The Greatest Worship Concert in History

Click Here to Listen to the Sermon for Sunday, January 29, 2012 by Pastor Rodger S. Loar

Scripture Reference: Nehemiah 12:27-47

The Greatest Praise Concert of All Time!

What do you do when life takes a turn for the better? What happens when you’ve been in the depths of depression and despair and you finally come back into the light?  What’s next when you’ve gone from unimaginable grief to unspeakable joy?

You praise God!

Our only hope in this world is God and when He gets you through all of that, you worship Him with everything you’ve got.

Nehemiah and his people encountered that.  They came from absolute defeat to total victory.  So they threw the greatest praise concert of all time.  They mounted two choirs on either side of the city of Jerusalem, on top of the walls, and they sang and played instruments and praised God with total abandon.

Imagine what it would be like to worship God with all you have.  Picture the joy, the passion, the crazy, wild fever of love for God.  It’d be like Times Square at midnight on New Years, but even better.

That’s what heaven is described like in Revelations 7:9-10.

But we don’t have to wait.  Surrender yourself to the Lord.  Express your thankfulness and love for Him throughout your life.  Sing of His great works, dance for Him, raise your hands, and stomp your feet.

Next Sunday when you are in church, don’t worry about what those around you might think: worship with all you have and everything you are. 

Pastor Rodger

Turning Back to God

Click Here to Listen to the Sermon for Sunday, January 22, 2012 by Pastor Rodger S. Loar

Scripture Reference: Nehemiah 8-10

Turning Back to God

When was the last time you wept at hearing God’s word?  Have you ever?  Has God’s word every broken your heart?  Have you ever stopped to consider the depth of your sin, the distance between a sinful human being and a holy God? 

In Nehemiah, the people wept upon hearing God’s word. They realized that they had been away in a foreign land.  They realized that they had lost touch with God.  They realized that more than their physical city was lost, their very holiness was gone too.  So, they wept.

Nehemiah reminded them that this day was holy and that called for joy and rejoicing. 

The same holds true for us.  God’s grace is cause for ultimate rejoicing.

But sometimes I wonder if we need to take a moment.  Let’s stop and not rush to the rejoicing without first recognizing how far away from God we are, how much we need Him to rescue us.  When we realize that, then the joy at knowing that Christ died to bring us back in reconciliation with God will be that much more powerful.

Let me encourage you to take some time in the coming weeks.  As you read God’s word, as you listen to sermons, as you pray to Him; take a little extra time to explore the gulf that lays between you and Him, so you can better experience the joy at knowing that He reached out to you across that divide.

Pastor Rodger



Leading the Way through Troubles

Click Here to Listen to the Sermon for Sunday, January 15, 2012 by Guest Speaker, Pastor Josh Anderson

Scripture Reference: Nehemiah 4-6

I recently heard a quote from a friend:

“Management is about taking care of what you have; leadership is about moving forward.”

As Nehemiah built the Jerusalem wall to protect the God’s people so they could worship in peace, the threats of physical harm, exhaustion and poverty were constant. Instead of “managing” the problems, Nehemiah stayed focused on the task at hand: to build the wall. It was what God had called him to do. He was not going to be deterred in moving forward with the task. When the obstacles arose, he prayed fervently, believed that God was working, and decisively acted toward the problem and the goal. And in fifty-two days, the wall was built!

Where do you need to take decisive action in your relationship with God? Are you moving forward or are you dealing with what you have? Are you leading decisively, or are you managing hesitantly? Following God means leading, not managing. Whatever obstacles may come, don’t let them deter you from the focus in your life: to build the wall!

Pastor Josh Anderson

From Discouragement to Action

Click Here to Listen to the Sermon for Sunday, January 08, 2012 by Pastor Don Allen

Scripture Reference: Nehemiah Chapters 1-3

What challenges do you face today that tempts you to give up? Is your faith in God challenged to the point that you doubt His faithfulness? Today’s Bible Blog invites you to explore these questions by reviewing Nehemiah’s life.

As you learned in yesterday’s message, Nehemiah was a key official in the Persian Empire (as ‘cupbearer to the king’ (see Nehemiah 1:11), Nehemiah functioned as a top advisor). Like many Jews who lived in Persia during the years of exile from Palestine, Nehemiah was keenly interested in the welfare of his homeland. In fact, Ezra the scholar-priest took a group of fellow priests to Jerusalem to rebuild the Temple, which was the center of worship for the Jewish people. After 14 years, the Temple was nearly finished.

You might expect that Nehemiah would be encouraged by the restoration of God’s temple, but in fact he was heartbroken! The reason: the walls surrounding the Temple and the city of Jerusalem were destroyed, leaving both the city and God’s Temple vulnerable to its enemies. Unless someone rebuilds the walls, the Temple would fall and Ezra’s mission would fail. Nehemiah was deeply troubled by this, because God’s reputation was at risk. The people of the Empire may mock the God of the Hebrews. Why would anyone believe in the God of the Jews, if He cannot even protect His place of worship?

This story teaches us a lot about God’s character and how He uses His people to accomplish His purposes. As you face your faith challenges, consider Nehemiah’s life and what he does to restore God’s honor.

1.       Read Nehemiah 1:1-4. In v.4, how does Nehemiah respond to the news from Jerusalem? How is this different or similar to what you did when you last responded to bad news?

2.       Read verses Nehemiah 1:5-11. List the ways that Nehemiah describes God’s nature in this prayer. After listing this, try to summarize the part of God’s character that Nehemiah focuses on in his prayer.

3.       Based on what you discovered from Nehemiah’s prayer to God, how would you change your prayer to God when you face difficult situations?

4.       How grieved are you about the physical and spiritual state of God’s people? Enough to mourn? To fast? To pray? What do you think is God telling you to do about this?

5.       When faced with the spiritual brokenness of other people (or other dangers), some are tempted to cast blame, or to become angry at the terrible state of things. Still others pray and act. What do you think God is telling you to do about this?

Pastor Don

Rebuilding the Wall

Click Here to Listen to the Sermon for Sunday, January 01, 2012 by Pastor Rodger S. Loar

Scripture Reference: Nehemiah 8:10, Romans 8:28, 2Samuel 11:1-27

 Is God at Work in Your Life?

As we read Nehemiah, we see that God can work through non-believers to accomplish His goals.  And, He can definitely use believers to accomplish His goals.  God was at work in this world, helping the Jews get back to Jerusalem and rebuild the temple, rebuild the wall, and rebuild the city.  God was at work in history and God is at work today.

That’s right, He is at work in your life today.  Did you know that?  Have you stopped to notice what He is doing?

This year, we are rebuilding.  We, at MVCC, are working on rebuilding our church body and rebuilding the individuals within.  This year, we invite you to take notice that God is at work in you and He is at work in us.

Like Nehemiah, we may look at this task as daunting, but it can be done.  Like Nehemiah, we will have threats from the outside, people who don’t like faith, don’t like Christians, and don’t want to hear from us.  We will also deal with threats from the inside: gossips, complainers, and the like.  But we are God’s people and we know that He is at work, so we just need to look for the places that He is at work and join Him!

Make a commitment this year to turn back to God, to rebuild your relationship with Him, and to become active in the work that needs to be done.

Pastor Rodger