Hi friends,

 

                I hope you have been having a great week this week. I’m still buzzing a bit from how God powerfully met with us as a community last Sunday. So many of you were open and willing to lean into the Holy Spirit of Christ. There were several healings (me included!) as well as others being prayed for. There were hundreds of names offered up to Jesus of people who don’t know Him yet and the worship singing times were fantastic.

 

                Thank you to all who served to make that day possible (especially the unsung heroes in the kids’ ministry – they gave up their comfort so that the rest of us could have that experience – I believe God saw that and smiled widely at their service!)

 

                Last Sunday’s service reminded me of when Jesus was talking to the woman at the well. He said to her that the Living Water He was offering would become in her a spring of water welling up to eternal life. Sunday felt like a spring of water. It was flowing all around us and through us and in us.

 

                My hope and prayer is that God’s Spirit will continue to have the freedom to move amongst us, refreshing us, transforming us, convicting us, encouraging us. Whenever you come to a gathering at ACC, come with the expectation that God is going to move. Come believing that Jesus will be honoured. Come anticipating that the gentle Holy Spirit will point all of our hearts towards the Messiah.

 

                Some of you dipped your toes in the River of Life. That is good. But there’s more. Some waded in a little deeper, up to their knees. That also is good. But there’s more. Ezekiel paints a vision of this river in Ezekiel 47. The idea is that the farther we go, the deeper the river gets. And then he says in verse 9, “so where the river flows everything will live.”    

 

                This is what God has in mind for us as a church and for Sylvan Lake. He wants to bring life, life to the full.

 

                Will we set all else aside in order to receive the life that Jesus offers? Truly He is our only hope.

 

                We are precious to God and He has a beautiful idea for what He wants to do with us!

 

                This weekend, we will be celebrating our second anniversary in our Room to Grow campaign. I am really excited about it. I can hardly believe that two years has already passed. There will be some delicious cake and coffee as well as some updated information as to where we are in the process.

 

                Our new teaching series will also kick off this weekend as we will be working through the book of Nehemiah under the theme “Rise Up and Build.”

 

                I hope you can join us this Sunday as we worship Jesus together and rejoice in what God is doing in us as a community.

 

                I love being on this journey with you and I love being your pastor.

 

Pastor Tim