NorthStar Church Blog

We finished our first series of the New Year with Decision 7, I Will Not Waste My Pain. Prior to the sermon we heard testimony from John McGrath as he bravely shared his pain, recovery and healing through God. After taking the stage Pastor Roscoe discussed what we can do with our past painful experiences. We can choose to waste our pain or we can use our pain. God never wastes our pain and neither should we. There’s purpose and meaning behind our pain.

Our greatest ministry and contribution to this world will be our pain. We’re rarely helped by each others successes. Rather, we’re encouraged by someone who’s stumbled, struggled and made it through. We can learn from their mistakes. We realize that this person was able to get beyond his/her pain and are encouraged that we can do the same.

God comforts us in our troubles so that we can comfort others. Therefore, one of the greatest signs of recovery is when we begin looking for others to help. Oftentimes we find healing in reaching out to others in pain. We don’t have to have it all together and we don’t need to have all the answers to help someone else.

In order to help others we have to be willing to share our pain. We have to be real about our pain, we must share how the pain got our attention and the lessons that we’ve learned. We must share how God is bringing good out of bad.

First, a very big CONGRATULATIONS to our Pastor and his wife Maryanna! They are expecting their 2nd child at the end of the summer! Can’t wait to meet the newest member of the Lilly pad!

Well, we’re almost finished with our current series. This past Sunday we listened to pastor Roscoe discuss decision 6, I will choose to forgive. Pastor Roscoe began the sermon by discussing what forgiveness isn’t. Forgiveness isn’t minimizing the wrong, regaining instant trust, nor is it business as usual. Why should we forgive? We are expected to forgive because God forgave us and because forgiveness is something we need to do for ourselves. The alternative to forgiveness is bitterness and resentment growing in our hearts. Forgiveness means we give up our right to get even. We all fall short. We are all imperfect people. We’ve all violated God’s standards. When we make a mistake, we expect others to cut us some slack. Yet, far too often we’re not willing to extend that same grace to someone else. God will never ask us to forgive someone more than he’s forgiven us. When we don’t feel forgiven, we have a hard time forgiving others. That is why a relationship with God is so important. We can’t do it alone.

Here is a note that we received from a family at NorthStar after Pastor Roscoe’s family talk about tithing.

It has been on our hearts to tithe for a long time, but we never really felt like we could financially afford to give that much every week. When we first started to attend NorthStar, we would drop the cash that was leftover in my wallet for the week, or if I remembered to bring the checkbook, we might give $25 or $30 at best. About a year ago, we decided to make a commitment to give regularly and a consistent amount, which is when I created an automatic payment from my checking account to the church office. I figure that way I wouldn’t forget, and it would be automatic. However, I still didn’t feel like I was doing enough in that area of my spiritual growth. When we became members, we decided to increase our giving, and we doubled the amount that we gave each week. We had been doing that for just a couple weeks before you talked to the church this past Sunday. I felt that it was God talking through you to me about what I knew I should have been doing all along. For us, it was a stretch to double our giving just a few weeks ago, and I was certainly apprehensive about doing so, but I have to say that this is truly a step of faith for us. We increased our giving this week to fully tithe for the first times in our lives. This is the first time that we are giving to the Lord first, and then thinking about our budget second. When I looked at my budget, I would always give what was leftover….now, we are giving first, and work with what’s left. If I would have made this change based on looking at the budget, it wouldn’t have happened. We’re a bit scared, but the more we pray about it, the more at ease we are…I know God will provide!