Upon reading these words again recently, I was shocked at how lightly I had taken this promise of Jesus so many times before. These words are so familiar, yet it was if I was reading them for the first time. Look what it says: “THERE AM I WITH THEM.” It’s such a small word - “I” - but it has so much magnitude. The “I” is the Lord. We are in the presence of Jesus Christ, the Savior and Creator of the world, when we gather together in his name. The world looks for some understanding of God, even longs to catch a glimpse of truth; Yet we who know Christ, actually fellowship with him and have personal audience with the Lord by our faith in the Son of God. This is what makes our gatherings on Sunday mornings so unique to any other meeting that happens in the day-to-day experiences of our lives.

My shock was in how lightly I had taken this promise. And I don’t think I’m alone. Many churches like ours all over the place have been so used to gathering in the name of Jesus that we have lost the impact of this promise of the presence of God. Because of that, we haven’t expected our life in this fellowship of believers to be transforming; we haven’t expected in the time of worship to hear God’s Word of discipline, healing, and renewal; we haven’t expected to be commissioned by this Jesus Christ in our midst to speak and be this good news to the world and to heal the broken-hearted; we haven’t expected really great things to happen - things that are only possible in the presence of the good and perfect God. And so really great things have not happened when churches lose sight of who and whose we are.

This doesn’t have to be our story, however, and I think that the more we really bring our whole beings into the presence of Christ, and submit to the magnitude of a God who comes to dwell among us—the more we will see that we are each part of something bigger and better than we can imagine, and that we are promised to have regular encounters with the God who’s changing this universe through his people.

With this in mind, I would like to offer a very few comments in this newsletter on the various aspects of our Sunday worship gatherings, as I believe we need regular and frequent reminding of why we do certain things that we do. Everything on Sunday is to prepare us for encountering God in this special relationship we received as followers of Christ. I hope you will prayerfully look over what I have included.

Also, I would like to make a plug for Synod School, which is coming up this summer in Storm Lake. Catalogs are available in the office, and there is a list of a few of the classes offered in this newsletter. It is a wonderful opportunity for people all over our Synod (which extends from the eastern border of Wisconsin, south through Iowa and Nebraska, north through Minnesota and west through the Dakotas—so it is very conveniently located for us!) to really gather in Christian community for a number of experiences you simply can’t get in any other place. I hope you will give it a shot, and see why so many people look forward to this week of the year. Take care and God bless you all.

Your friend in the Ministry
Matt Milligan

Did you know?  If you missed a sermon, or would like to listen to it again (and, c’mon—who doesn’t?), you can listen to them over the internet. Go to www.sacpc.com, and click on the button that says “sermons” on the left side of the screen. That’s it. Now enjoy! :)