141 years (and we are) “STILL Yet Holding On”
I greet you in the marvelous, matchless and majestic name of Jesus the Christ who is our Lord and our Savior.
Wow, what a whirlwind of a year it has been – and continues to be.
From the humble beginning of the New Hope Missionary Baptist Church we have been blessed with great Faith, Hope and Love. From our genesis, only 14 short years from being in the inhumane chains and under the oppressive laws of slavery, when our ancestors met in a brush harbor a short distance from where our church now stands and formed this fellowship that we have come to love and cherish so dearly. No doubt many of them who could not even read nor write possessed tremendous Faith in Almighty God – who had, much like for the children of Israel, heard their prayers and brought them out of bondage and into a semblance of freedom. Since that time we have gathered each week and served the Lord in spirit and in truth as a church family.
Down through the years we have encouraged one another as we STILL faced the Jim Crow laws of the south, the headaches and heartaches of sharecropping, the disparate treatment brought about by segregation, the loss of our schoolhouse to a tornado and our church house to a fire. We endured and have persevered during the civil rights era, the stormy days of integration and even the injustices and inhumane treatment that many of us have to endure and watch in this generation. (DO NOT GET DISTRACTED in this racially charged time in history, this season of civil unrest and disobedience, nor during this divisively political climate that is gripping our society. REMEMBER, we serve a Mighty God who does not take sides – but HE takes over and His will is going to be done!!)
Nothing has proven to be as painful as what we have had to endure during the year 2020, as we for the safety and well-being of our church family and the community/country at large, has been forced to stop having in-person Worship Experiences for seven months and counting. However, it is through this season that we have learned:
• to have deeper respect for the meaning of the words of that old hymn of the church which says: “I’ve learned how to lean and depend on Jesus.”
• to understand the words of Paul in Romans 8:18 wherein he penned: “For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.”
• In VERSES 24-25 of that same chapter that: “For we are saved by Hope: but Hope that is seen is not Hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet Hope for? But if we Hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.”
NEW HOPE, in this season when we have had to adjust to a “New Normal” of not greeting each other with a Holy hug nor embracing one another in LOVE as we are accustomed.
While we had been forced to refrain from visiting with our families and friends – even in the times when they were/are dealing with “all manner of sickness and disease” and in this season of so many deaths, loss of jobs, schools and businesses being closed and yes EVEN the church where we gain our strength has had to close its doors.
I remind you of the words of Proverbs 3:5 “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not to thine own understanding.”
This has been, and continues to be, and excruciatingly painful year BUT in the words of Jesus the Christ we must “Love ye one another.” Let Philippians 4:12-13 speak to your spirit in these troubling times: “I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: everywhere and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ which strengthened me.”
I thank God for every one of the members and friends that have worked so diligently to support our efforts of building the Kingdom of God in these unprecedented times. You have found a way to give of your time, talents and your finances to undergird and help to strengthen our FAITH, HOPE and LOVE in Jesus the Christ. This is precisely why even after 141 years (we are) STILL Yet Holding On! As I close, I remind you (as I did in previous years) that we are the seed of a proud and dedicated people of God who understood what Jesus declared to Peter in Matthew 16:18 : “Upon this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”
Finally, I encourage us all with the words of Paul as chronicled in 1Co 15:58 “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.”
A Humble Servant of Christ I remain,
Rev. Michael A. Butler
I greet you in the marvelous, matchless and majestic name of Jesus the Christ who is our Lord and our Savior.
Wow, what a whirlwind of a year it has been – and continues to be.
From the humble beginning of the New Hope Missionary Baptist Church we have been blessed with great Faith, Hope and Love. From our genesis, only 14 short years from being in the inhumane chains and under the oppressive laws of slavery, when our ancestors met in a brush harbor a short distance from where our church now stands and formed this fellowship that we have come to love and cherish so dearly. No doubt many of them who could not even read nor write possessed tremendous Faith in Almighty God – who had, much like for the children of Israel, heard their prayers and brought them out of bondage and into a semblance of freedom. Since that time we have gathered each week and served the Lord in spirit and in truth as a church family.
Down through the years we have encouraged one another as we STILL faced the Jim Crow laws of the south, the headaches and heartaches of sharecropping, the disparate treatment brought about by segregation, the loss of our schoolhouse to a tornado and our church house to a fire. We endured and have persevered during the civil rights era, the stormy days of integration and even the injustices and inhumane treatment that many of us have to endure and watch in this generation. (DO NOT GET DISTRACTED in this racially charged time in history, this season of civil unrest and disobedience, nor during this divisively political climate that is gripping our society. REMEMBER, we serve a Mighty God who does not take sides – but HE takes over and His will is going to be done!!)
Nothing has proven to be as painful as what we have had to endure during the year 2020, as we for the safety and well-being of our church family and the community/country at large, has been forced to stop having in-person Worship Experiences for seven months and counting. However, it is through this season that we have learned:
• to have deeper respect for the meaning of the words of that old hymn of the church which says: “I’ve learned how to lean and depend on Jesus.”
• to understand the words of Paul in Romans 8:18 wherein he penned: “For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.”
• In VERSES 24-25 of that same chapter that: “For we are saved by Hope: but Hope that is seen is not Hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet Hope for? But if we Hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.”
NEW HOPE, in this season when we have had to adjust to a “New Normal” of not greeting each other with a Holy hug nor embracing one another in LOVE as we are accustomed.
While we had been forced to refrain from visiting with our families and friends – even in the times when they were/are dealing with “all manner of sickness and disease” and in this season of so many deaths, loss of jobs, schools and businesses being closed and yes EVEN the church where we gain our strength has had to close its doors.
I remind you of the words of Proverbs 3:5 “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not to thine own understanding.”
This has been, and continues to be, and excruciatingly painful year BUT in the words of Jesus the Christ we must “Love ye one another.” Let Philippians 4:12-13 speak to your spirit in these troubling times: “I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: everywhere and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ which strengthened me.”
I thank God for every one of the members and friends that have worked so diligently to support our efforts of building the Kingdom of God in these unprecedented times. You have found a way to give of your time, talents and your finances to undergird and help to strengthen our FAITH, HOPE and LOVE in Jesus the Christ. This is precisely why even after 141 years (we are) STILL Yet Holding On! As I close, I remind you (as I did in previous years) that we are the seed of a proud and dedicated people of God who understood what Jesus declared to Peter in Matthew 16:18 : “Upon this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”
Finally, I encourage us all with the words of Paul as chronicled in 1Co 15:58 “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.”
A Humble Servant of Christ I remain,
Rev. Michael A. Butler
