By Tom Jenkins on 9/26/2008 6:58 AM

  I have a cross-stitch piece my mother made for me years ago. It is a saying she picked up somewhere: "Today is the first day of the rest of your life." It is in a beautiful frame that she had made for it. I think about her when I see it. She made it for me at a difficult time in my life when I was struggling to understand God's will in a difficult situation. Mother wanted me to understand that the past is the past and every day presents me with new opportunities.    Paul says in 1 Corinthians 4 that we "are perplexed but not driven to despair." I think the idea behind his words is that we are perplexed by many things we do not understand but we do not despair. That takes faith. We can despair over what we do not understand unless we face uncertainty with the certainty of Christ dwelling in us, as Paul says to the Colossians, "Christ in you; the hope of glory."   I think that's what my mother was saying to me with the framed words she delicately stitched. You can give in to the despair that may come from dwelling...

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By Tom Jenkins on 9/17/2008 5:52 AM

  I popped in and out of the sanctuary several times yesterday while skilled workmen were installing our new Allen Digital Organ. I returned last night after leaving the annual meeting of our association and found our organist, Nancy Wynn, sitting before the keys playing "Amazing Grace." What a thrill to listen to her play the new instrument.   I've always appreciated good organs. Don Surrency gave me organ lessons many years ago and even on an old Hammond organ with slide bars he could play in such a way as to make the hairs stand up on the back of my neck.   I know that we live in a time where many churches use contemporary music in worship. I believe there is a place for that style of music. It has brought many people to worship that were turned off by other musical expressions. Personally, though, I like our style which our music director, Betsie Forsythe, and I call blended. We sing traditional music mixed with some modern renditions of gospel favorites. Our choirs and soloiosts often favor us with more...

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By Tom Jenkins on 9/4/2008 10:18 PM

  I've been taking some time off this week to oversee the paitning of our house. The people charged with the job have painted the house before. That is, the father of the current painter did the job for me about ten years ago. The son is now running the company, appropriately called a father and son company. I was happy to connect again with the family. I had not known that the son had taken over the company.   My job is to watch what they are doing and be sure the work meets my wife's specifications. It's a plesant job when you have good people working. We should finish tomorrow before Hannah pays us a visit with wind and rain. The bad thing about painting your house is that it makes other things stand out in relief and you begin thinking about upgrading other areas. Maybe we need new cabients in the kitchen and the wallpaper in one of the bathrooms needs to be replaced and also the carpet in the bedrooms and..... You get the drift.   I think there is a lesson in this for the Christian life. C.S. Lewis likened...

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By Tom Jenkins on 8/26/2008 2:40 PM

The presidential election campaign is now with us. The Democrats’ Convention is meeting this week and the Republicans will meet next week. Each party’s nominees will be paraded by adoring delegates before millions of people who will watch by television. Surfing the television channels will reveal multiple venues vetting the conventions. In the following weeks we will be bombarded with ads telling us why one specific candidate and his platform represents our best interests. None of us will be surprised, though dismayed, if the campaign turns ugly. Some political strategists believe that negative campaigns hook the unsure voter so they try to present their opponent representing the antithesis of what is best for America. What is a Christian to do?

            First, Christians should vote. Dismay over the marketing of the presidential candidates should not keep us from voting. In fact, that’s another reason for voting. Vote with the hope that reforms may ultimately reverse the negative trend in politics.

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By Tom Jenkins on 8/7/2008 3:55 PM

  Larry and Dawn Sanders will be with us  Sunday morning. They are missionaries to Milan, Italy.  They serve in a country where witchcraft is openly practiced. The Catholic Church in Italy, as in other parts of the world, is struggling to have enough priests to serve its churches. But witchcraft is flourishing.    These are challenging days for Christian ministry. Some leaders of the Southern Baptist Convention have declared that the convention is becoming irrelevant. They cite decline in baptisms for support and predict a steady decline for the convention if the present course continues.    Polls consistently show that most Americans believe in God. But polls also suggests a wide gap exists between our belief in God and our practice of it. It's the old problem of our "walk" not matching our "talk."    We must continue to advance the Gospel in places like Milan, Italy and Creedmoor, North Carolina. In addition, we must help the people we reach with the Gospel understand that being a Christian is a religion that places demands on us. Saying "Yes" to the Gospel is saying "Yes" to a radical lifestyle when Christianity is compared to the mores of secular culture....

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By Tom Jenkins on 7/28/2008 1:03 PM

Bad things happen to good people as surely as good things happen to bad people. Jesus said that the rain falls on the just and the unjust. We look around us and wonder about the beautiful Christians we know that have to suffer. In my many years of Christian ministry I've never found the "perfect" way to address the suffering of God's people. I know the platitudes that well-meaning people speak when they observe the suffering of others. I've heard them often given as feeble attempts to explain that which cannot be explained. So it really catches my attention when a Christian speaks about suffering from the "inside" rather than a casual observer speaking about it from the "outside." Tony Snow, at one time press secretary to President Bush, recently died from cancer. I ran across a link to an article he wrote about his suffering that I found helpful. Perhaps you will, too. Click Here

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By Tom Jenkins on 7/23/2008 7:52 AM

Our street appearance may soon change. For years FBCC has had an agreement with the company that owns the BP Service Station next to our property on Main Street to use part of their land for parking. The company has been very gracious to allow us to use their property and even allowed us to pave the section that we use. That section is primarily the asphalt paved portion of our parking lot that joins the larger cement section. Now the company plans to demolish the service station and place a convenient store there. The plans call for the new store to take in the area of their property that we have used for parking. A retaining wall will be built to separate our property from the convenient store. Obviously, that will severely impact us. Not only will it change the appearance of our property, but also we will lose some parking spaces and the entrance to the parking area that is nearest to the BP station. The store will be open seven days a week and that may complicate our accessing our parking area on Sundays.

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By Tom Jenkins on 7/9/2008 1:21 PM

Some of our youth, along with adult chaperones, will travel to Wingate University for Passways Camp Sunday, July 13. This is the second year for a group from FBCC to attend Passways at Wingate. It will be a busy week. Each day includes Bible study, worship, work on mission projects, a nightly party and group time. One of the highlights of the week will be the mission projects. Youth and adults will actually go out into the community in and around Wingate for hands-on mission work. One of the best ways to teach missions is through actual involvement.

 

Our youth returned last year filled with excitement from the week and eager to continue exploring the themes presented at Passways. After this year’s Passways experience, it may be time for our youth to plan more involved mission trips to new, perhaps even international, settings.

 

Another group of FBCC members will be traveling to eastern North Carolina to work out of the NC Baptist Men’s Disaster Relief facility in Grifton on July 27....

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By Tom Jenkins on 7/9/2008 1:01 PM

I am not very often surprised. Events in my life usually follow a fairly orderly and predictable pattern. I've spent years planning and executing according to good research and data collection. That's just the way I am. I was, however, truly surprised yesterday by FBCC's Pastor Appreciation Day. I was overwhelemed by the crowd that had gathered in the Family Life Center for, what I thought, was the usual Fifth Sunday lunch following worship. Not so. I noticed that no one was eating when Cheryl and I walked in. Everyone was seated at tables with expectancy written on their faces. Then the greeting by the crowd, the presenation of gifts, kind words of appreciation all signaled a blessed surprise. We will forever cherish the memories of the event and take them out of our hearts now and then and rub on them to get us through difficult times. I will keep the cards and read them many times in the years to come. We will wisely use the moneytary gifts and most especially the gift from the church that can be used to purchase...

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By Tom Jenkins on 6/26/2008 4:25 PM

     Our Academy started the first session of summer camp last week. Boys and girls begin gathering at 7:00 AM for a day filled with activities. In less than two weeks they have enjoyed swimming, a trip to the library, a learning activity at the lake and opportunities for spiritual development. I have the opportunity to participate in the latter. Today we went to the sanctuary and I told the students about the long trip of Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem and the birth of Jesus. I told them about Mary’s wrapping Jesus in strips of cloths and placing him in a feeding trough. Then I told them about the angels visiting the shepherds and the shepherd’s visit to the baby in the manger. We were in the sanctuary so I pointed to one of the stained glasses windows to illustrate the story. The window has a panel depicting Mary and Joseph bowing before Jesus in the manger. Behind Jesus is a shepherd. On one side is a donkey and on the other a sheep. The creator of the window gave vivid and colorful representation to the story...

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