The following is the bulletin note for a sermon on July 4, 2021, and is a summary of thoughts from Eric Metaxas’s book If You Can Keep It: Os Guinness views America through what he calls the “Golden Triangle of Freedom”: Freedom requires virtue. Virtue requires faith. Faith requires freedom. The founders understood that if this American experiment were to work, we would have to be built on virtue. We were the only nation founded on a creed, not on blood or on a despot (or group of anarchists) overthrowing another despot. To become truly great, the founders knew we needed
Read more →We make our summer interns earn their keep, but we treat them with respect and do our best to train them in ministry. It’s only a short time that they’re here, but we accomplish a lot. Here’s all the information that our interns (Bro. Zack Roberts and Bro. Evan Myers) needed to get going at our church: 2021 INTERNSHIP CALVARY BAPTIST CHURCH Temecula, CA | Pastor Ryan Rench WELCOME! This is all new for me. It’s my first time to Pastor. It’s my first time to have interns while trying to also lead a staff. It’s my first time
Read more →I wrote the following article for the Baptist Times magazine Youth to Truth column, submitted March 4, 2020: With 10,000 Baby Boomers retiring every day, transitions are shaking everyone up. Take Disney, for example. When CEO Bob Iger retired last month, Disney’s stock dropped 2.8% the next day—a collective shiver rippling down the spine of investors who bailed before the new guy could tank the company. I can’t blame them. No one can read the future, and uncertainty makes people nervous. The best way to calm people’s fears is to have a succession plan, even in youth ministry. Although I
Read more →ALWAYS SAY YES Improv rule number one: ALWAYS SAY “YES.” If your partner says, “I’m rowing my boat across a sea of elephants,” you never say, “That’s ridiculous… it’s actually a regular sea. Of water.” *crickets.* You said, “NO.” Where are you supposed to go from there? Instead, no matter how crazy it sounds, it’s always a “YES, AND…” answer: “Yeah! And you’re rowing SUPER fast for someone with no arms! How are you doing that?” Spontaneity adds a wonderful spark of fun and inclusion and lets people know you’re on their side. The “Um… ACTUALLY” person always has a
Read more →“This could change your life!” Psh, yeah right. Feels like an empty promise. I’ve been let down by too many “this could change your life” statements. I mean… I’ve been told that about everything from a $2000 webinar to a $2 bag of sour gummies. Call me crazy, but not much changes my life. But this… this will change your life. I promise. Er… it’ll change your life IF you change your life. The dirty little secret of changing your life is that YOU change your life. Not the program. Not the gummy. You do. I put together a little
Read more →I studied almost 20 hours for last week’s sermon, and it STILL came up short. But it was important. Here’s the gist… Leviticus was a guidebook for the people of God to gain PHYSICAL access to a holy God. The tabernacle was his house, and the way they were made acceptable to be in his presence was through physical sacrifices (chapters 1-7), a physical priesthood (chapters 8-10), and physical laws (what to do with diet, uncleanness, leprosy, etc.) When they obeyed, God blessed them physically—rain, flourishing crops, peace from battle, etc.—and when they disobeyed, they were physically cursed—drought, death, captivity,
Read more →“I would OBVIOUSLY follow God if He talked directly to me.” In last Sunday’s Rooted Sunday school Zoom meeting, I encouraged my class to stay in the Word of God. Something in my Bible reading jumped out to me that morning like it never had before. Solomon had the law, and several of David’s Psalms, so he definitely knew better than to take all those wives, but in 1 Kings 11 he ignored the Pentateuch. “Well… maybe it was just a cultural thing, and all his concubines were just part of what they did back then. You can’t really blame
Read more →The following article first appeared in the baptisttimes.org. Playing Guitar in a Grocery Store I was doing what normal homeschool teens do—playing my guitar in a grocery store. It was a gig in exchange for an amplifier, but an event that impacted my life. A man asked, “Are you Christian?” and the conversation progressed to the topic of sign gifts. I cared about truth, and needed answers from God’s Word. I went home and devoured a book from my youth group, crafting a lengthy response email to the man. It probably did nothing to change his mind, but the research sure helped
Read more →I write two notes per week to our teens. This was one of them: Do you ever get “gun-shy” when you get in trouble? You know what I mean? You messed something up, or you hurt someone, and from then on, you think that person hates your guts. You walk into a room where they are, and even if you have made it right, it still makes your stomach sink a little. Or, you know you’re falling behind in an area and you feel bad around them. Believe me… I KNOW the feeling! There are times I’m scared to open
Read more →I write two notes per week to our teens. This was one of them: …and you weren’t there with me. It was a bummer. I missed being home, and I missed being in this class, in particular. No, not just this class—but YOU. I missed being around you. I saw a bunch of churches I recognized. I went to college with some of their youth pastors, so I got to catch up with some of them, but what I really missed was having you along for the event. The Youth Rally itself was cool. They do theirs monthly—Bible quiz, games,
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