09-02-12 Pastor Dave Lennander – Character in the Midst of Chaos

August 31st, 2012
Greetings,

It is so good to be back in Eau Claire after our summer ministering in La Crosse at Coulee Rock Church. Sandy and I had very enjoyable summer living and exploring La Crosse. God is doing a good work through the team that we sent down there. Thanks again for all the financial sacrifice that many of you made to get that church established. We are coming to the end of our three-year Capital Campaign (January 1st, 2013) and it looks like Coulee Rock will be self-sufficient financially at that time which is very rare for a church plant that young.

I am eager to go into this fall and to see all the work does here at Cedarcreek in transforming your lives and us as a community of believers. This Sunday, I will finish the summer series – “Character in the Midst of Chaos” in the Book of Judges. I feel somewhat challenged to wrap up a series where I didn’t teach and only heard two of the messages. But God will give grace. This week I will teach on the civil war between Israel and the Tribe of Benjamin. This is a tragic chapter in the history of God’s people but as with all of the Scripture we can learn much for our lives. Sin became tolerated and ingrained in the nation with devastating consequences. We will learn about overcoming sin in our own lives through this event with the title being “The Struggle with Sin”. If you would like to prepare your heart, read Judges 20.

I leave you with a verse that has been on my heart for the last several weeks. Following the great love chapter in I Corinthians 13, Paul writes:
“Let love be your highest goal” I Corinthians 14:1 NLT

As I watched the Olympic athletes compete this summer, I realized that they can’t win the gold without making it their highest goal in life. In the kingdom of God to win the gold, love must be our goal.

Pastor Dave