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Church News
Lord
Of
5955 FM 78, San Antonio, TX, 78244
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A New LEEAF Life Endurance Exercises As Assets for Faith PRAYING LISTENING LOOKING What is A New LEEAF? In the Gospel reading from Luke on
November 18 of 2007 I was intrigued by the statement of Jesus, “By your
endurance you will gain your souls.”
(Luke 21:19) I immediately
began to think about the approaching Olympics in I thought about the contrast between
all the stores we saw and heard about the different athletes and the
commitment that many had made to training for their events. I thought of how many of us would become “couch
potatoes” and perhaps become less physically fit as we ate our unhealthy
snacks will watching the athletes compete for their countries. Jesus’ words in Luke began to make
me think about how we train to be people of faith. We expect Olympians to spend decades
becoming physically fit. We rarely
think about exercises that we can do to become faithfully fit and have a
better prayer life. I became even more intrigued by this
idea after attending the Assets Based Ministry Training Event, “Using What
You Have to Get God’s Work Done,” in San Antonio on November 7 & 8,
2008. What if each one of us made a
commitment to train and become fit in our faith and renew and strengthen our
relationship with God? What if we
intentionally decided to develop our individual and communal prayer life as
an asset for ministry and as a way to develop and strengthen our faith? An athlete spends hours each day
developing the endurance that he/she needs to compete. We admire the persistence and perseverance
of those who make their nation’s Olympic teams. We expect them to make major time
commitments to their training. What would happen if each one of us
made a similar commitment to develop our “faith endurance” and our
prayer life? How many hours or minutes
or seconds do each one of us spend exercising our spiritual faith
muscles? Do we even think that it is
important to train to be a better person of faith? Life Endurance Exercises as Assets
for Faith (LEEAF) is a challenge and an opportunity to train and develop “faith
endurance.” and an enduring life of prayer. You will not need to join a gym or purchase
any special or expensive equipment or clothing. You already have the assets of your time and your relationship with God. You will need your Bible. You will need a willingness to start
something new in your life of faith.
LEEAF is a system of four spiritual exercises and assets that you can
practice to develop your faith muscles and help you to develop endurance and
growth in your faith. The four exercises are: Links to the first four LEEAFs are listed Above(click
the word links). You may also email
Pastor Michael at lordoflifesa@juno.com and
I will email or snail mail you copies. Yours in Christ, Pastor Michael
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