Grace Abounding

Join us this Sunday, October 23, as we observe the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church. Our Sunday service at Grace Church of Alexandria will feature Scripture, prayers, a video, resources, and a sermon from Hebrews 13:3 to highlight the needs of oppressed Christians throughout the world and how we can serve them.

You may notice we’re observing this important day on October 23 instead of November 13, as the poster suggests. Since a special speaker is already lined up for that Sunday in November at Grace Church, this coming Sunday we’re taking the whole service to draw attention to the persecuted church.

International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church from Christian Freedom International on Vimeo.

Also, here’s a recent blog post I wrote on how to pray for the persecuted church.

Last Sunday at Grace Church of Alexandria we celebrated Reformation Day. Annually, we set aside a Sunday to re-tell how the gospel was recovered at the end of the Middle Ages. This year we told the story of Martin Luther on the 493rd anniversary of the day he definitively nailed 95 theses onto the doors of the Castle Church in Wittenburg, Germany.

If you’re interested in learning more about how God was at work during the Reformation, here are the two books I recommended during Sunday’s sermon:

• The Unquenchable Flame: Discovering the Heart of the Reformation by Michael Reeves.

This short paperback makes church history and the Reformation come alive like no other book I’ve read. A worthwhile read that retells fascinating stories of believers and rehearses the essential doctrines that were recovered during this theological renaissance.

• Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther by Roland H. Bainton.

Bainton’s classic biography of Martin Luther is a page-turner. With the skill of a master storyteller, he brings to life the millieu and role of the German monk. This book will whet your appetite to read more about the Reformation.

This rock marks where Jonathan Edwards preached his famous sermon “Sinners In the Hands of an Angry God” in a church building that used to stand there. The rock sits alongside a busy road in Enfield, Massachusetts, is a testament that the Holy Spirit worked mightily in a visible and undeniable way as Edwards preached the Gospel on July 8, 1741. If you heard this past Sunday sermon at Grace Church, you heard me mention this famous rock.

Christy and I stopped here 2 weeks ago on our vacation to the coast of Maine and took this picture. Just think…the Great Awakening began as pastor and theologian Jonathan Edwards preached on this spot, leading to the conversion of tens of thousands throughout the United States and Great Britain to begin worship God! I pray the words of an ancient hymn, which says, “Lord, we long to see your churches filled!”