Pick one of the following and work on it this week…

• Resolve to Know God Better: Make a commitment to read through the Bible in a Year. Stop by the Resources Kiosk to get your schedule or go online.
• Keep the Pray for Families in our Community: Continue to pray.
• Know you Family Better: Discover one new thing or become interested in discovering more about something one of your family members “is into.” Look for an opportunity to talk with them about it this week.

Pick one of the following and work on it this week…

• Pray for Families in our Community: Pray for families in our church and community. Pray that they would attend the STRONGFAMILIES Seminar on January 10th.
• Know Yourself Better: Do you know your God-given strengths? Are you using them for God’s glory? Ask God to make your strengths more evident in 2009!
• Notice Your Family: Notice the uniqueness God has put in each of your family members. Tell them what you see.

Pastor Bob Fox
Psalm 33

God wants to give you hope extraordinaire. He wants to lift you above hoping in yourself, in things, in the combined ability of humanity, in political philosophies, or anything else but Him.

Five Important God-facts

1. What God decrees is right: both correct and moral.
2. All God decides to do, He does thoroughly and well.
3. God can only do what is just and “squeaky clean.”
4. God has a long, persistent history of lovingkindness.
5. God bats 1.000! All He decided comes to be.

One Important Me-fact: I have the greatest imaginable blessing. This is the One who chose me and obligated Himself to me, to make me part of His most treasured investment. THIS is my destiny!

Three Important Implications; Or, what to remember on your journey.

1. I can wait: whatever is, I have what I need in Him.
2. I can rejoice: whatever is, is not where He’ll leave me.
3. I dare anticipate good: whatever is, His lovingkindness can shape its outcome.

Listen to Bob.

Download Pastor Bob’s study notes.

Knowing GOD better is one of our biggest goals at RMCC. Reading through your Bible in a year, while a large undertaking, is an excellent way to “zoom out” and get a good look at God.

Many of us, including Elders and Pastors are journeying through the Bible with you this year. If you have questions, as you read, email us at biblequestions@rmcchurch.org or use our contact form and send to Bible Questions.

Stick to it! Keep pursuing God! If you miss a day or two, just pick up where you left off. May God bless you as you seek to know Him better.

As questions are asked and answered, check back here for the posts.

Pastor Carlyle Naylor

Download the first 120 days now!

Pick one of the following and work on it this week…

• Desperately Hope for Someone: Think of someone who is in a less than optimum situation this Christmas. Pray hard for them this week!
• Put Your Hope in Yahweh: Read the story of Joseph in Matthew 1:18-25. Notice his desperation and his strategizing. Notice the hope Yahweh gave Him to replace it. Believe the same for yourself and your family for the coming year.
• Pray each day for our Christmas Eve Services: Pray for people who are not very connected or not connected at all to come and connect to us and to Jesus on Wednesday night. Pray for our church family to connect deeply to each other and to Jesus.

Pastor Bob Fox
Psalm 107

God extends toward humanity a very deep love (chesed).

1. It initiates continuous acts of kindness toward us.
2. These acts are unmerited.
3. This love is never-ending.

Four things must be said about this love of God.

1. God’s love is illustrated in the stories of the people who are in His family.
• a. He has embraced the unloved, those who have nothing to offer.
• b. He has embraced rebels, people who have been deliberately hostile.
• c. He has embraced fools, victims of their own “dumb choices.”
• d. He has embraced those who have buried themselves in “getting theirs.”
2. God in love blesses and disciplines so as to stimulate our attentiveness to eternal matters. So His love shows up in our lives in strange disguises.
3. God’s love brings about two distinct experiences in people.
   • a. Great celebration for those who respond to it.
   • b. A great sense of loss, defeat, and regret for the indifferent.
4. God’s love is part of a healthy perspective on the World and on life.
• a. It is wise to revisit God’s love at work in humanity (Psa 136).
• b. It is wise to analyze the incomprehensible greatness of God’s love (Eph 3:17-19).

Listen to Bob.

Download Pastor Bob’s study notes.

Pick one of the following and work on it this week…

• Love the Hard to Love: Who is in your life (work, family, neighborhood) that you find it difficult to love. Do something anonymous for them (leave a plate of cookies, pray everyday this week for them, leave a encouraging note/card). Leave the results to Yahweh.
• Love the Easy to Love: Who is in your life that you find it easy to love? Remind them of how much love Yahweh has for them. Remind them of how much love you have for them. Tell them why you find it easy to love them.
• Celebrate Yahweh’s Love: Read and reread (maybe even memorize) John 3:16 & 17. Thank Jesus that He loved you enough to come here to be your Savior!

Pastor Carlyle Naylor
John 17:14-16 (NIV)

14 I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. 15 My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of it.

Jesus knew the gift of Himself was…

1. Of high value
• a. It is both priceless and practical
2. Distinctive
• a. It is both noticed and targeted
3. Diminishable
• a. It fades overtly and subtly

Tonight at Communion, let’s remember Christ’s gift is…

1. Priceless (we’re “saved” by Christ)
2. Practical (we’re becoming more and more like Christ)
3. Distinctive (we’re being noticed by the world)
4. Replenishable (there much more where that came from)

Listen to Carlyle.

Pastor Bob Fox
Psalm 4

God is the source of a very deep peace that includes the experience of:

1. Completeness―There’s nothing I will need that I will not have.
2. Wholeness―I am right with the Creator of all that is.
3. Unimpaired relationship with God and His family.
4. Fulfillment in my undertakings.

Life’s pressures can divert us from this peace. Psalm 4 is the story of a man recovering it in the midst of great personal trauma. It reveals habits he had that mark out a pathway for us to follow.

1. He had come to know God, and against the trend called out to Him in his distress.
2. He responded to his own anger with:
• a. Self-examination―it makes us humble and teachable.
• b. Silence―it puts us in a position to be ministered to by Yahweh.
3. He had learned peace is cultivated through the things God has prescribed. Continue in them and trust Him with the uncertainty (Psalm 50:14-15).
4. He had learned that only Yahweh was the source of this peace. Expecting it from people will only result in a gloom and doom outlook.
5. He had learned the comparative depth of his own joy and didnít let go of what produced it.

Listen to Bob.

Download Pastor Bob’s study notes.

Pick one of the following and work on it this week…

• Memorize a Verse: When you find yourself in the fray of Christmas busyness, recite this verse: I will lie down and sleep in peace, for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety. Psalm 4:8
• Make Peace: Watch for ways (prayers, encouraging words, etc) you can bring calmness into someone’s life this week. Imagine yourself as a little squirt gun of water on little flames of fretting and discontent.
• Celebrate the Birth of Jesus: Read, as a family or alone, the story of Jesus’ birth in Luke Chapter 2:1-20.