About 350 years ago a shipload of travellers landed on the northeast coast of America. The first year they established the site for a town.  The next year they elected a town government.  The third year the town government planned to build a road five miles westward into the wilderness.

In the fourth year the people tried to impeach their town government because they thought it was a waste of public funds to build a road five miles westward into a wilderness.  After all, they thought, who needed to go there anyway?

These were people who had the vision to see 3,000 miles across an ocean and overcome great hardships to get there, who nevertheless couldn’t see the point in venturing five miles further out of town a few years later. They had lost their pioneering vision.  With a clear vision of what we can become in Christ, no ocean of difficulty is too great.  Without it, we rarely move beyond our current boundaries.

A missionary society wrote to pioneer missionary David Livingstone and asked, “Have you found a good road to where you are? If so, we want to know how to send other men to join you.”  David Livingstone wrote back: “If you have men who will come only if they know there is a good road, I don’t want them.  I want men who will come if there is no road at all.”

When Julius Caesar landed on the shores of Britain with his Roman legions, he took a bold and decisive step to ensure the success of his military venture.  Ordering his men to march to the edge of the cliffs of Dover, he commanded them to look down at the water below.  To their amazement, they saw every ship in which they had crossed the channel engulfed in flames.  Caesar had deliberately cut off any possibility of retreat.  Now that his soldiers were unable to return to the continent, there was nothing left for them to do but advance and conquer.  And that’s exactly what they did.

In Chapter 37 of the book of Ezekiel in the Old Testament we can imagine that the prophet Ezekiel must have felt as desolate as the piles of bones that he saw in a vision.  He must have known that only a miracle could bring together his scattered people, just as it would also take a miracle to bring life to dry bones.  Yet even as he watched, a miracle of life took place.  Where before only dry bones had littered the landscape, the Lord added muscles, tendons, and tissue.  And into those restored, silent bodies, God breathed new life.

You might be feeling dry, disappointed and defeated.  Perhaps you too are sitting alone and dejected, watching a panorama of devastation unfold before you.  If so, do not despair.  Because the God of Ezekiel is our God, we know that even the dry bones before us can live again.  We are promised: “I will put my Spirit in you and you will live” (Ezekiel 37:14).

God has done this very thing on the Alpha Course that has just wrapped up and to celebrate we are going to have a party to which everyone is invited!

The Alpha Celebration Dinner is on Sunday July 19th at 6 pm, would you consider bringing a friend that tends to avoid God and the church? It will be a wonderful opportunity for your friends to experience the atmosphere of Alpha and hear a little about what the course is all about. Most of all a few folks, including a guest on the present course has stepped forward to make the entire evening free. It would be helpful if you could let Maria (alpha@trurochurch.org) know how many guests you will be bringing!

Your Brother In Christ,
Pastor Derek Rust