Category: Bulletin Articles

Welcome to the Groveland Church of Christ.

In this section, you will find announcements of upcoming congregation events and fellowship activities as well as articles of spiritual interest and encouragement.

By Glen Elliott via Bulletin Digest

“One of the primary building blocks of a nation is the character of its people. Webster, in one of his renderings, notes that character is moral excellence and strength. Our nation, founded upon godly principles, has enjoyed unparalleled success and prosperity. In stark contrast, the French revolution of the eighteenth century, founded upon godless principles, produced anarchy and repression. We may confidently rely on the age-old axiom: “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people” (Proverb 14:34). The building of character will be the key to the continued success of our nation.

Character is that which is supplied by the inward and spiritual part of man. While the Bible stresses the importance of living exemplary lives in the outward man, it does so by encouraging the transformation of the inward man into the likeness of Jesus Christ (Colossians 3:9-11; Romans 12:1-2).

There are three persons in each of us, as Dr. Childress affirms:
1) What people think we are.
2) What we think ourselves to be.
3) What God really knows us to be.

Character, in the spiritual sense, is what God knows us to be. God does not accept pretended religion, but requires service from the heart. When we serve God in the spirit as
well as in the letter of the law, we find Christianity to be a character-building way of life. This is not only good for our nation; it is essential to the salvation of our souls

By Robert Kargbo (Bulletin Digest)
 
“He reached down from on high and took hold of me; he drew me out of deep waters.” (Psalm 18:16) Water is one of the most powerful forces on earth. It sustains life, cleanses, and shapes the world. But it can also bring destruction—storms rage, floods rise, and oceans swallow ships whole.
 
Scripture often uses water as a symbol of both danger and deliverance. When the Israelites were trapped between Pharaoh’s army and the Red Sea, God parted the waters to save them. When Jonah ran from God, he was swallowed by the depths until repentance brought him back to dry land. When Peter walked on water toward Jesus, doubt nearly drowned him—until Christ reached out His hand.
 
Have we ever felt like we were drowning in life? Fear, shame, and regret can rise so high that we struggle to stay afloat. But Psalm 18:16 reminds us that God is not distant from our struggles. He reaches into our deepest waters, pulls us up, and sets our feet on solid ground.
 
Water is also a symbol of renewal. Through baptism, we are buried with Christ and raised into new life. The very element that can destroy also brings salvation. When Noah and his family were saved from a world of sin, they passed through water into a new beginning.
 
Who is praying for us? Perhaps our parents have whispered
our names before God since we were born. Maybe a friend
or someone we don’t know has lifted us up in prayer. These
prayers are spiritual lifelines, unseen currents that carry us
toward the shore.
 
If we feel overwhelmed today, remember this: the same
God who pulled Peter from the sea, who split the Red Sea,
and who washes us clean in baptism, is reaching for us
now. His hands are strong. His mercy is deep. 

Joe Slater

The New Testament sometimes poses “letter” and “spirit” in contrast to each other. Christians “serve in the newness of the spirit and not in the oldness of the letter” (Romans 7:6). How should we understand this distinction? Newness and oldness should clue us in! This very verse begins, “But now we have been delivered from the law.” Oldness, then, would refer to the Law of Moses in contrast to the newness of the Gospel (New Covenant).

The same distinction occurs in 2 Corinthians 3:6 with an even more obvious application to the Old and New Covenants: “The letter kills, but the spirit gives life.”

Sad to say, many carelessly refer to “letter” as strict compliance with the text of Scripture, as opposed to a more generalized and loose interpretation (spirit). We hear such things as, “We must go by the spirit of the law rather than the letter of the law.” No doubt some have gone to unwarranted extremes and missed God’s intent, just as Jesus said the Pharisees did by straining out gnats and swallowing camels (Matthew 23:24). But was this Paul’s subject in the passage quoted above? No, indeed!

The apostle himself makes it crystal clear he is contrasting Old and New Covenants, not strict and loose interpretation! Immediately before saying “the letter kills but the spirit gives life,” Paul stated that God “made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter but of the spirit.” He went on to refer to the Old Covenant as “the ministry of death, written and engraved on stones” (3:7) and a “ministry of condemnation” (3:9).

In these contexts, then, letter and spirit are metaphors for the Old and New Testaments. The Old Testament lacked any provision to make sinners right with God. By contrast, the New Testament has the blood of Jesus which paid the atonement price in full. Glory be to God!

Joe Slater via Bulletin Digest
 
Jesus’ parable of the persistent widow concluded with a promise and a question. Jesus promised that God will speedily avenge His persecuted people; and he asked, “Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth” (Luke 18:8).
 
Trials and mistreatment test our faith. The persistent widow in the parable kept pleading to the unjust judge for justice and finally received it. How much more should the servants of a just and faithful God keep praying even under the worst of circumstances?
 
But some disciples allow severe trials to destroy their faith. In the parable of the sower (Luke 8), Jesus spoke of the rocky soil where the tender plant had no depth of root and perished in the hot sun. This illustrated people with shallow faith who “in time of temptation/trial fall away” (8:13).
 
Christians in the early church endured devastating persecution from both Jews and the Roman government. Many remained faithful unto death; but some surrendered their faith to save their lives. They gave up before God avenged the blood of the martyrs by destroying Jerusalem and causing the fall of the Roman Empire.
 
Faithful believers have continued to be abused down through the centuries by Catholics, Protestants, atheist governments, and others. Here again, some brethren remained steadfast while others threw in the towel. Nobody said waiting for God to take His vengeance would be easy.
 
If persecuted Christians should remain faithful under such challenging circumstances, how much more ought we to serve the Lord zealously when the worst we face might be an ugly remark or a door slammed in our face? We know not when Jesus will return, but when He does, will He find you being faithful?

Adapted from an article by Joe Slater

July 4, 2026, marks 250 years since John Hancock and 55 other delegates of the thirteen colonies signed the Declaration of Independence. As flawed human beings, neither they nor we have ever completely succeeded in practicing the lofty goals and principles of that matchless document. Nevertheless, those goals and principles shine forth like a beacon to challenge us to improve.

“Righteousness exalts a nation, But sin is a reproach to any people” (Proverbs 14:34). No nation in history has been without fault; that certainly includes America! Genocide against the original inhabitants of the country and the institution of slavery are but two of many stains that tarnish the nation’s image. Denying or minimizing those sad realities only prevents us from improving.

It is equally erroneous and counterproductive to ignore improvement while denouncing the entire nation because perfect solutions haven’t been reached. As long as flawed humans are in charge (and that will always be the case), ideal solutions aren’t even in the realm of possibility. Humans will never create Utopia!

Christians can and should be a preserving influence. A mere ten righteous people would have moved the Lord to spare the sinful city of Sodom (Genesis 19:32). The very sin that spelled Sodom’s doom was heralded all of last month in America as something to be proud of! The same Satanic forces are in a dither now that their “right” to slaughter pre-born humans will be restricted in several states. Given the genocidal and racist nature of abortion in America, the hypocrisy is staggering.

While never stooping to their level of vulgarity or resorting to violence, we must kindly, firmly, and plainly teach and practice the truth as revealed in God’s word. May God help us to be the salt of the earth and light of the world!

Joe Slater

“Pardon Definition: A pardon is a government decision to allow a person who has been convicted of a crime, to be free and absolved of that conviction, as if never convicted” (Duhaime’s Law Dictionary; duhaime.org).

That is essentially what the New Testament term justification means. You know you did the crime (sin). God knows it, too. But he acquits you of the charge – finds you “not guilty” even though everyone knows you did it. How can a holy, righteous, just God do that? Only by accepting the penalty Jesus paid for you.

How can you know God has pardoned you? Sincere religious people may say, “I’m just putting my trust in Jesus.” So far so good, but is “trust” merely an exercise of the heart? Suppose a death row inmate summons the warden and says, “open the prison gate and let me go! The Governor has pardoned me!” The warden asks, “what evidence shows that the Governor has pardoned you?” The convict replies, “I have full confidence in the Governor; I’m certain he has pardoned me.” If you’re the warden will you turn him loose?

Another prisoner might say, “I know I’ve been pardoned because I feel it right here in my heart!” We can’t know what he feels, but no warden worth his salt would release him based on feelings!

Reliable assurance of pardon comes from a trust that obeys! “Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water” (Heb. 10:22). The reference to baptism is hard to miss, especially considering that baptism is “an appeal to God for a good conscience” (1 Peter 3:21, NASB).

On what basis do you have assurance of pardon?

Do you have a good conscience?

What is its basis?

Joe Slater

Where did the word “father” come from? The background of the Hebrew term (abh) is uncertain, but the Greek term (patḗr) is from a root meaning nourisher, protector, upholder (International Standard Bible Encyclopedia).

Father can refer to your closest male ancestor; that’s the way we commonly think of it. But it can also mean a more distant or remote male ancestor (perhaps what we call a grandfather or a man with several “greats” before grandfather). The Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well said, “Our fathers” (that is, our ancestors from several generations back) “worshiped on this mountain” (John 4:20).

Most importantly, Scripture uses “Father” numerous times denoting God. We who are blessed to be fathers in the flesh strive to demonstrate those positive qualities of nourishing, protecting, and upholding that characterize our Heavenly Father.

Nourishing includes far more than merely providing a balanced physical diet for our children. It involves everything that supports growth; and spiritual growth is even more important than physical growth.

God provides the protection His children need from the storms and pitfalls of life. He is “our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble” (Psalm 46:1). Our children need the same protection from us as their earthly fathers.

Our Heavenly Father upholds us when the world would knock us down and when we, through weakness and sin, fall flat on our faces. Let us, as fathers, do the same for our children.

Rob Redden

“. . . even Solomon in all his glory was not as arrayed like one of these” (Matthew 6:9).
What do the lilies of the field have over the glory of Solomon? Certainly it isn’t the distinction between the beauty of nature and the product of human ingenuity, although that’s worth considering. The flower has glory naturally without any effort of its own. It’s glory is simply being what God meant it to be.

A Solomon may use his potential and gifts from God to promote his own pride and ambition. One scholar wrote concerning man: “. . . the more he becomes what he desires to be the less he resembles what God meant him to be.”

Solomon had glory for sure, but his glory came short of the glory revealed in a flower! Solomon’s glory, unlike the flower, was imperfect because, like the rest of us, he had a competing will that brought him lower than even the beasts of the field. But, unlike the flower, we have the capacity to choose to become what God wants us to be.
We are challenged every day to be what God wants us to be. God wants us to be what He created us to be, and that’s obedient children who trust in His guidance. Instead, we are often full of pride, and ambition, and seek our own glory rather than God’s.

As God’s children, we need to take in the glory of the flowers of the field, and realize that we must submit our will to His, and become more like Jesus.

We are given the resources for this aspiration. “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image
from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:18).