Thank you for being willing to serve Jesus and our COTR
family as Community Group Leaders!
When you meet as a small community within our larger body,
you are actively “doing” the Gospel together- you are making “Life. Community.
Purpose. ” a living reality!
Thank you for opening your heart and homes to Jesus for the
purpose of developing fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ! He WILL bless
your gathering!
I want to reintroduce myself to you- I am Mary Kaye Abbott-
I am part of the Community Group Team headed by Joe Richter and under Pastor
Kevin. My role on the team is as the Community Group Leaders’
“Shepherd”- I pour into you and your own individual walks with Jesus, as you
pour into the folks in your community groups.
As your shepherd, I hope that we will spend the next year (or
more!) getting to know each other while encouraging one another to love and
obey Jesus more deeply-
I will be sending out a weekly devotional to encourage and
challenge our hearts to love and respond to JESUS, THE ONE who loves us best
and most! I can’t think of a better way to serve my COTR family than by pouring
into you dear people who are pouring into your community groups, one person at
a time.
I don’t know about you, but I can get shortsighted as I walk
in life? Life is busy, challenging, often difficult and frequently painful- my
focus is easily lost and distracted….I need to continually “reset” and refocus
on what’s truly important and needful. So, as I’ve prayed for our discipleship journey
together, I asked Jesus to clarify… to “reset” my mind and heart to see what’s
essential- in HIS eyes… As I waited and listened, Jesus continually brought me
back to the Garden of Eden-where God first breathed His Gospel Grace into human
history. He reminded me that just as His
merciful grace saved me from being rightly condemned as the sinner I was/am,
that same grace “birthed” me into new life and a permanent relationship as HIS
daughter where I am loved, known and welcomed!
How awesome and magnificent is this LORD GOD who chooses to love so
lavishly! This Savior who took all my
sin, guilt, rebellion and shame unto Himself- bore and paid all so that He
could restore a broken relationship with me??
How can I NOT steadfastly love Him in return? Serve HIM whole
heartedly?!
Well, unfortunately, my heart wanders easily despite being
loved by this gracious King and SaviorL
My “ self-directed” heart constantly needs realigning and
refining….I was saved by Jesus’ marvelous grace and I am to walk by it- but how
often I try to follow JESUS in my own strength and wisdom rather than HIS! I
need to be reminded of WHOSE I am, and
WHY I am His- the gospel of JESUS CHRIST reminds me both of my need for
salvation/true life in Christ and IS the provision for that need! Despite
knowing and believing this truth, I can gloss over the MAGNITUDE of His grace
thereby diminishing its effectiveness in my daily walk …That’s why I need to be reminded of “the big overall
picture” of God’s grace via the gospel every day- I am very easily
distracted. All humans are. Once “saved” or “rebirthed” by the Holy
Spirit, we are a constant work in progress! But, praise Jesus! He says that
what HE starts, HE brings to completion! (Phil.1:6)
The Apostle Peter said in 2 Peter 1:12:
“So, I will always remind you of these things even though
you know them and are firmly established in the truth you now have…”
Paul was reminding the early believers (primarily Gentiles
in Galatia, Pontus, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia (regions north of the Taurus
Mountains in Asia Minor/part of the Roman empire- Now, present-day Turkey) that
they’ve been saved by the Gospel of Jesus through faith in Him by grace, and
that they are to be daily transformed to reflect the Christ they believe in,
have life in, and follow. Jesus’ new
life, imparted to them via His Holy Spirit, brings the fruit of a changed
life….not by their own “doing”, but by HIS LIFE working in them so that they
each respond and surrender to Him and He empowers them to live by grace through
His Holy Spirit.
What was good for the early disciples is STILL true and good
for us “modern” disciples.
So, for that reason we will weave the gospel message into
everything we think about. Indeed, as
Pastor Jack Miller of Westminster Theological Seminary said…”Preach the gospel
to yourself every day.” You might not know who Jack Miller was, but the brother
was right on!
If not for that amazing grace, we’d still be dead in our
sin… We’d have no access to God’s power to change. We’d be hopeless, clueless, lost and
alone…Fatherless, sinful, sad orphans chained to a very nasty sin-filled world.
SO! Because of HIS AMAZING GRACE, we will celebrate Jesus
and HIS gospel message by preaching it to ourselves daily!
It is my hope that you will take the time each week to read,
pray over and engage with the devotional and learn to see by the Holy Spirit’s
power, how MUCH JESUS Christ who is the ONE TRUE GOD loves you, desires to
transform you and bring to you HIS fullness of JOY!!
My heart’s prayer is that we will see and taste HOW GOOD the
LORD GOD is, HOW DEEP AND WIDE HIS LOVE FOR US IS… and that we respond to Him
and grow in our appetite for HIM….
I close with these verses I carry on my heart for you all-
please pray it for me as well?
Ephesians 3:16-19
“..that He would grant you, according to the riches of His
glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, so
that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; AND that you, being rooted
and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the
breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ which
surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.’
Psalm 34:8
“Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who
takes refuge in HIM.”
To Him be the glory!
See you next week. We
start in Genesis!
Your sister in JESUS,
Mary Kaye Abbott
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