The Noteburning

INTRODUCTION

There is going to come a day in which we are going to be out from under this building debt. It will be gone.

On that day we are going to have a massive celebration. I have this picture in my head of us in this parking lot and we have some of our senior church members setting the note on fire and we are singing and a few of us Baptists might even dance.

I might be like King David bringing the Ark of the Covenant home on the day. It could be undignified. I will keep my garments on though for the benefit of everyone who is involved.

Pastor Michael Howard, February 2019

I am here today to state emphatically that God has kept His promises to the faithful saints of Seaford Baptist Church.

I sat with a local pastor in 2020 of a megachurch in the area and he looked at me and said, “Seaford?!? You guys are still around? I thought that debt would have buried you.”

A lot of people gave up on us. They had 4.4 million plus reasons to do that.

But God never did.

He pulled this church from financial deficit through the generosity of her people. The kindness of her members. The openhandedness of the body.

And we learned that from His Son.

The One who laid down His life in order to pay the debt of our sin.

This church will turn 59 in less than a month.

God has watched over it every step of the way and He will not stop.

And I have absolute confidence that this church will be here, heralding the one true Gospel to the lost and perishing of Seaford until the Lord cracks the sky and He returns.

And on that day, He can do whatever He wants with this building.

The old girl will have served her time.

After that it will just be glory.

PRAYER OF THANKSGIVING

WHO IS OUR PRAISE BUT JESUS?

Who will be our praise but you, Jesus—your beauty, your glory, and your excellence? You are the one in whom all divine perfection is focused.

It is tempting to want to thank Dewey and Colleen Ragans or Wallace and Alice Tucker.

It is tempting to want to thank Jim Behring and Helen Shope.

It is tempting to want to thank Bob and Margaret Powers or Ken Dickerson or Lawrence Rooks.

We might be tempted to get out of this debt and look backward and thank Chip Byrum or Sylvia Mt. Castle or Bob Broom.

But Father—they were just your servants obeying your Word. They were your servants giving generously because you gave to them in Christ.

So Lord—we know it was you.

Who will be our praise but Jesus, the Mediator, the Christ of God, whose glory it is to redeem poor sinners and make them saints, to give out of your fullness, and grace for grace?

Again Lord, we might be fooled into looking around and thanking the wealthy among us who cut checks at crucial times.

We might be fooled into thanking our senior saints who have been here the longest. Those faithful brothers and sisters who even moved away, but continued to chip away at our debt.

We might think it was more of those saints who are now a part of that great cloud of witnesses: Lucille Closson, Lee Hudgins, Steve Jarvis and Carol and Charles Martin.

We might fondly recall Dan Leonard and Liz Ryan and Cathy Wells and Ginny Anderson and Alice Wells. We know they gave.

But Lord, they were the servants in your fields, swinging your sickle and bringing the harvest into the storehouse.

But Father—You brought the rain. You gave the growth.

We give our thanks to You for these faithful saints and for every penny.

Who will be our praise, but you who have made our peace, in the blood of your cross, and ever lives to intercede for us?

That blood is the very reason that Buddy Poe sacrificed financially for this church, O Lord.

That is why Don Wiggins gave, Lord God.

That is why Bill Blake gave, Father.

It is why Bill Davis gave, Father.

Lord, it is why Minnie Rooks was such a faithful giver. And Jim Bowman, Lord. And Mitch Cheek, Lord. Our sister, Ruby Bentley. Jesse Rawls.

Claude and Ruby Walker, Father—faithfully sewing into the Gospel all the way to the end.

Alberta Flowers, Mae Brown, Emma Fischer, Dewey Engle, Sandra Jones, and Peanut Brown.

FAITHFUL. FAITHFUL. FAITHFUL.

These saints and all these standing with me and those who moved away.

Others that passed away whose precious names have escaped my feeble mind.

They all GAVE because YOU GAVE the blood of your cross—the life that brings us peace.

Fair and lovely one, the first among ten thousand, you are my praise, my glory, my song, my rejoicing!

I will praise you every day; morning by morning will I praise your name, and night by night testify to your faithfulness.

Here, while I am on the earth, will I never stop speaking of your praise. And before long, We will join the happy multitude above, in that song: “To him that has loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood!”

Jesus, you are the praise of all the saints. Amen.