A Three Pronged Approach

At Cottrell Corners Community Church we summarize our goals with three short words: up, out, and in. We desire to reach up to God through worship. We want to reach in to the church through discipleship. And we want to reach out to our community and our world through evangelism. Our guest speaker reminded us about evangelism on Sunday, and that reminder caused me to consider how we are doing on all three of our goals.

This congregation has advanced significantly in the area of worship. Of course we gather every Sunday morning to worship God as a group. Recently our worship team had the priviledge of attending a conference together. They have been putting some of the things we learned into practice in recent weeks.

I have been pleased with the growth of our church in the area of discipleship. Discipleship is simply teaching people how to live more like Jesus. We do this through a host of Bible studies, sermons, children's programs, and special meetings. We intend to add a Youth Group next month to help our teens grow in their faith as well.

This church was established based on reaching out in evangelism. And our guest speaker on Sunday reminded us that we need to get back to work in that area. He reminded us that we all know people that the rest of us in the church don't know. It is our responsibility to use our relationships in a way that encourages our friends to trust Christ as their Savior from sin. I hope to have more teaching about this topic in the coming year. And I hope on a personal level to do a better job in developing relationships with people outside of the church.

One thing that we all realize will assist us in reaching up, out, and in will be a new building. The Building Committee is still working and praying diligently toward that end. We have made plans. We have toured other buildings. We have begun to raise money. We have contacted builders and engineers and architects. We have investigated financing. But there is still more to do. Please continue to pray that God would provide our congregation with a building that would indeed help us to accomplish our three pronged approach of reaching up, out, and in.