March 6, 2015

“I am the true grapevine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch of mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and he prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more.  You have already been pruned and purified by the message I have given you.  Remain in me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful unless you remain in me. “Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing.” John 15:1-6

Barbara and I are very eager to see our great-granddaughter in person. Work schedules and bad weather have prevented us from getting down to Roanoke. It is driving us nuts!

We enjoy all of our grandchildren but this will be a new experience for us! What a blessing!

This week-end will provide me another memorable experience when I travel to Las Vegas to meet a group of spiritual grandchildren!

Sunday I will be the guest speaker at Sin City Church in Henderson, Nevada for their first anniversary celebration.

A year ago, Randy and Rhonda Baker were part of a group that launched this church plant committed to the mission of loving people to life. For the past year they have been doing exactly that!

Randy Baker attended the youth group at Princeton Wesleyan Church in Princeton, IL during the ten years I was privileged to lead that church. Randy met a young lady named Rhonda and began bringing her to church. It wasn’t long before she accepted Christ as her Savior. It was my joy to baptize her and lead her through New Believers Class.

Several years later I united them in marriage.

I moved on to another church in the Chicago area and they began their family and stayed very active in their church. After they finished raising their two godly sons, Rhonda began sensing a calling to pastoral ministry. After much prayer, she answered the call and enrolled in seminary. When she received her Master of Divinity Degree she sent out resumes to various churches for a ministry position.

She was offered a top position in the Women’s Ministry at Central Christian Church in Las Vegas. It is a large multi-campus megachurch where she received great training and enjoyed much success in ministry. About a year and a half ago I got an email from Rhonda asking me to pray for her because she was sensing a stirring in her spirit that God had something else in mind for her to do. So I began to do so. A couple of months later she told me that God had put it in her heart to plant a church in the Las Vegas area and there was a group of people who wanted to be part of that faith venture. So they began Sin City Church for the sole purpose of loving people to life. For the past year they have done exactly that!

Since I am their “spiritual father” the people they have loved to life in Jesus can be considered my spiritual grandchildren!

I ask for your prayers as I travel and then as I challenge them with a message God has laid on my heart.

God is indeed faithful to bear fruit through us when we abide in Him!