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My 2006 Agenda
I have made no secret that I view 2006 as our turning point year
regarding evangelism congregationally. We have bandaged old wounds
and laid strong doctrinal foundations. It is now time to start
sharing God’s good news with the people of Franklin and Middle
Tennessee in whatever scriptural way we possibly can.
That is not to say we will immediately
start with baptisms in January. There will be some time of
training and establishing roles and patterns within our work.
However, I do see congregational evangelism as a work in which
every member has a part. In 2006, our congregational agenda is to
get as many members in the congregation doing their part in the
evangelism (If this scares you, perhaps you missed my lesson
entitled Roles
in Congregational Evangelism. Get online and
listen to it. It was preached Sunday evening, December 4. There is
a role you can fill and be comfortable doing so).
However, I have also developed a
personal agenda. In last week’s article I applied one piece of
advice I have always given but rarely followed. That is, I looked
back to specifically determine how I had really grown this year.
Now I want to specifically apply another piece of advice. I want
to look ahead and plan some growth for the coming year.
In our 2005 Fall Focus, Built
by the Lord, we learned one of our family goals is
to bear fruit glorifying God. We kept that in the specific context
of family life and discussed growing the fruit of the Spirit in
our families. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace,
patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness,
self-control; against such things there is no law” (Galatians
5:22-23).
I want to make 2006 the year in which I
specifically and purposefully develop these qualities, along with
the further virtues listed in II
Peter 1:5-8 (moral excellence and knowledge) and in I
Corinthians 13:13 (hope).
Obviously, trying to focus on every one
of these at once is not focusing at all. My plan is to devote one
month of 2006 to specifically working on one of the above
characteristics. I hope to get my family involved in this. I
invite you to join me in this year of personal spiritual growth.
In fact, telling you about it is following another piece of
advice. Now that you know my plan you can hold me accountable.
In what would you like to grow in 2006?
Is there a particular Bible book you want to know more about? Is
there a characteristic you want to develop more? Is there a
concept you want to understand better? Is their a character with
which you want to become more intimately acquainted?
Figure out a spiritual growth goal for 2006 and develop a
plan to accomplish it. Perhaps we can work together on the fruit
of the Spirit. Whatever the case, this time next year we need to
look back and see if we accomplished our 2006 agenda.
Edwin L. Crozier
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