My Thank You Note To SweetWater
Posted on October 7, 2009
We are living in a day when positive viewpoints of the Church are rare. The Church has been struggling to have the public influence she once had and the stories of great spiritual growth are few and far between. Our own community in what’s left of the Bible Belt has been a vacuum for many years in regards to a church with a good reputation. Waycross has been my home since I was a little boy and I am not sure if I have ever heard a fellow citizen say anything good about a local church, even routinely blasting the church. Most of the time all that is communicated about any given church is how bad the pastor is or if it is the pastor talking, how much a pain in the hind parts the church people are being. All the while the unchurched watch with great satisfaction how the “religious” hypocrites act just like those who do not claim any church affiliation. Sounds depressing does it not? Well, get your head up there is hope. The hope has shown up as a tiny blip on the radar screen of church annihilation. I am a member of a church that gets “it” and I want to brag on what God is doing through a group of Biblical Fundamentalists that are neither religious, nor judgmental. The people that gather on a regular basis on the corner of Alice Street and Riverside Drive to corporately and personally follow Jesus are a group of misfits. A misfit is someone who cannot fit in anywhere else. I guess that is why I am comfortable among them. Here is the encouraging point, we are not trying to be misfits in order to reach misfits. We are all just trying to be honest with God and one another. My family has had a real encounter with people who care about us. We have never experienced anything quite like it. Churches have loved us in the past, we thought, until they finished getting what they wanted from us. But, these people are not worried about what we give them; they are more concerned with what they can give to us. The love of Jesus is free and our church models His love. The people who gather on the corner of Alice Street and Riverside Drive on a regular basis love unconditionally. It is like I am living at Calvary where my Jesus died on a cross for my sins.
I want to publicly say thank you to my family on the corner for loving me like Jesus loves me. I have never been more proud to call a group of people my friends than I am today in regards to SweetWater. God has allowed me to see Him in action through the hands and feet of His people. Thank you, SweetWater for allowing me to be a part of the family.
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