Northeast Oklahoma District Church of the Nazarene

Getting the Glory Down

Dear NEO Family, Praise God for his renewing work. Almost every week I hear reports of God breaking in on one of our churches. And then on Feb. 24-26 we had a powerful AWAKENING weekend! Thank you for your prayers and support. There was a powerful sense of anticipation from the first song of the first service. Attendance was great and children and adults all encountered God. Our altars were lined with young people on Friday; on Sunday evening  there were 56 children who responded to the altar call in our elementary age service! And adults responded in every service in obedience, surrender and faith.  Our workers – Marci Marquis and worship team, Lenny and Joy Wisehart and the Raeburns and Big Blast Kidz Ministries were all anointed and just what we needed. Central Church was again a wonderful host. Praise be to God for a time of refreshing. Where do we go from here? Our expectation is that we would be “awakened by His Spirit” so we can “live in His Spirit” and “walk in His purposes.” As one of our pastors told me this weekend, this is only the beginning! In December I was reading an old book Getting the Glory Down. In it I found an address made by E. O. Chalfant to a gathering of District Superintendents in 1944. The address was entitled, “How Can We Keep the Church Deeply Spiritual”. Chalfant wrote: “It was never easier in the history of the world to get souls saved than it is now if we will pay the price to make it possible to get the souls saved. It is easier now to get souls saved than it was in the first century of the Christian era. They had no printing presses then – they had no automobiles then. The world had none of the modern conveniences then. We have about everything now to promote the gospel with one exception. We do not have enough of the burning, consuming passion of the first Pentecost or deep spirituality. Here are the simple things that we must do: 1.  Keep up our devotions. 2.  Keep aggressive. 3.  Keep awake to lost souls. 4. Keep doing something about the great white harvest field of the earth’s unchurched millions. 5.  Keep kind and humble, keep away from criticisms, keep a forgiving spirit. 6.  Keep the love of God dwelling richly in our hearts. 7.  Keep your passion life up. 8.  Work hard, study hard, pray without ceasing. 9.  Keep Jesus Christ first in everything. Sounds like good counsel in 2012 if we want to “keep the glory down.” Remember in Prayer · Hispanic Coordinator, Otoniel Danneman, whose mother has had a heart attack in Guatemala. · Chelsea Pastor, Scottie Behm, whose mother died recently in Florida. The funeral was in Illinois. · Davenport Pastor, Lowell Clark, whose sister, Karla Lesslie, passed away in Topeka 10 days ago. · Retired Pastor, Clint Mitchell, who had triple by-pass surgery on February 23. · Lou Burch, Coweta Pastor's wife, recovering from surgery · Tahlequah Pastor, Jason Powers, suffering from asthma

General Board Report

I drove to Kansas City on Sunday night following AWAKENING to participate in the last day of the General Board of the Global Church of the Nazarene. It was exciting to hear the reports of growth from every region of the world. For example: In Africa, our members have grown from 233,006 to 549,463 in the last decade, a 135% decadal growth rate. The church is now ministering in 42 of 54 countries across Africa. In Eurasia, we have 562 new churches in the past year with a net gain of 12% in attendance. We have had 7 straight years of double-digit growth! Sunday School/Discipleship reports 16% growth worldwide this past year. We concluded our meeting by commissioning 14 new global missionaries. Praise be to God for leading us in making Christlike disciples in the nations.

Day of Prayer - March 26

The following is a portion of a letter from SNU President, Dr. Loren Gresham. In view of this wave of the gay activist movement to normalize a destructive lifestyle and to threaten religious freedoms please do all you can to help your people observe a day of prayer for SNU....MARCH 26. We would like to support our administration, professors and students in prayers of intercession during this stressful time. Please plan a prayer effort for this! Here is a portion of President Loren's letter: "Dear Friends of SNU: Because we value your trust and prayers, I wanted to make you aware that a gay advocacy group will be visiting our campus this Spring to protest our biblical position on homosexuality. Early this semester an organization called Soulforce contacted us to say they would be bringing  'Equality Ride' to our campus on the afternoon of Monday, March 26, 2012. Soulforce is a 'lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer' group (their self identification)  founded by Dr. Mel White, former ghostwriter for Jerry Falwell and Billy Graham, that exists to promote, in their words, 'freedom from religious and political oppression' for homosexuals. The 'Equality Ride' is a national bus tour of selected college campuses to challenge policies that they claim discriminate against homosexuals. They target colleges and universities that maintain a biblical stance on the issue of homosexuality, as SNU and the Church of the Nazarene do, and attempts to generate media attention to these institutions." This group's visit to campus is NOT by invitation. It is meant to attract media attention. President Gresham has appointed a team of Dr. Hal Cauthron, Dr. Terry Toler, Dr. Brad Strawn and Dr. Scott Strawn to lead our response effort. Please pray for these men on that day! Grace and peace,   Dave