a blessing to the community and so that's why we're saying there's something else God has in store for us and I was talking with my friend Tyler this morning he said something very very uh very good because it was a reminder to me as well too something that he and his wife Jill are going through sometimes God says wait

because he wants you to understand the value of what he has next and so that waiting doesn't mean we sit still either but in that waiting we keep moving until we understand where the spirit of God is leading us for that next step amen so understand that that has that has some impact on on why uh the the giving is a little little off this year but the team effort funds were not going to be added to the 2019 budget until

the back end of 2019 because that's when the summer funds start to kick in so it really doesn't really affect the numbers we're looking at today these are just cold numbers of where we sit today okay and again just once again in the spirit of transparency that's where we stand and you know what um this could be dangerous but and if it gets if it gets a little dangerous are we live streaming right now

okay cut the live stream if we need to okay if we need to but uh again just in the spirit of transparency does anyone have any questions that myself or any of the elders could could uh answer for you this morning