Walk the talk

Blessings my dear brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus;

     Well, it's definitaly been a busy week and I for one am feeling it.

     Monday was spent putting together the last toutches for this week's lesson for the Bible study we have going on FaceBook.  Right now we have 192 members and growing each week.  You can find it in the Bible study section on the G.L.O.V.E. website but if you are able I really reccomend doing it on FB where you can get others comments.  You can find it under G.L.O.V.E. Bible study in groups or just send a friend request to me by searching Tom Towles (there are about 6 of us listed so look for the picture of me speaking with a mic).  Once I get you on my friends list I'll send you an invitation for the group.

     Tuesday and Wednesday were spent writing my sermon for the website for this Sunday.

     Thursday and Friday went to working on our Friday night family fun festivals.  This was supposed to be the last one but our pastor asked me to do one more in October although we will be moving it to a Saturday afternoon.  This was our second year for this and has I feel been great.  Once again we have gained new people arrending our church and even more who are now aware of us.  I want to thank all the people who helped out noting especially those who came from Betheny and Mt. Ollivet United Methodist churches here in Wichita.

     Today started with setting up a drink and snack section for the Bishop's Bike challenge.  There were 3 groups going 18, 50 and 100 miles.  O was totally humbles sitting there helping pour drinks when this sweet lady who is 88 years old rode up.

     After that I spent the day putting together the musuc and power point for tomorrow's service.  I am really looking forward to this week as Beautiful Becky is preaching.  Her topic is :Living Sacrifices" so it should be wonderful.

     If you have never volunteered in a retirement home to preach or do a Bible study you don't know what you are missing.  But I admit that there have been times wgen I have wondered if I really made a difference in their lives.  After all, whar could I really offer to these people who had lived so much more than I.  Dis what I did really matter or did they even remember me when I left?  Last night I got my answe.  I have this one sweetheart of a lady who has over time become one of my favorites.  I've even gone just to visit her at times even though I knew that she would just spend the time telling me the same 3 or 4 stories over and over.  With a memory like that I was sure she never remembered me, but then she did celebrate her 100th birthday last May.  You know, having spent a long wonderful life married to a pastor she gad 2 gouls left in life that she rtells me every time I see her.  She wants to live to be 110 which is the time God set for man and she has always said she wants to go out still praising God.  She has told me over and over that you can't just talk the talk, but that you have to walk the talk which means praising Him constantly.  WellI now kmow that she did remember me because my name was on the list of people she wanted called when she passed on yesterday.  She may have missed the mark by 10 years but she made it with flying colors where her praise was concerned.  Miss Dorothy you will never know how much you have affected the one who was there to offer help to you.  You gave me so much more than you ever took.  For you dear lady I will continue to walk the talk each day.

God bless you all,
Pasor Tom

Blessings to all of my brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus;


     Ok, so it hasn't quite been 6 months since my last post here.  Hopefully you have been reading my weekly messages on our website and are still familiar with some of the things I have been up to. I have been very busy over the last months, but I decided tonight that it's time to start writing my blogs again as well and rededicate them to use in spreading the Great News.


     The church I am a member of here received a new pastor last July and I have been working hard with him ever since.  This is his first appointment, but his father is also a Methodist pastor with a church in Salina Ks. so he has a lot of wonderful ideas for improvement and is trying to implement as many of them as possible in order to serve as many as we can in as many ways as we can.  He has turned the English part of our worship music over to me (we are a bi-lingual congregation) which I love as I know how music can reach so many emotionally and I'm blessed in the fact that like me he is a fan of modern Christian rock, so it's a labor of love.  I also put together the power points to show during each service.  I started out by just getting free slides online and inserting the text, but have now graduated to making my own on Microsoft Paint.  Now each slide has our church name at the top,  pictures on the left and our theme for the week on the bottom.  Right now we are taking part in the rethink church program (www.rethinkchurch.org) so that will be the theme throughout this month.  Also I did the planning and organizing for our annual Family Fun Festival which takes place each Friday evening during September.  It really is a great way to let the community know about your church.  Last years event saw 3 new families come into our congregation as a direct result and 4 children of one of therm baptized.  I am also starting a Methodist men's group which will meet on the 3rd Saturday of each month and working to put together both adult and kids Sunday school classes.  Plus I am researching different things we can do to raise funds so that we can pay for all of these new things.  And if it sounds like I am doing it all trust me, Pastor Walter has several others working just as hard as I including my wife Beautiful Becky.  He eve talked my son Just Call Me Joe into coming to church and running the new sound system when we get it and he had quit attending church after some bad experiences at our last church.  Praise God my whole family is now back worshiping Him where we belong.


     I have been hard at work on our ministry website and Facebook.  We now have 184 members in our Facebook Bible study group.  This week made lesson 19 in a series I have planned to go for 43 weeks unless I need to add something in the end.  Right now we are looking into prophesy using the book of Daniel.  I have also been working just as hard to get up new materials on the website as well as redoing all of the old pages to match our current format.  It's a lot of work, but we just won our first award for it.  Admittedly it's only second place not first, but to me it still means that we are reaching people with God's Gospel and that's what it's all about.


     Well, I do have many more things to talk about but I think that this is enough for now.  I promise that my next post will be no more than a week away.


     In parting I would like to offer this prayer:


     Dear Heavenly Father, we ask you to bless all of us here in our church without walls as we seek to know You better and spread Your word.  We ask that you watch over, protect and guide us so that by imulating You we can help to bring even one person even one step closer to accepting You and the eternal salvation you offer through Your precious son Jesus the Christ, Amen


God bless each of you.
Pastor Tom