My ordination in August 2003. Pictured from left to right -Pastor Lonnie Snell, Pastor ChrisCrowe, Pastor Martin Holman (holding the mic), Pastor Frank Holman, Pastor Charles Whitfield
9 years ago today I led worship for the first time at my present church (previously Wachusett Valley Christian Church, now Fellowship Church) I had no clue where God was taking me when he brought me here. I’ve grown up here at this church, grown closer to God, found an incredible church family, married an unbelievable New England beauty, and now am the lead pastor of this incredible group of Christ followers.
This weekend will be one of the most fascinating services we’ve had at Fellowship Church in a long time. 4 baptisms, including the baptism videos, from ages 10-70, the Lord’s Supper for the first time in several years in our church (Generally we take this ordinance of the church in our “life groups”), A focus on this ministerial use of technology in our church, and a testimony that is one of the most powerful testimonies of coming to Christ I’ve ever heard.
It’s also the last message in this 2 part series called “Something old, something new.”
Next week, we’ll begin the series, “One Prayer” with 1200 other churches and 750,000 other church attenders. This is a four week series where we will ask this question: “If we had one prayer to pray for the church at large, what would it be?”
Over the next four weeks will hear from 4 pastors (3 on a video venue) where they will be answering that question. The first two weeks are:
So my encouragement to you over the next few months is not to get in a summer rut, but be ready to see God work in amazing ways here at Fellowship Church. Invite your friends. Play a part in something bigger than rest and relaxation. (by the way, I’m not talking about vacation, I think people need that)
My Blogging friend Pete (you can find him on my blogroll to the right) is doing a series at his church called “Sync” and he put up the promo on his site, which conveniently left an embedding code so I could steal it and show you it here at martyholman.com.
“For I am already being poured out like a drink offering and the time has come for my departure. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” – 2 Timothy 4:6,7
Watching Sportscenter this morning, I was updated on what happened in last nights big games in the NBA and the NHL. I found that both of my teams won – the Celtics and the Penguins (two teams I’ve rooted for since my childhood, lest you believe I’m a band wagon fan).
During the bit about the Celtics, one of the commentators mentioned that Doc Rivers, the coach of the Celtics, showed clips of Muhammed Ali’s fights, and made this statement over and over again:
“It’s not how many times you get hit, it’s whether or not you move forward.”
I wonder whether this would be a great statement for you and I to move inside our head and our heart. Because we are going to get hit.
Maybe in the context of work life – When your doing what you absolutely love to do, maybe even what God has made you to do, yet your boss is a demotivator and the environment is as low as it can be, but you still think this is where God wants you to be.
Or maybe in your family life – In this day where it seems people are out for themselves, including those closest to you.
Or maybe in your church – If you go to a church without a dream, without a future, and where the people are critical of everything anybody does to bring in new life.
It could be that you’re getting hit. And it seems like it will never end. But “it’s not how many time you get hit, it’s whether or not you move forward.”
Moving forward doing what God wants you to do will eventually prove that God is who He says He is and that He is making you what He promises to make you.
I read this earlier this morning as I caught up on my blogs, and couldn’t stop laughing for almost 5 minutes. It reminded me of my days in this place.
Last week my message focused on baptism, and how important it is for us to be able to choose whether or not we identify with Christ at a time when we can actually choose to identify with Him.
I am excited this Sunday morning, June 1st, to be able to experience the baptism of an elementary student, a new mother, and a retired mother, who have come forward to publicly declare that they are now following Christ!
We also showed a baptism video from Mark Batterson’s church in Washington DC. It was pretty inspiring, and I received a lot of comments about how it touched people, and even some comments about how convicting it was as they remembered their own baptism and how maybe they’ve lost that fire.
Earlier in a post I wrote that I was going to write about our lead team retreat this weekend. It looks like I don’t have to, because Billy, our first impressions director, already did. Check out this incredible post on Billy’s blog and get a glimpse of the weekend we all had.
I just returned from an amazing weekend in New Hampshire with our church lead team, and we’re ready to take on the summer time to fulfill God’s purpose for Fellowship Church. We started off this excellent weekend on Sunday morning at FC in Holden. I’m pleased to report that for the first time in the history of our church (or at least in the ten years that I’ve been there), we did not decrease in attendance on Memorial Day weekend. We started off a new series called, “Something old, something new”, and the whole morning was absolutely phenomonal.
I think I’ve mentioned it before, but if you need a reminder – I love our church!
Afterward the service, which focused on Baptism, blogs, and the announcement of our new series coming in June called “One Prayer,” 12 of us took off for Waterville Valley, NH for a time of relaxation and dreaming. I’ll write more about the actual trip tomorrow, but I wanted to share with you what an outstanding weekend Carie and I had.
Also, you may remember this post where I asked if there was any pastors in New England who blogged. I found very few in my search on google that I would read regularly, but I did find a few and I’ve been diligently reading their posts. This morning getting caught up in my posts, I found that I received a shout out from this guy who’s a pastor in Hopkinton, MA. Thanks Mike for your kind words,and I’ll be communicating with you very shortly.
As many of you know from this post, and from other places, tragedy struck the family of Christian singer Steven Curtis Chapman when his 5 year old adopted daughter was struck down by a vehicle in Tennessee. This morning I watched this video and it brought me to tears.
My life group had a cookout last night. This is a new game that Ben Erickson taught us. It proves that a group of adults can have a good time with one pen, dice, and paper.
