Monday, May 21, 2012

Check out our PULSE Blog!


Hey everyone.  Welcome to our new PULSE blog!  Our goal in this is to keep all of us as connected as possible over the course of the summer.

As we learned from Mannie and Raquel at the last PULSE of the semester, one of the greatest tools that the devil will use to deflate our faith this summer is isolation and disconnection.  We know that this blog is only a small effort to intercept the "Summer" agenda against us, but hopefully it will be a catalyst for all of us to maintain fellowship these next few months.

Yesterday at Trinity Church, we were looking at John 15 where Jesus is talking to His disciples about "abiding in the vine".  He told them, as He does to us today, that HE is the vine, and WE are the branches, and that GOD is the vine dresser.  This is a great picture for us to see the relationship that we have with Him.  The branches can only exist and be nourished when they are connected to the source of their nutrition, the vine.  The vine dresser is the one who prunes, cleans up and beautifies the branches.

This weekend, I was trimming some trees in my front yard.  I noticed that one of the branches was completely dead.  Although it was attached to the tree, it was somehow disconnected from the source of nutrition that the tree was offering.  As a result, the branch was dry, irrelevant, and quite ugly.  As the villain in this story, all I had to do was reach up and gently pull on the branch and it fell right off.  It didn't even put up a fight!  It's almost as if it knew that it didn't stand a chance because it was so malnourished.

It's impossible for us to be connected to each other, to our church and to serving God without being connected to Jesus.  All of the services/Bible studies/fellowships/conferences and such will serve us little if we aren't connected, first and foremost, to Jesus.  He is the vine, He is the One who nourishes our souls, and He is the One who will protect us from being snapped off of the tree.  Disconnection from Him causes us to be like that dead branch - dry, irrelevant and spiritually ugly.  The villain will no doubt attempt to snap your branch from off of the vine, but if you are connected to the Vine, He doesn't stand a chance.

This summer, let's resolve to stay connected to the Vine through prayer, reading of the Word, sharing our faith with others, and by maintaining fellowship with one another.  This could be the greatest spiritual summer you've ever had, or not.  The choice really belongs to you.

Please use this blog as a place to connect, fellowship, post prayer requests and praise reports.  I look forward to hearing from each of you, and can't wait until we all see each other again.

Pastor Jerret