John Markum

Category: Ministry

Monday Morning Review

Posted on by johnmarkum

Welcome back to a regular work week! I hope you all had an AMAZING Thanksgiving day with friends and family. Last week for me, our family, and church broke down like this:

  • Spent the first part of the week recovering from my trip to Indiana where I got to speak to 80 teens at an All-Nighter.
  • Shopped, prepped, and cooked Thanksgiving dinner with my family. Pics and recipes coming soon, I swear!
  • Ate food, played with kids, and spent time with my wife. So grateful for all the good things God has blessed us with!
  • Stayed up way too late playing video games as my coupon clipping, sale-hunting, savings queen-of-the-universe wife (official title) left at 11:30 Thanksgiving night to spend the next 8 hours systematically hitting the best black-Friday sales available. She spent far less than most. God loves me…
  • Took wife and kids to the Festival of Trees Saturday morning. Ran into a friend from church who gave us a $10 punch card to play the games. I love our church family! We all had a great time together.
  • Got our worship on Saturday night with a good crowd. Saw more visitors, some from out of town visiting family. We worshiped like we loved Jesus, preached God’s Word, and people gave their lives to Christ. Jesus is awesome!
  • Came back Sunday morning to see more of our out-of-town college students. I love their generation! They are world-changers… you watch and see!
  • Came home, cleaned the house from a crazy week and watched Iron Chef America with the newest Iron Chef winning his first battle. I’m a food nerd…  I can’t help it.

I hope you have a great week getting back into your routines. May you experience God’s blessings and power in your life. I look forward to seeing many of you back this Saturday for our new series “Shine.” More on that later this week!

Blessings,

John

Your ministry has gas!

Posted on by johnmarkum

If you’ve ever ran out of gas while driving, you know how much it sucks! And being gas-less is indiscriminate. It does not matter if your car is an outdated, broke-down clunker or a brand new, fresh-off-the-line sports car…  if you don’t have gas, your stuck.

Prayer is the gas in your ministry’s tank. Too many of us pastors get so busy in ministry that we neglect to fill it’s tank. It would be the equivalent of spending all your time under the hood, getting greasy working on the engine, changing the plugs, adding a booming stereo, or giving it chrome rims but forgetting to fill the tank. It doesn’t matter how good your ministry looks, or how mechanically sound it is, if you don’t have prayer your ministry won’t run far.

Of course you could push the car. But nobody willingly does this. It would be insane to exert the energy of pushing your car past the gas station, insisting that you’ve got everything under control. But doing ministry without consistent prayer is equally insane. Sure you can do it for a while, but why? It’s stupid, exhausting, and short-lived at best. Your ministry was never intended to run without prayer just like your car was never meant to run without fuel. Your strength to push a car is irrelevant compared to the power of gas. And your power to maintain ministry apart from a consistent prayer life is irrelevant and insulting to the God who called you.

If you’re getting burned-out because you’ve been bearing the responsibility of ministry without the resource of prayer, imagine how much faster, and how much farther you’ll get when you stop trying to “push” your ministry in your own strength, and pray for Jesus to do what He promised He would do – build His church. When we commit our ministries to the power of prayer, God rewards us with supernatural resources to deliver our message compellingly, gain influence, lead people, and overcome obstacles. It’s sounds so basic… it is. So is filling up your car. Don’t neglect the critical just because it’s basic. The growth of your youth ministry, small group, church plant, etc. depends more on your prayer than it does your next slick illustration or cool activity.

And this principle is true regardless of whether God has called you to preach or run a business. The fulfillment of your calling depends on prayer.

John Markum

Why I love Church

Posted on by johnmarkum

   I love our church, Edgewood! My wife and I have been a part of this church family for only a little over 2 years, but the church has made us feel like family. The crowd from our Saturday night worship experience is especially near to my heart, as these are the people that I worship with week in and week out. These are the people that I more often get to see bring friends to hear the Gospel. This is where we get to see life-change happen. A few reasons I love my church family would include:

  • The willingness of our people to receive God’s Word, even when the message is challenging their status quo.
  • The genuine attitude of worship that is often so palpable in our worship experience.
  • The smiles and warm greetings that take place before, during, and after our service.
  • The many volunteers that setup, teardown, run, play, lead, greet, ush, serve drinks, design graphics, edit video, watch the little kids, teach the big kids, and so on – many of whom worship at one of our Sunday morning services.
  • Our leaders’ creativity, passion, and commitment to the success and growth of our church.
  • The consitent enthusiasm of our church family in worship, hearing God’s Word, bringing others with them, and even in their generosity.

Edgewood is a great place to make relationships, grow closer to God, serve others, and be a part of a move of God ithe Quad Cities. I love our church! To see more about our church, check out www.edgewoodbaptist.net or to see more about our Saturday night worship experience, The Awakening, go to www.qcawakening.com

John

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