If you plant it, it will grow. Another crop of corn and creation of a children’s corn maze is planned for our field.  An enlarged area will be planted in 3 stages in order to extend the harvest time and have the best possible maze in the fall.  If you would like to help plant the seeds, join us Saturday, May 25th from 9 to 11am.  All ages are welcome and encouraged to participate.  Other planting days are scheduled for June 8th and June 22nd. Contact Tom Tompkins at 853-4234 or ttompkins@rcfnv.org for more information.

Experience the insights and joy gained from reading the Bible. You can read the entire Bible in one year by investing as little as 15 minutes a day. “The Bible in One Year” and other reading plans are available at www.youversion.com/reading-plans.

Find the one that’s right for you!

On 4/19/2012, RCF Senior Brent Brooks moderated a roundtable discussion on the subject of religious freedom questions raised by the recent Health and Human Services mandate requiring religious employers to pay for contraception, sterilization, and abortion-inducing drugs.  Our panel included a pastor, a Catholic priest, two attorneys, and pro-life advocates.

Click the arrow below to listen to a recording of the event.

http://www.renocatholicnetwork.com//sound%20files/talks/Religious%20Freedom%20Roundtable%2004.19.2012.mp3

Let me first say, “This is not my idea!” I sat in class the other day and learned about a church in Tacoma Washington called “Soma Communities.” That is where I got this blog name. It is a great way to think about how I am called to live and reach out to people who are not a part of His Soma.

To unpack this idea of what it means to be His Soma is my goal for my life. Being a part of God’s Soma, means that I am a passionate follower of Jesus. Therefore, I must deduce that if I am not a passionate follower of Jesus, I am not a part of His Soma. However, I was designed to be a part of His Soma. When I was created, I was created in “His Image” (Genesis 1), and was meant to be in a relationship with God. The Fall of man (Genesis 3), broke that connection between us and God. Jesus, whose Soma we belong to, came, lived and paid the price of death to reunite us in our relationship with God and restore us back to where we found ourselves before Genesis 3. NOW, we are able to be a part of His Soma, because of Jesus’ death.

Now, how are we being the Soma of Jesus? Well if I think about what is the purpose of my body, I come to the conclusion that it is what assists me in living. My body isn’t what is important but instead, it is my spirit. The body is where my spirit and the spirit of God dwells. The body of someone who is a part of Jesus’ Soma is used as a tool by the Spirit of God to bring others into the Soma of Christ. This means our body is used to love those who need to feel the love of God. Our body is used by the spirit to care for those who need someone to care for them. Our body is used by the spirit to serve those who need to be served. The list goes on and on.

So how do you view your body? If you are a part of the Soma of Jesus, He tells us how we are to view our body. It is a place where His spirit resides and is to be used to accomplish His purposes and not our own. My goal is to be used for His purposes and His purposes alone. How are you fulfilling your call to be a part of Jesus’ Soma? Are you a part of Jesus’ Soma? Do you want to be? It is as simple as confessing you need Him and want to follow His teachings. You don’t have to earn His love. He already loves you and has already paid the price for that gift. All you need to do is accept it. Please e-mail me at rbryan@rcfnv.org  if you have questions about this. I love being a part of His Soma and want you to join in with me.

At RCF, NO ONE STANDS ALONE!

At RCF we recognize that genuine relational connection, spiritual growth, and pastoral care are best achieved in a small group setting. Our Community Groups are designed to be a place where all three of these needs can be most effectively met.

Just “Go To the Mountain” in the overflow area to sign up or learn more.
Contact Janell Chinn at 853-4234 for more information.

1)  A good father avoids compromise.

Leviticus 20:7 says “consecrate yourselves and be holy, because I am holy.”  Consecration involves a decisive and continual choice to set ourselves apart (the literal meaning of “holy”) from all that would be improper, wrong, and unworthy of God.  A good father keeps himself compromise free, because he knows that every time he says “do as I say, not as I do,” he is really saying to his kids “don’t take this God stuff seriously, I sure don’t.” We must practice what we preach.

2)  A good father is caring.

Over and over God says to us constantly, continuously, and unceasingly, “I love you.”  In Jeremiah 31:3 He says “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness.”  Even more adamantly He says in Hebrews 13:5 “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”  God’s love is not a “now He loves me, now He doesn’t” kind of love.  We fathers need to examine ourselves to see if our love is of this same constant, continuous, and unceasing variety, or do we sometimes in our moments of anger display something different.

3)  A good father is compassionate.

Too often God is portrayed as the great, gruff sourpuss in the sky waiting to pounce. Instead He is “the Father of compassion.” (2 Corinthians 1:3).  The Greek word used here for compassion comes from a root word meaning “gut.”  Compassion is God’s pain-in-the-gut identification with those who hurt.  Jesus is the proof of how much God identified with us.  As Peter Kreeft has put it, “Jesus is the tears of God.”  Part of the very nature of being a father is having compassion for our kids as they encounter the pains of life. (Psalm 103:13).

4)  A good father offers comfort.

God is “the God of all comfort,  who comforts us in all our troubles” (2 Corinthians 1:3-4).  The Greek word for comfort used here comes from a root meaning “to come alongside of.” It conveys the idea of wrapping an arm around someone who is distraught and in need of help.  I still remember vividly when I called my Dad the week after high school graduation with that phone call every parent dreads.  “Dad, I’ve had a wreck.”  And what I remember most is that his words were “Are you okay?  Where are you? I’ll be there.”  He never asked whose fault it was and he never said a word about the car.  I can’t tell you how much that comfort meant to me that night.

5)  A good father is never condemning.

Ephesians 6:4 says “Fathers, do not exasperate your children.”  Colossians 3:21 echoes nearly exactly the same thing:  “Fathers, do not embitter your children, or they will become discouraged.”  Unfortunately it is only too easy to convey an exasperating, embittering, condemning spirit.  Let me give you a short list of things that will accomplish the trick:  ask them to walk in your footsteps, force them to accept your goals and ideas, don’t ever admit your own mistakes, consistently criticize everything they do, always be too busy when they seek you out, force them to do things with you that they have little interest in, betray their confidences, and frequently use sarcasm, teasing, and ridicule.  In no time at all any of these can produce a child who feels totally condemned and put down.  But God’s character is just the opposite.  Rather than knocking others down, “The LORD upholds all those who fall and lifts up all who are bowed down.”  (Psalm 145:14)

My prayer is that we fathers on earth will more and more come to reflect “Our Father who is in heaven.”  That’s my prayer for myself and it’s my prayer for all the fathers who are reading.

In the Father’s love,

Brent

“I would also like your feedback regarding the concept of not being saved until you make that Lordship decision. In my discipleship training this year, I was taught that all believers are saved, even if they don’t make that Lordship decision. (Those who don’t make the Lordship decision just end up with less rewards in heaven).

However, even the Devil believes in God. Because it is possible to believe in Jesus as Savior, but not accept Him and submit to His sovereign authority over our lives, is it possible that some believers are not saved?

We must trust Christ as Savior from sin but also commit ourselves to Christ as Lord! Could it be that any “faith” that rejects His sovereign authority is really unbelief?”

Here’s my answer …

The norm we are called to strive for is committed disciples who are submitted to their Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

The Bible never asks us to accept lack of Lordship as an acceptable state. But we should also be wary of those who want to add so much (in what they call Lordship) to the gospel that it becomes salvation by faith plus works rather than salvation by grace through faith.

Let me throw in some thoughts.

The idea that someone can accept Christ without seeing Him as Lord doesn’t fit what I see in the Bible.

On the other hand, none of us really know what His lordship will fully mean in all areas of our lives. We can’t possibly know that beforehand and surrender to all of that beforehand. Our initial acceptance of Him as Savior and Lord must be limited to what we can see and understand at that time.

Lordship is thus a continually growing experience. For some that will take place in one or several crisis experiences. For others it will be slow and gradually unfolding.

Any view that says we can accept Christ as Savior without acknowledging Him also as Lord is heretical because we would then not be accepting Him as God.

But any view that says we can’t be saved until we have absolutely accepted Him as Lord of all is also crazy. We can’t possibly understand the depths of what that means at the point of salvation.

As Sam Shoemaker put it “we can only bring as much of ourselves as we understand to as much of God as we understand.”

So yes, at the point of salvation we must be willing to surrender to Him also being Lord as best we can understand it at the time. But there is danger in frontloading too much understanding of that Lordship in the beginning. I think that will lead to way too much insecurity in our salvation. And we have to recognize that there will be subsequent decisions to be made to let Him be Lord in areas that we did not even foresee or understand when we accepted Him. These well may be crisis decisions (once or multiple times) or they may simply be gradual surrenders over time.

In HIM, Brent

Thank you for your love and grace to me! Thank you for all the ways you jump in and fill in and serve continually! Thanks for your recent responses to the challenges we have faced! You are a joy to serve!

To the staff and elder team:

Chris Chimits, Thanks for being a great small group leader, a trusted friend, an encouraging supporter, and a prayer warrior.

Eric Schelling, thanks for bringing joy and passion to everything.

Kevin Huffer and Chris Taylor, You may have left the elder team, but you’ve never stopped loving and serving RCF. Thanks for being faithful, trustworthy, supportive, and sticking in through all the last 5 years. I couldn’t have done it without you.

Mike McCarthy, thanks for going to the ends of the world with me. I’ll never forget nor lose the friendship we bonded over yams and fish sauce.

Mike Reynolds, thanks for challenging the socks off of all of us and bringing new innovation.

Steve Anderson, I said it before. You’ve been an incredible friend and leader through the worst of the muck church can offer. Looking forward to sharing the best of times with you.

Tom Loftus, You and Conny were our first physical contact with RCF. You made an awesome impression that has only grown as we’ve gotten to know you better.

Brad Chinn, you keep us on course with the bills paid. Thanks for being such a gracious host to us when we first came.

Cheryl Pierce, you are the glue that keeps holding all the cracks together. Thanks for always being reliable (with great joy!)

Holly Schelling, thanks for making our facility look beautiful and keeping our books with beauty and grace.

Janell Chinn, you have been my partner in starting so much ministry — first impressions, community groups, foundations. Thanks for helping me take us where we haven’t been before!

Jerry Hudson, you are the ultimate servant! I know I can always rely on you to meet whatever the need may be.

Lorrie Furman, you are the children’s ministry. So incredibly faithful year after year after year. And thanks for the many times you’ve stopped in my office to ask me how I am doing. Oh, and did I forget the cookies?

Marshall Drake, what a joy to work together again after so many years. This past Sunday I was awed at the privilege of sharing ministry once again. You rock!

Mike Pieretti, dude you define creativity! We look and sound so very much better in so many ways since you came!

Pat Sweeney, thanks for years of reliability to RCF, our kids, our parents. You are the bedrock that has kept the preschool solid year after year. And amazingly you never ruffle!

Robbie Bryan, I’ve seen you grow from brand new Christian to a leader of boys and girls and men and women. Last Sunday you got praised nearly as much as God. You have an incredible future in ministry!

Tom Tompkins, you have been the glue that has held RCF together through so many things. Thanks for letting me borrow your memory so many times. Thanks for caring for our body, and for me!

Dan Culbertson, Dan, the man! You hold the funky bottom together on Sunday mornings and serve us all with the brightest of smiles all week. We love you!

What a team you are! Thanks for being God’s gift to me and RCF!

What happens when people gather to praise God? Is there a power in praise that effects those around us?  Watch this video clip. See the stunned reaction of the shoppers all around.  Nobody knows what to expect, but they all know something new, beautiful, and profound is happening in their midst. They find themselves getting caught up in it, singing along, and in the end they can only applaud!

What would happen if we sang the praises of God regularly in the midst of the crowds around us?  What if they heard the amazing crescendos and powerful harmony that our God can create among his people? What if we weren’t scared to boldly sing His praises in the midst of others through our words and deeds?  Would they get caught up in it? Would they join in? Would they applaud?

What does Thanksgiving mean to you?  Is it really just about Turkey and football?  Or is it about God?  This Sunday we gather for our annual Thanksgiving Praise Service at RCF, a time where we gather to remember the awesome works of God in our midst during the last year.  Don’t miss it!  Come prepared to share what you’ve seen Him do this year.  But also, don’t let the praise stop on Sunday. Take it from there to your family and friends as you celebrate this Thanksgiving week. Let them hear the praise. Who knows, they just might join the chorus and applaud their Creator, too!

Joining the Chorus of Praise,

Brent