July 2017

Brothers and sisters,

Happy Monday to all! I hope your morning has gone well as we all enjoy this comfortable summer day. Being with the people of God yesterday and worshiping the eternal God of the universe who gave Himself for our redemption was wonderful. I am encouraged and strengthened when we fellowship and worship together. I want to thank our worship band for leading us to focus on the greatness of God. I know many of the band was gone but David, Annette, Barb and Ron did a great job leading us. I hope the message helped us all to see that we can trust our lives and all our treasures to God because we see that God gave His greatest treasure, His only Son dying in our place, for us! God asks us to do for Him what He has already done for us. Trust your life and all your treasures to Him today and every day.

Please be thinking and praying about being a part of the new small group beginning in the fall. This group will focus on following Jesus more closely and then being able help others grow in their faith. If you are interested in being a part of this more intensive small group, please let me know.

I also want to thank today those who work with our children in Sunday School and worship. Deanna faithfully teaches preschool children every week the love of Jesus and the truths of God’s Word. We then have people who step up to the plate and provide childcare weekly for those too young to be in Deanna’s class and too young (and possibly too wiggly) to be in worship. Also, we have those who provide the children a special children’s worship time twice a month. Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.” I want to thank all of you who help with our children in any way for you are truly investing in eternity when you care for children.

For those who are sick, on vacation or away for other reasons, remember you can always listen to the messages preached on Sunday on our website: embclife.org. The messages are usually posted a few days after they are preached.

You all are great! Love being your pastor!

Bob Ray, Pastor, East Madison Baptist Church

Sisters and brothers,

Happy Monday to all! Hope your day is going well. We had a wonderful day yesterday in worship, fellowship, and learning together. I hope the message from 1 Samuel 17 helped us deal with discouragement that comes to all of us by remembering this: God enables His children to be victorious even in the most difficult of circumstances. God has prepared us for whatever battles we face today and He will enable us to walk in victory with Him. Just as He gave David the strength and power to defeat Goliath, He will give us the strength and power to defeat whatever giants we find in our paths as we walk with Him.

We serve a giant-defeating God!

Youth, remember youth canoeing at Lake Wingra tomorrow, July 18 at 4:30 PM. If you did not pick up a waiver, they are available at the church building.

I want to again thank all who helped us conduct our 5 Day Club outreach to children. The word of God was shared and we pray it took deep root in the lives of the children who heard it. I want to thank Jody and Maria for helping host this event and all of you who prayed for this outreach.

We will be starting a new small group in the fall for those who desire to deepen their walk with God and help others also do this. If you are interested in being a part of this more intensive small group, please let me know.

Love being your pastor!

Bob Ray, Pastor, East Madison Baptist Church

Brothers and sisters,

Happy Monday to all! We celebrated in worship that we serve the Lord Jesus Christ who died for us and rose physically from the grave never to die again. By Jesus taking His life up again He proved He alone is Lord who will reign forever and ever. We examined the evidence of the empty tomb; the evidence of the Old Testament Scripture that prophesied His dying and rising again to rule and reign forever; the evidence of skeptical people who had to be shown that Jesus was alive and the evidence of the continuing witness of the church who proclaim Jesus lives even when His children might face persecution and death as they proclaim that Jesus lives. We challenge skeptics to look at the evidence and see for yourself if the evidence points to the bodily resurrection of Jesus, because if it is true, Jesus is what life is all about. Yes, Jesus is alive! He is our life and we want others to know this life in Jesus and share in it.

Remember to be praying for 5-Day Club held for children ages 5 to 12, beginning this afternoon, Monday, July 10 and lasting through Friday, July 14. It will be held from 3:00 PM to 4:30 PM daily through Friday. It is not too late to invite children and their parents, who are always free to attend with their children, to the 5-Day Club.

We will have a Pot Luck dinner this Sunday, July 16 after worship service.

Love serving our Risen Lord with God’s family at East Madison and I love being your pastor!

Bob Ray, Pastor, East Madison Baptist Church

Sisters and brothers,

Happy Monday to all! It great to worship with the family of God and adore the great King of the universe. He is worthy of all our praise! We looked at Jesus laying down His life for us by taking the judgment that we deserved. Jesus ushered in a new covenant with God and giving us access to God through His sacrificial death. We saw the witness of the centurions and those who stood with Jesus during the most dangerous event in His life. We also asked ourselves where were Jesus’ closest friends, His apostles, during this time. They believed the wrong things about Jesus and thought He would be a worldly, conquering King. They did not understand that He was sent to be a suffering and dying Messiah. They believed the wrong things about Jesus and had a crisis of faith. That helped us to see that we needed to continually seek to understand God as He really is instead making Him into something we want Him to be. We need to continually try to understand God’s Word as it really is instead of what we want it to be. If we see Jesus as He really is, we will see absolute true beauty.

Remember the 5-Day Club that will be held for children ages 5 to 12, Monday, July 10 through Friday, July 14 from 3:00 PM to 4:30 PM daily. I encourage you to invite children this age to the club. Parents are always free to attend with their children to see what is happening. Please be praying for this outreach and all who will attend it.

Ladies, remember Ladies Night Out Summer Concert at Olbrich Park Botanical Gardens Tuesday, July 11 from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM. Bring a friend!

Remember that our Pot Luck will be held Sunday, July 16 instead of July 9 because the Rehoboth Ethiopian special events weekend.

Love being your pastor!

Bob Ray, Pastor, East Madison Baptist Church