April 4, 2025
- credford5
- Apr 4
- 3 min read
Do you find wonder and mystery in prayer? Do you come to prayer as a holy and yet intimate encounter with the Creator of the Universe and the lover of your soul? Those are some important driving questions for you and me as we approach and experience prayer from a fresh perspective in this season.
We have big plans for White Oak this season. Our mission at WOCC is connecting people to full life in Jesus. My desire is that we discover more of that fullness of life as we trust God to form us more into the image of Christ for the sake of others. It’s possible you’ve heard us saying that a lot this year. Good. We’re going to keep saying it. It is Jesus’s heart and prayer (read John 17) that we share in his glory, his identity, and his mission. Paul will echo this sentiment consistently throughout his letters to the New Testament churches.
14 For this reason I kneel before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. 16 I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. -Ephesians 3:14-19
Did you catch that? Paul was praying for more of Jesus to get into them! That’s it! We want more of Jesus in us and changing us both for his glory and for the sake of his mission. Does that drive your prayers? It should. In prayer, we should long for more of Jesus’s heart, strength, wisdom, compassion, empathy, conviction, attitude, and love to flow more and more into us.
I am praying for a culture shift at White Oak. That we would become a church of people who are each being filled to the measure of the fullness of God. This is one of the reasons White Oak is meeting on Friday, April 11 at the Ross Twp. Campus at 7pm for a Night of Formation. We want to spend time praying, listening, worshiping, and in formation together. We’re asking God to use this special night to focus us on him this Easter season and beyond!
As our church family is formed through prayer, my desire is that this sanctified life pours into the lives of others. Not just concerning who you are inviting to Easter services with you (though, that is a legitimate need), but how is your prayer life focusing you outwardly?
This question leads to why we are spending more focused and intentional time and resources this year at White Oak in the following areas:
· Encouraging life groups to get into the community and to serve together.
· Considering global and local needs and how WOCC can partner to meet them.
· Plans to help people at White Oak take intentional steps in evangelism and in making disciples.
· Considering White Oak’s strategy of launching multi-site locations in the future to reach more people who are disconnected from life in Jesus.
· Summer outreach initiatives meant to draw families and kids closer to Jesus.
· We celebrate what God is doing through mission trips to India, the high school team who spent the week serving in E. Kentucky, the middle school group who will serve at Mountain Mission School in Grundy, VA this summer, and more!
36 When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. 37 Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. 38 Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” -Matthew 9:36-38
We have big plans for White Oak in this coming season! I ask you to join me in bathing these in prayer. I don’t want us to go to places where God is not leading. I don’t want to go in a direction where the Spirit hasn’t gone before us to prepare the way. I want God’s plans and mission to be White Oak’s plans and mission! Would you pray with me? As you do, pray that God is forming your own heart and that the overflow would be much to his glory and for Kingdom advancement.
Expectantly,
Nathan
Nathan Hinkle
Lead Pastor