Love is…

…patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. These words from the Apostle Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth are primarily for relationships within the church. But like all biblical teaching, its truth can be applied in a number of different situations. This week as we celebrate Valentine’s Day, named after two Early Christian martyrs named Valentine and which became associated with romantic love during the time of Geoffrey Chaucer, it is a good time to reflect on these words. Some would tell us that if we have the proper emotional romantic feelings toward another, these actions will take place automatically. I tend to subscribe to the idea that these actions, and love is something you do, if applied will lead to the emotional romantic love that is desired by our spouse. How about you…done anything loving lately?

We are so blessed as a church to be a servant to our community and other churches. We will be hosting two of our Neighborhoods Association meetings this month. Our Glenlocke Grove neighbors will meet in our facilities on Tuesday February 10th while the Whittier Mill Village Neighborhood Association will meet in our Fellowship Hall on Thursday February 19th. Another great opportunity we have to help a new Baptist Church in our community will occur on Sunday February 15th at 6:00pm in our Sanctuary. Midtown Bridge Church, a new church sponsored by FBC Woodstock and our state convention, will have a worship/baptism service. They meet on Sunday mornings in the movie theaters in Atlantic Station and have no other facilities. Larry Grays leads this wonderful cutting edge ministry and I am delighted that we can serve them with our Kingdom mindset like this.

Other ways of service that we have as opportunities in the near future are connected to the Georgia Tech Baptist Collegiate Ministry (Former BSU). The first venue of service is to provide refreshments on campus for about 125 Tech students after the BCM Worship Service on Tuesday night March 3rd. At this time we have commitments for 20 dozen of the 25 dozen home baked cookies needed and $45 of the $75 needed for water and soft drinks. Please let me know if you can help with either. We are also helping to facilitate a Saturday work day on March 28th for the cleanup of the Spink-Collins Park, just down the road from where the Barnetts live. It will be a joint effort of the Georgia Tech BCM and neighborhood volunteers. It will be a great opportunity for church volunteers to build relationships with these college students and neighbors. I hope you will consider participating.

The Easter Egg Hunt is off and running! We have had a tremendous response from our neighbors so we will proceed to have the best Upper West Side Easter Egg Hunt in history! It will be held on Saturday April 11th at 2:00pm in the Whittier Mill Village Park. Joy Gilbert and Mitsy Austin are working on a steering committee with me from our church along with volunteers from three of our surrounding neighborhoods. You will be hearing more in the days ahead.

Two other ways that we might be able to use our facilities to connect and help those that live around us are being discussed at the present time and will be coordinated with our Building and Grounds Committee. The first opportunity came out of our discussions with our neighbors concerning the Easter Egg Hunt. There seems to be a great need for a Mother’s Day Out ministry a few days a week. Mitsy Austin is going to work with me to discuss with our neighbors ways in which our church can be of assistance in seeing this happen. Personally, in addition to the service we would provide it would be exciting to see our building become a center of community activity. In addition to that possibility, I was contacted recently by representatives of the Fulton-Atlanta Community Action Authority who are interested in having a location much closer to our community for the help they provide needy senior adults. At this time a person in our area who doesn’t have transportation has to change busses three times to get to their offices on the other side of the city. Their director is coming to our campus soon to meet with Bob and me in order to investigate the possibility of them using some space in our facility to receive requests from our community residents.

One of the greatest Kingdom assets we have is our building. Isn’t it wonderful to see how God is using it?

Expectantly,

Jim