We have some exciting news! Immanuel will be sending a ministry team to Malta, an island off the coast of North Africa, from January 31-February 7. They will be providing a Kid’s Club for the missionary children during an annual missionary conference of one of Immanuel’s missionary families working in the Mediterranean region (since this article will be on the IBC website we can’t mention their name or location). These conferences are special times for missionaries when they can get a break from ministry, are able hear God’s Word taught in English, and have fellowship with other teammates they don’t get to see regularly.

The IBC team members are: Dick & Pam Anthony, Joel & Ruthie Hess, Renita Like, and Beth & Karl David Webel. The MKs range in age from 1 ½ to 16 years old and are from the USA, Canada and Korea. There are several evening meetings and a date night planned when our team will also be with the kids. Most of these children are in isolated locations without contact with other MKs. Our team will be an important link in fostering interaction with other adults like their parents and among the kids themselves. In some cases these MKs will eventually attend colleges in their home countries with classmates they met on the mission field.

Please pray for our team:

• For the ability to plan activities and prepare well for the trip with their everyday responsibilities
• Wisdom in packing since they will need to bring everything they use with the MKs
• For team unity as they meet to prepare, and during the trip
• For good health leading up to and during the trip
• That God would use this trip in a special way with the MKs and the team. For the salvation of
those MKs who may not know the Lord.

Paul Dreiling
Church Administration/
Missions Director
pdreiling@ibcrichmond.org

Sunday, January 12, we launch a new sermon series at Immanuel Baptist Church on the book of Ezra called Rebuilding Ruins. I don’t know precisely how many sermons it will include, somewhere between 14-16, but Ezra will be worth all the attention we give it for at least five reasons.

We need eyes to see God’s providence and man’s opportunity.

Preaching Ezra will clearly present God’s power to change hearts and attitudes. The story begins: “the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia” (Ezra 1:1). God motivated expatriated Jews to return—“everyone whose heart God had moved” (Ezra 1:5). Later, God changed the heart of the king of Assyria (6:22), motivated the king of Persia to beautify the house of God (Ezra 7:27-28), and caused both kings to submit to God’s sovereign will (Ezra 1:2; 7:23). God can change your mind too. We need faith to pray big prayers for our sovereign God to move among us and spread the Gospel to the ends of the earth.

We need the courage to start over or try again.

Perhaps it is helpful to know that the book of Ezra spans almost a century, and two big gaps form in the story. In chapter 4 false accusations against the Jews ended construction of the temple for 20 years, and 50 years lay between the events of chapter 6 and Ezra’s return in chapter 7. That is a long time to finish a project. Will your patience last decades? Perhaps you quit too soon—quit serving, quite sharing the Gospel, or quit attending church altogether. Reading Ezra will give you patience to start over or try again.

We need atonement for our sins.

When the people returned to Jerusalem, they immediately built an altar in the seventh month and began establishing the temple in the second year. The people praised God at the temple’s foundation singing, “For he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever toward Israel” (Ezra 3:11). But why build the temple before a wall as Nehemiah constructed? Why not roads, houses, and infrastructure first? Why set the altar before the temple’s foundation? The answer: sins were atoned on that altar. For 50 years the sin of Israel’s rebellion laid exposed. The altar was the place of forgiveness, and God’s people wanted to be clean before God. We must hold the Gospel of Jesus Christ as our priority in the church for the same reason. Before good works and worthwhile projects, we must hold to Christ’s sacrifice for sin.

We need purity as God’s people.

The book of Ezra ends with a public confession of the people’s sin of intermarriage. To be clear, Ezra was not condemning interracial marriage. The Law made provision for non-ethnic Jews to join the nation, and Ruth, as an example, was a Moabite who joined Israel through marriage after accepting the God of Israel. The impure marriages were dissolved because the people had “broken faith and married foreign women” (Ezra 10:10). A holy God is equally concerned with the purity of your marriage, money, education, and career.

We need the Bible to restore the church.

God’s Word (the Bible) restores God’s people. That is the book’s unifying theme. Ezra 7:10 says, “For Ezra had set his heart to study the Law of the Lord, and to do it and to teach his statutes and rules in Israel.” Knowing Scripture, obeying Scripture, and teaching Scripture will revitalize the church just as it restored Israel after the exile. No fancy mission statement or program launch necessary. Just Christians who carry their Bible to church. We need to be Ezra-like in our hunger for God’s Word.

Blessings,
Pastor Michael
mwilburn@ibcrichmond.org

Immanuel Family,

On Sunday, January 5th in the 5:00 pm service gathering we will share a special time reflecting on church members who entered the Lord’s presence in 2019. We said goodbye to these faithful brothers and sisters, we miss them still, and we look forward to seeing them again at Christ’s return for his Bride, the Church.

Let me invite you to attend Sunday’s Remembrance Service as we listen and share about those who have gone before us. Then we will observe the Lord’s Supper and look forward to resurrection day.

Shirley Baldwin – January 20, 2019
Audrey Redmond – March 7, 2019
Margaret Fox – April 2, 2019
Anne Terrell – April 30, 2019
Mary Ann Cate – June 30, 2019
Charles Baber – July 10, 2019
Jane Anthony – July 20, 2019
Audrey Nichols – July 21, 2019
David Eshleman – July 30, 2019
Jeanette Lane – September 15, 2019
Tom Conner – September 19, 2019

Blessings,
Pastor Michael
mwilburn@ibcrichmond.org

You need more Scripture. You need more time reading, listening, praying, applying, and sharing God’s Word. What better day to begin than January 1, 2020? Let me challenge you (and me) to invest more time in the Bible this year.

You can achieve this by:

Completely reading the Bible in a year;

Reading Immanuel’s weekly Scripture reading and sermon text ahead of Sunday morning, and;

Reading the Gospel of John one-on-one with an unbelieving friend. Do this and you will disciple yourself, enhance corporate worship, and evangelize a friend.

Here are three tips for getting started:

Buy a new Bible (digital copy, study Bible, or whatever gets you motivated to read).

Read a new English translation of the Bible (For example, I followed this tip and read the KJV, NKJV, NIV, NRSV, NLT, NET, CSB, ESV, NASB, and CEV).

Use a reading plan for the Bible (try the Through the Bible, M’Cheyne, or chronological plans – or use our church app).

Here are 10 biblical reasons to read the entire Bible in 2020:

Joshua 1:8
This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.

Matthew 4:4
But he answered, “It is written, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.”

John 6:63
It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.

John 8:31-32
So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

John 14:23-24
Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father’s who sent me.

John 17:17
Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.

Acts 20:32
And now I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified.

Romans 15:4
For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.

2 Timothy 3:16-17
All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

Hebrews 4:12
For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

Blessings,
Pastor Michael
mwilburn@ibcrichmond.org

Immanuel Family,

The year 2019 will soon end. A new decade full of opportunities and beginnings will capture our attention. Before we flip the calendar, let me encourage you to reminisce over God’s amazing grace to you and your family and remind yourself that God’s here-and-now grace leads to a never-ending future grace. As Ephesians 2:7 speaks, “so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” Do you understand what that means? The good news of the Gospel only gets better. This year will end but God’s grace never will.

On behalf of the church staff, thank you for allowing us to lead and serve you. We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Blessings,
Pastor Michael Wilburn

“For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”
Luke 21:11

Luke 2:1-20
In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child.

And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear.

And the angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. 1And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.”

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying,

“Glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!”

When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.” And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger. And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child. And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them.

But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them. And at the end of eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.

Please join Gloria Duffey and our children’s ministry for a Christmas play on Sunday during the 5:00 pm service gathering.

Blessings,
Pastor Michael Wilburn
mwilburn@ibcrichmond.org

This Sunday Evening, we will hear from Dr. David Nelson with his sermon, Live Life Forward (2 Peter 3:14-18). Let’s learn a little more about Dr. Nelson and his history with Immanuel:

Tell us your background and history with Immanuel.

• For his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation
• For the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war
• For the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed
• For the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted
• For the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed;

• To enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually
• To render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed
• To protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shewn kindness unto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord
• To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the encrease of science among them and us
• And generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.

Whenever I see a person with earbuds I ask myself, “What are they listening to?” because what we hear shapes who we are in the long run. Often, podcasts fill that airspace. Podcasts offer free downloadable audio content to anyone with a computer, smartphone, or digital device. Some of the popular “podcatchers” are iTunes, Google Play, and Stitcher. In fact, you can subscribe to Immanuel’s podcast on Stitcher HERE.

Why Listen to Podcasts?

What you hear influences how you think. Your time and attention really matter, and your commute time is more than background noise. Proverbs 18:15 approves, “An intelligent heart acquires knowledge, and the ear of the wise seeks knowledge.” Podcasts are an excellent alternative to talk radio and music. They allow you to selectively hear profitable conversations for your mind, heart, and spirit.

In case you wonder what a pastor plays in the car, here are 13 podcasts on my iPhone right now:

1. 5 Minutes in Church History
2. 5 Minutes with Pastor Lutzer
3. 9Marks Pastors’ Talk
4. Ask Pastor John
5. Classic Tales Podcast
6. Expositor with Steven J. Lawson
7. HBR Ideacast
8. Revitalize & Replant with Thom Rainer
9. The Briefing with Albert Mohler
10. The On Preaching Podcast with H. B. Charles, Jr.
11. The Tolkien Professor 
12. Thinking in Public with Albert Mohler
13. United? We Pray

Make a Suggestion

What podcasts do you listen to? Follow the link to our Facebook page, Immanuel Baptist Richmond, and post a comment with your podcast recommendation.

Blessings,

Pastor Michael