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January 2011

January, 2011

Hello guys and gals! Did you all have a good Christmas break? I was so proud of the ones who participated in our Christmas Program. You all did a great job! I have heard so many good compliments on the performance. We would like to use the bells again for Easter, and are in the process of ordering music for that. January 17th is Martin Luther King day, and we would like to go back to Savannah to bowl and eat pizza again. (Sign up sheet on the table) We would need to leave the church absolutely no later than 10:00 a.m. January 30th, after church we are going to have a lunch, and sing at Briarwood Nursing Home at Lexington. The residents there love to see guests, and I think it is a wonderful mission opportunity. February 6th is Souper Bowl Sunday; more information on this will come later. Feb 19th we will have Children’s Missions Day in the activity building. We will learn more about missionaries and make cards for shut-ins and soldiers. There is a possibility we may make some fleece blankets for the shut-ins also. I hear we may get snow in the next few days, so enjoy it! See you at church!

Lisa Hopper

Pastor’s Notes: Alligator Gar

Alligator gars are ambush hunters and may lie very still at the top of the water waiting for smaller prey to come within range of their deadly jaws.  They feed mainly on other fish but have been known to prey on birds, small mammals, turtles, and carrion. Alligator gars have been reported to attack duck decoys and eat injured waterfowl shot by hunters.  This gar, in particular, is capable of delivering a serious bite to fisherman or swimmers but there are no documented cases of attacks on humans.  All of God’s gars grow slowly and live, relatively speaking, long lives.  Females of the species reach sexual maturity around age 11 and may live to be 50 years of age; males mature around age 6 and may live over 25 years. They easily reach 6 ½ ft and weigh over 100 lbs.  Females are generally larger than males and have been reported at over 300 lbs. and 10 or more feet in length. The largest recorded alligator gar was taken from the St. Francis River in Arkansas (near Cathy’s old stomping grounds) during the 1930′s  and weighed 350 lbs.  Their eggs are poisonous, causing illness if consumed by humans. They have a highly vascularized (a good blood supply) swim bladder connected to the throat by a pneumatic duct.  By gulping air, gars are able to survive in water with very low oxygen levels, i.e. sloughs.  These characteristics provide the perfect design for living within slow moving rivers, reservoirs, oxbow lakes, bayous and bays.  However, due to dredging, dams, dikes, and levees  the large overflow floodplains that once existed have all but vanished in North America.  Consequently, populations of this magnificent fish have in recent times been on the decline over virtually all of its range.  For a number of years the Tennessee Wildlife resources Agency has been stocking alligator gar within the Hatchie and the Forked Deer river system in an effort to restore the balance that God intended these giant creatures to provide to the ecology of our river systems.  I applaud these efforts as I am certain that we are called to be stewards of God’s creation.  Genesis 7:3 makes plain God’s concern that the different kinds of animals would be preserved and Genesis 8:1 indicates that God had not forgotten Noah or the animals.  Just as Noah and his family were God’s chosen servants for the preservation of animal life during the time of the flood. I would argue that we too are to preserve and protect what remains of His creation in our day…even the alligator gar.

November 2010

NOVEMBER, 2010

Hello everybody!  What a wonderful time we had at the Fall Festival! Special thanks to all the hard workers!! I loved the fellowship that we had.  It is a nice time to look around at the beautiful fall colors that God has given us.  This month will be busy for most people.  We have Thanksgiving almost upon us.  I hope we will all remember to thank God for our many blessings.  I will be remembering my church family when I say my prayers!

We have received our new hand bells.  We will be playing two songs at Christmas.  I hope everyone will participate.  We will start practicing on Sunday nights (5:30) during the month of November.  I will be available to run the van, if needed.  Please call my cell phone before 5:00 p.m., so I can make arrangements to pick you up.

Weather permitting we may take a trip on November 20^th to Tennessee Safari Park in Alamo, TN.  You can check them out on the website www.tennesseesafaripark.com .

Hope to see you soon at church!!

Pastor’s Notes: Common Murre

The Common Murre or Common Guillemot (Uria aalge) is a type of bird known as an auk.  God gave them a circumpolar (around the poles of the earth) distribution and a sea-faring existence, occurring along the Arctic waters of the North-Atlantic and the North Pacific. Their flight through the atmosphere is quite fast but they lack the maneuverability they enjoy while “flying” under water.  They hunt at sea, really only coming to shore to establish colonial nesting sites on rocky ledges along the water’s edge. They have only one mate (monogamous) and mate for life.  The pair produces a single egg and, as they nest in densely-packed colonies (called loomeries), the eggs would most certainly be rolled over the edge was it not for the egg’s God-given design.  It tapers to a point on one end and any movement of the

common-murre-egg

egg simply results in its pivoting around that single point. Matt 10:29-33 says “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.”   It is comforting for me to know that God watches over and provides for all His creatures and that we are His most prized of all!

Dr. James Huggins

Pastor’s Notes: Northern Short Tailed Shrew

Northern Short-tailed Shrews are small mammals that apparently look a bit like baby moles to many people as I am constantly having people describe them to me in that fashion. Metabolic rates are extremely high and they may consume up to twice their weight in food on a daily basis. In their never-ending search for food they are highly active for several minutes periods then relax for periods of 20 to 25 minutes. In designing an animal that needs to eat so much and so frequently God made them insectivorous and carnivorous and He gave them some special talents. Poisonous saliva enables them to kill mice and even larger prey and to paralyze and store invertebrates such as snails alive for later consumption. God has provided them with a form of echolocation which enables them to move through tunnels and darkened landscapes via emitting a series of ultrasonic “clicks” that bounce back to alert the shrew to living and nonliving objects around them. The tiny shrew has a place in God’s plan and is testimony to His provision. Gen 1:31 says “and God saw everything that He had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.”

September 2010

Hey guys and gals! Hope you all had a long and relaxing weekend. We had a great service this weekend at Chickasaw park. If you have never attended one of these, we would love to have you next year. We don’t have a lot going on this month. Cathy Huggins, Ranny Jo Morris and I are taking children ages 9 and up to Jackson to get their Hunter Saftey license. The times are Saturday 8:30 – 6:00 and Sunday 1:00 – 5:00. We will be leaving the church at 7:30 a.m. Saturday morning and be returning around 6:30 Saturday afternoon. We will leave right after church on Sunday and return back for our Sunday night church service. We will fix sack lunches for the kids on both days. Children will need to bring their Social Security Numbers. If you are interested, please contact me early so we can provide enough lunches.
Our Hayride has been rescheduled for Oct 1st . If it rains, we will have it Oct 2nd. We will meet at the church and ride the wagon to Gleeman & Jane’s house for hotdogs and smores! Our Fall Fun night is scheduled for Oct 29th. We will be doing games and cake walk, just like last year. Mark these dates on your calendar and hope to see you soon.

Revival

We want to invite everyone to our revival that starts tonight, August 8 at 6:30 pm tonight. The rest of the week it will begin at 7:00 pm. Our revivalist will be Dr. Jerry Welch from Hillcrest Baptist in Jackson. Marty Phillips, also from Hillcrest and our own Bob Wadley will be leading the music.

August 2010

August 3, 2010

Hey guys and gals! It has been a fun summer! I can’t believe it’s over. Back to school and all that fun
stuff. We have had a great time with the stew sale & car wash, going to see Toy Story 3, Children’s
Camp, and most of all VBS. We have Revival coming up next week. It starts Sunday night and goes
through Friday night. Starts regular time on Sunday night and 7:00 p.m. the rest of the week. Bob
Wadley has scheduled a church wide trip to float the Buffalo River on Aug. 21st. More details to follow
from him. Come join us this month where we gather to worship and scatter to serve.

Lisa Hopper

Children’s Camp 2010

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July 2010

Hey guys! We have lots to do this month. On Saturday, July 10th we are having stew day. Come join us around 7 a.m. and help us make some yummy stew. There will also be a car-wash to help the youth finance their next trip next week.

Are you ready for Children’s camp? I am! It is July 23-24. We will be leave on Friday and come back Saturday afternoon.

When we go to camp, we will be taking a Holy Land adventure to Egypt. We will learn about Joseph’s journey from prison to palace. It will be at Camp Clark Williamson, just like last year. I will be giving more details with exact times soon.

I had a great time at VBS, and hope you learned a lot at Saddle Ridge Ranch. Let’s continue our summer adventure to Egypt! Hope to see you there!

Lisa Hopper

Here is one our verses we will study at camp.

“for I know the plans I have for you… to give you a future and a hope.” Jeremiah 29:11