The Holy Spirit

Before Jesus left His disciples to Heaven [Where He is preparing a place for us even now] He said that unless he left them, the Holy Spirit wouldn't be able to come and guide them. He assured them that this "helper" or "advocate" would be with them always, teaching them and guiding them in their ministries. To help them share the gospel with those who need to hear about God's amazing Love and share with them about His gift of eternal life.

We also have the Holy Spirit with us when we've accepted Jesus Christ as our personal Savior. When we do this there are times when we may feel convicted that what we are doing is wrong, or even feel an urge to speak to someone who maybe most times we don't even know. We shouldn't ignore this warnings or convictions to either stop what we are doing, or to speak and share with someone the greatest gift.

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Winter Retreat!!

For those of you who will be going on the winter retreat with us next weekend [Feb 18-20] Its coming up pretty quick. We are excited to be able to go have fun and get to know you all even better, but most important and even more exciting than that, it will be amazing to see everyone grow closer to God. There are going to be lots of fun stuffs to keep everyone pretty occupied so looking forward to it!! I suppose we'll hafta start packing pretty soon, or if yer already packed, then yer more on top of it than I am!!

Blessings~

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Welp, for those of you that came to 3D wednesday night, thanks for coming and spending time with all of us =] For those that couldn't sorry we missed you. =[ We had a lot of fun playing all sorts of neat-O Christmas games and had some Christmas Trivia. We had a White Elephant gift exchange and I think this year we saw more stealing going on which made it a blast!!

There will not be any youth group the next two weeks due to Christmas and New Years, so be safe, have fun, remember that Jesus is the real reason to celebrate Christmas and see you all next year Lordwilling. We love you all!! =]]

Zechariah

For those of you who didn't get to make it to 3D tonight, we learned about Zechariah. Zechariah was a prophet who's name means: "Yahweh Remembers" which was a very key point to the entire book. In the book we learned about God's message to Zechariah and to the people of Israel. How He wanted them to complete rebuilding the temple that was started over seventy years after it had originally been destroyed. The main point of the book of Zechariah is this: God remembers, God delivers, God restores.

If God has called you to do something, go and do it because you have no idea how He is going to use you in the process of moving and following God's will.

Jeremiah and the Lock-In

So nathan brought the message to us last night on jeremiah [the weeping prophet] and the people of israel. Israel had been really backsliding and began to put other things before God and jeremiah had told the people the violence and destruction was going to come out of what they were doing.

I think one of the verses he shared last night should be one we think about this week and try and work on it in our own lives.

"Because from the least of them even to the greatest of them, Everyone is given to covetousness; And from the prophet even to the priest, Everyone deals falsely." Jeremiah 6:13

We need to understand that none of us are perfect and we will all make mistakes. This verse points out that EVERYONE, not just some, is given to things that are unholy and that we all deal falsely, lying, cheating, stealing etc...

Not a single one of us is excluded from this and whether we like it or not we are and always will be sinners, but if we truly repent, make a 180 degree turn and confess to the Lord our sin and choose to follow after Him, He will forgive us.

Lock-In Info

Our 3D lock-in starts next friday night on september 24th at 7pm at the church where we will meet fer a game of sardines before going to the libertyville sports complex fer tons of games, food, prizes and loads of fun!! It'll go till Saturday morning at 8 so come and see!! The last day of registration was last night so hopefully you all got yer checks and waivers sent in. Sorry I didn't get around to putting this notice up sooner. We look forward to seeing you there =]]

God bless and have a greatastic week!!

Surrender

Tonight, Everett shared from the book of Isaiah and we had a time of reflection and prayer on and with things in our lives that we thought may be hindering us from fully serving the Lord. If we repent, God grants us salvation, if we don't, there is nothing but destruction that awaits us.

Is there something in yer life that you want to change?? Give it to God today. Last week I challenged some of my girls in small groups to give up something that they normally can't do without and use the time spent on that one thing to spend more time with God in prayer and in His word. Fer some they chose to do certain things fer a couple days, some one-two weeks on others. If you feel like yer making something other than God number #1 in yer life then maybe its time fer you to take a "sacrifice challenge" see how you do, and see if you feel closer to the Lord when yer actually making time fer Him. Fun things are ok and their not bad things, its just how you moderate them ;]

Have a great week guys and be blessed!!

Also, don't forget to wish cathy, sarah [i believe it was] and vince a happy birthday!! =]]

Words of Wisdom

Tonight noah brought the message to us on solomon and the things of this world. He took us through the first few chapters of ecclesiates and brought forward some very interesting points, one that will stick to my mind well is "chasing the wind" how the bible explains that certain things we strive for here on earth will be meaningless when we die and depart this world, it will be like chasing the wind as it says multiple times in the book of ecclesiates [which is another great fact that noah also pointed out]

Take some time to read through ecclesiates 7 and try and determine what you think the verses could mean, back then, and also fer today.

God bless~

Trusting in the Salvation of the Lord

Everett brought the message to us last night and we read along in psalm 13 where king david is feeling distressed. We learned that when bad things happen to us, whatever they may be, whether losing a loved one, or just having a bad day in general that its ok to pour our hearts out to the Lord and be angry with him. Its ok so just be like: "God why is this happening?? where are you??"

Now even though you may be upset in the moment there will be some point where you'll get through it and in that moment, be sure to praise him fer the things that he has already given and blessed you with. Trust in him to bring you through the hard times and know that his saving grace, and unfailing love is more than enough.