the Logos

Attention, Mt. Zion Parents: If you are a parent of preteens and/or teens, we have created an emailing list, parents@mtzionmb.org, for the sole purpose of sharing important information about protecting and raising our children. To subscribe, send an email to parents-subscribe@mtzionmb.org. Don’t forget to sign up for the fall '07 session of the Spiritual Enrichment course scheduled to start Sept 16th. The deadline to sign-up is Sept. 9th. The Greeters’ Ministry is looking for dedicated people to join us. When we move to the new edifice, there will be a greater need for dedicated greeters (especially to help at our new welcome center). You must have a friendly personality and have a sincere willingness to work with others. On 9/9, Mt Zion, along with other churches across the nation, will be participating in a 21 day prayer campaign for parents and teens to pray together. In addition to prayer, I’m going to challenge the teens to fast from listening to secular music and the i...

This is one of the most powerful skits I've seen in a long time. Please share with your friends and family because this is a struggle that many people have dealt with or are dealing with now. But there is victory in Jesus Christ!!! Romans 8:1-4 (NIV): "Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man, in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit."

I've been getting a lot of these lately, so just be careful. If you didn't sign up for whatever they put in the email, then just delete it! read more | digg story

Thanks to your generous giving to the Love Offering. Proceeds from today’s love offering will go towards preparation of the meal for the ladies at the Helen Wright Center on August 30th. Ladies, don't forget that you are invited to attend the next Women's Fellowship on this Friday, Aug. 24th from 6:30pm to 9:00 pm at the American Legion Building (across the street from the church). Well, praise God...we have received our Certificate of Occupancy for the new church building! We truly give God all the honor and praise for getting us to this important milestone. We also thank our construction company, Bobbitt, our project management team, PMSP, our furnishing and transition committees for all of their hard work to get us to this point. Now all that is left is for us to go "occupy the land"!

Pictures from my 5th anniversary banquet and celebration are available from our photo gallery . The next Bible Study series, “Rising Above the Level of Mediocrity: A Commitment to Excellence,” will begin on Wed., Aug. 15th at 7:00pm. We invite everyone to come join us for this important series as we strive to do our very best in all areas of ministry. Parents, the Youth Ministry will be holding their quarterly Youth Ministry Open House on tomorrow at 7:00pm. I will be presenting some important information to the parents at the beginning of the meeting. Also, parents of preteens (9-12) are welcome to come as well. Ladies: We are visiting the Helen Wright Center on Thurs., Aug. 30th and need you to help serve a meal to the residents of this center. Please sign up on the bulletin board if you would to help serve. Also, next Sunday’s love offering will go towards preparation of this meal. All women are invited to attend the next Women's Fellowship on Fri., Aug. 24th from 6:30pm to...

Just sharing this from Pastor Eric Ellis... A website that offer great deals on lens and frames: www.zennioptical.com

I want to remind everyone that there should be no food or drink in the sanctuary. We are finding too many empty water bottles after services. If you need water during the service for medical reasons, please let an usher know. We want to take care of our current sanctuary so that we will not take bad habits to our new one. Parents, the Youth Ministry will be meeting with the teen males who enrolled for the Male Mentoring Session on Sat., Aug. 11th at 9:00am-10:30am in the fellowship hall. If you are interested in getting your son involved, please contact Deacon Adrian Jones. If you were at the 11:15am service on this past Sunday, you know that we had an awesome time in worship that invited the power of the Holy Spirit into our sanctuary. Youth began to worship and praise God and deliverance took place. This happened a few week ago, but God took us to another level this time. I look forward to whatever God has in store for us when we worship Him in spirit and in truth. So if you we...

I found these amazing pictures on Flickr of the tragic I-35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis. Please keep all of the families affected by this in your prayers.

Some items from our recent church family meeting... Please follow the seating instructions from the ushers when you arrive at church. It makes their jobs easier and keeps the seating organized. We appreciate your cooperation. Be sensitive to the Holy Spirit. Please restrict movement during the Call to Discipleship. If you must leave, try to do so right before the sermon ends. We don't want any movement to be a distraction to someone that the Holy Spirit may be touching their hearts to come forward. Also, do not interrupt the move of the Holy Spirit when someone is shouting and praising God by forcing tissue in the person’s hand or fanning them directly in their face. This can also be very distracting. Be aware that only people in leadership (pastor, elders, deacons, deaconess) officially represents Mt Zion for phone calls and visitations. When other members call you or visit you, they do so on their own good will, but do not necessarily represent Mt Zion (meaning that they ...

This comes from Greg Laurie ... When it comes to identifying whether a person is really a Christian, there's an "outward-inward" dynamic that we sometimes fail to realize. Let's take a closer look at some of the aspects of this. 1. A person may pray and still not really be a Christian. If we're to believe the statistics from opinion surveys, nine out of ten people in our nation pray. Three out of four believe God is a heavenly Father who can be reached by prayers. In addition, recent scientific studies have verified that prayer improves the health of those who are sick. But that doesn't necessarily mean you're truly a believer if you pray. Most of us pray when we're in trouble. What's the first thing on the lips of most people when they're confronted by a crisis? You've heard it: "Oh my God!" That's a prayer, whether they admit it or not. It was true of me too, before...

Most of you know that I'm ever vigilant to keep our youth safe on social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook, so I was really intrigued by a couple of articles (which I digg 'ed) on predators and cyberattacks, ID theft on Facebook. What really had me floored was the following statement: "In a "thought experiment" the two conducted in the United States before visiting Australia, Howard said they managed to acquire enough information on one young user to steal her identity. "We pulled down one person's name--in this instance, a female--and everything she put out there," Howard said. "In 15 minutes of doing Google searches, we were able to collect enough information to steal her identity."" So to continue to sound like a broken record, we must be careful how much personal information we release on these sites as well as who we allow to see our information. read more | digg story

Congratulations to Minister & Deaconess McCullough on birth of their daughter, Leah Danielle McCullough (weighing 4 lbs, 10 oz). The Men's Ministry invites all men and young men to come out and fellowship at the Men's Life Study Group on Fri., July 27th at 7:00 pm. The meeting will be at the home of Bro. William Carpenter. Call the church office if you need directions. Don't forget that there will be a Youth Contemporary Service next Sunday at 4pm. Minister Cy Young will be the speaker. Please bring your youth out to support this service. July 31 from 5pm to 8pm will be With Love From Jesus (WLFJ) night at the Chick-Fil-A at Cary Town Center. Ten percent of the sales from that evening will be donated to this ministry. WLFJ is a great outreach ministry, worthy of our support. The Chick-Fil-A cow will be there with balloons and a craft for the children. So go out, enjoy and help!!!

Here's a good article with some links to sites that will help you "decode" and communicate with your kids who are texting: http://tinyurl.com/2mogl5

We have made it back from our vacation in Williamsburg, VA. Thank God for a safe trip and traveling mercies (we got stuck in traffic on the return due to an accident on I-85). Isaiah and Abigail really enjoyed themselves at the amusement parks. We went to Busch Gardens for two days and then Water Country USA. We also visited the Jamestown Settlement to look at the galleries and learn a little history. The kids enjoyed it too, especially boarding the Colonial ships at dock. Check out our photos from the trip. Some of these pictures were taken by Isaiah and Abigail. Isaiah is becoming quite the photographer. Abigail needs a little more practice as parts or all of my head are missing in some of her shots. Photobucket Album

Congratulations to the newlyweds, Deacon Ivan and Sis. Shanetta Porter. What a beautiful wedding ceremony they had on Saturday. The Love offering next Sunday to go to family that lost everything in fire. Thankfully, no one was home but the family has lost everything. Please be prepared to come next Sunday to give generously in the love offering to help this family. The New Believers’ Class will be held on Sundays, July 22nd - Aug. 26th during the Sunday School hour. Please place your name on the sign-up sheet located on the bulletin board if you plan to take this class. Please go out to support Minister Candice Walden, accompanied by the Male Choir, who will be speaking at a revival on Thurs., July 12th at 7:00pm. Everyone is invited to attend. Keep my family in your prayers as we will be going on vacation this week. So we will be out next Sunday.

On July 4, 1776, we claimed our independence from England and Democracy was born. The 4th of July is Independence Day where we celebrate the freedoms we enjoy in this country. But the sad fact is that we are less free than we think. There are many people in the U.S. that are in bondage (not physical, but spiritual). The quest for freedom is high on most people's agenda today, and it has also been one of the main threads of human history. We speak of freedom in many ways...personal freedom, freedom of speech and association, academic freedom, free trade, freedom of the press. We also talk about individual liberties, liberation theology, and religious liberty. Other basic freedoms often discussed include freedom from want, fear or interference, and freedom of choice, conscience or opportunity. Common phrases that sum up many people's attitudes toward freedom include "doing your own thing," "going your own way," or "it's up to you (or me)." Re...

There will be NO BIBLE STUDY on Wed., due to Independence Day. I will be speaking at Little Zion Missionary Baptist Church in Youngsville to celebrate Rev. Patrick Clay’s 8th Anniversary on Sunday, July 8th at 4:00pm. Everyone is invited to attend. Harvest Crusade: Just to recap, 41,500 people came to the RBC Center over the three days of the Triangle Harvest. Of that group, 2,471 people responded to the call of the Holy Spirit and made professions of faith during the event. Praise God for the lives that were changed. In addition, 12,966 people watched the live webcasts over the Internet and I heard of one testimony where someone accepted Christ while watching the webcast. It's great to see technology like webcasting over the Internet being used to build the Kingdom of God.

The above picture really sums up the powerful move of the Holy Spirit as people poured out onto the floor of the RBC center to give their lives to Christ. Participating in the Triangle Harvest has been a wonderful experience. I had the privilege of being a counselor for two nights (I watched the webcast on Saturday night) and it was great to be on the floor seeing so many people accepting the free gift of salvation. I thank God for using Greg Laurie to deliver a relevant message each night. As it was mentioned, there were about 230 area churches working together to bring Harvest to the Triangle. Despite any cultural or denominational differences, we all had one thing in common...wanting the Gospel of Jesus Christ to be presented to the lost. It was also great to experience different styles of worship at the various churches where the impact classes were being held. I loved seeing a lot of the young people praising God at Harvest. I pray that more of the youth at Mt. Zion would fr...

Our next Bible Study series, “Relying on the Holy Spirit,” will begin on Wed., June 27th at 7:00pm. We definitely need the Holy Spirit to guide, comfort, and counsel us in our everyday lives. Everyone is invited to come out and join us for this study. More ministry opportunities are available: The IT ministry is seeking new members to help with media operations as well as helping with website development. We are forming a new marketing committee to produce profession-looking materials such as church bulletin, newsletter, visitor packets, etc. If you are interested in volunteering for any of these ministries, please let us know by contacting the church office. Well, Harvest is over and I'll be sharing my thoughts on it in a separate blog entry.

VBS was a great success. I would like to thank to all who participated (teachers, students, and those that prepared the meals). We look forward to having VBS in our new facility next year. We are looking to start a College Ministry (ages 18-25). With so many colleges and universities in our area, we have a tremendous ministry opportunity to touch the lives of students. I've already heard from a few people who are interested in being a part of this ministry. If you are interested, please send me email or call the church office. On last Friday, I attended a session with Dr. Tony Evans to discuss gang violence. He introduced his Adopt-A-School initiative . Basically, a church would adopt a school in their community and provide mentoring, tutoring, and other social services (depending on the capacity of the church). By doing this, Dr. Evans said they saw a great reduction in gang activity in communities in Dallas. Urban Alternative will come to provide training if there a...