Happy Mother's Day

I just wanted to wish all the Mothers a Happy Mother's Day!! Thank you for your tireless work in rasing our kids!! Your the best.

1Th 2:7 But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children.

Thank you for your love and gentleness. Be encouraged. Have a great day!!!

Peace,
Rob

Faith and Prayer

In any study of the principles and procedure of prayer, of its activities and enterprises, first place, must, of necessity, be given to faith. It is the initial quality in the heart of any man who essays to talk to the unseen. He must, out of sheer helplessness, stretch forth hands of faith. He must believe, where he cannot prove. In the ultimate issue, prayer is simply faith, claiming its natural yet marvelous prerogatives--faith taking possession of its illimitable inheritance. True godliness is just as true, steady, and perservering in the realm of faith as it is in the province of prayer. Moreover: when faith ceases to pray, it ceases to live. E.M. Bounds

Mat 21:22 And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith."

Joh 14:12-14 "Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. (13) Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. (14) If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.

Mar 11:22-24 And Jesus answered them, "Have faith in God. (23) Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, 'Be taken up and thrown into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. (24) Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.

Phi 4:5-6 Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; (6) do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.

Jam 1:5-8 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. (6) But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. (7) For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; (8) he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

Well, there is not much I can say about these scriptures. They pretty much speak for themselves. Obviously, prayer is faith's voice. Without faith, prayer does not exist. That is pretty convicting. I know that I am praying daily for God to increase my faith. I want to believe and not doubt. Like the father of the demon possessed boy I cry out to God, "I do believe; help me to overcome my unbelief." (Mark 9:24)

Peace to all.
Rob

Ok guys this time it is for real. The weather is better...not good but better. So in about an hour we are about to get underway. I just want to start this thing so I can home to my friends and family sooner.

Love you all and take care

Charles

Saying goodbye...

It has been a sad 24 hours in the Burch household. We dropped Charles off at the ship around 4 yesterday and said our goodbyes. It was definitely difficult to remain strong for the children, but overall I did relatively well. This morning I woke the children up and prepared them to wave goodbye to Charles from the pier. We waved for about an hour, I took lots of pictures and was surprised not one tear fell. I will miss Charles greatly, he is such a wonderful man. I do however know that with a family like all of you, the children and I will be supported, loved immensely, and well taken care of. I am grateful for your love and prayers. Please continue to pray for our family to remain strong while Charles is away.

Here is a picture I thought was fitting for the day.

Love,
Melissa

Hello everyone, I just wanted to send out a quick message to all my brothers and sisters. It is always hard leaving a good place but the feeling of coming back to such love and kindness is wonderful. I know the being gone for 6 months will be hard on my family but with all of your love and support it will ease the burden. God says that he will not test us more then we can handle so that means we will make it through any storms that come are way....just LOOK TO GOD and he WILL answer.

Take care of each other with unwavering love and devotion and I will see all of you in 6 short months.

God Bless

Love you all

Charles

Soft Christianity

Wow, its been almost two weeks since my last post. I apologize for my delinquency. Hopefully I can get back to at least a weekly entry. We will see. Anyway, I came across a very interesting article on the internet that I wanted to share with you guys. The article comes from the Barna Group website, which I have added to the link list on the sidebar. Barna is a Christian research and resource group that conducts surveys and collects statistics on issues relating to the Christian faith. If you want to read the article click on the following link: Americans Have Commitment Issues. I thought that this was an eye opening study that made me ask a lot of questions regarding my own commitment to God and his Kingdom (the Church). The key point of the article that really made me think was how soft most people's commitment to God is. Most people (myself) are willing to go to Church and do religious stuff but are they(me) really committed to knowing God, loving God, making Jesus Lord (master) of our life? Am I letting God transform me and change my character? Am I making every effort to be close to God? These are good questions to ask ourselves. I believe the last thing that we (I) want to become is just a church goer. Well, read the article and let me know what you think.

Also, I just wanted to share that I have been studying the book of Nehemiah in my quiet times. I am inspired by Nehemiah's concern for the people and his reliance on God through prayer. It convicts me to think about my prayer life when compared to that of Nehemiah. Just thought I would share that with you. Anyway, have a great finish to your week.
Peace,
Rob

A note about the links

As you can see, there is a links column on the right hand side of the blog. I have tried to put in links that I felt would be helpful to everyone. Some links are church related and others are bible study related. I just want to mention a couple that maybe you might not know what they are. First is the E-Sword link. This is a free bible study software package that I use regularly. It is a very good program and gives you a large selection of bible translations, commentaries, and dictionaries. Check it out. I put a link up for Wikipedia. This is a free encyclopedia type web site that has great information on just about anything imaginable. The cool thing about it is that you can add information or correct information to any of the articles on the site. Very cool. I have a link for the Center for Science and Culture. This is a very good site that gives a lot of information about intelligent design and evolution. If that interests you I would definitely check it out. The New Testament gateway and Apollos.ws are two great bible study/theology sites with a lot of great articles and info. The Apollos site is actually run by disciples in Florida. Finally I want to mention the Alvin Plantinga Library site. This site has a collection of articles written by Alvin Plantinga, who is one of the most distinguished Christian philosophers of our time. If you have any interest in Philosophy/Christian philosophy, I would read some of his articles. Well have fun checking out the sites. It is great that we have such incredible resources at our disposal for free. Well I guess you do have to pay for internet service. But most of us do anyway, so we might as well use that service for good. Peace to all.
Rob

Rob's Weekly Blurb

Greetings,
Yes its Wednesday already. It seems that I keep pushing back my weekly post one extra day each week. I'll try to get back to posting on Monday. Anyway, midweek service is tonight. The Tri-Cities will be meeting separate from the Beach at our new location. That is exciting!! I am looking forward to seeing every one tonight. Well, I hope that everyone is having a good week thus far. It is great to have Charles back. I was encouraged to see his recent post. To close this post I have included a passage from Hebrews that I read this morning. It reminded me of Romans 12:1 (living sacrifice). The sacrifice that God desires is for us to acknowledge him and to praise him. I believe this includes prayer, singing, worship, sharing our faith, and so on. Also, God wants us to do good (good deeds) and to share what we have. This goes along with the idea of faith and deeds. When we have a strong faith in God, it is only natural that we will do good things and share what we have with others. That's all folks. Peace out and keep the faith.
Your Brother,
Rob

Hebrews 13:15-16 Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name. (16) Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.

Hi everyone. Just wanted to say that I was encouraged with the bible talk last night. Being gone from the body of the church is difficult to deal with sometimes. Even though I will only be back for a month I am sure that the lessons we will learn will help give us the courage and strength to get through each day.

God Bless and will see you all Sunday.

Charles

Weekly Encouragement: Acts 28:30-31

Acts 28:30-31 He lived there two whole years at his own expense, and welcomed all who came to him, (31) proclaiming the kingdom of God and teaching about the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness and without hindrance.

Excerpt from Matthew Henry's Commentary:
Yet it is a pleasure to us (for we are sure it was to him) that, though we leave him in bonds for Christ, yet we leave him at work for Christ, and this made his bonds easy that he was not by them bound out from serving God and doing good. His prison becomes a temple, a church, and then it is to him a palace. His hands are tied, but, thanks be to God, his mouth is not stopped; a faithful zealous minister can better bear any hardship than being silenced. Here is Paul a prisoner, and yet a preacher; he is bound, but the word of the Lord is not bound.

As I was finishing up the book of Acts, I found these last two verses very inspiring and convicting. Paul (the photo in this post is a Rembrandt painting of Paul) was a prisoner in Rome (house arrest) for two years and never stopped proclaiming the Kingdom of God!! Nothing would stop Paul from preaching the word. What stops me from preaching the word? What is my excuse? Just something to chew on this week.

Have a great week!! See everyone on Wednesday night.

Peace,
Rob

Happy Birthday Mike!!!

Just wanted to wish Mike a very happy 30th birthday. Have a wonderful day dude, you deserve it.

Peace,
Rob

1 Thessalonians 5:11

Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.

Hey Guys

Hey guys well I am finally feeling better what a relief. I am so glad that we have had the chance to be in Rob and Tiffany's Bible Talk I think that it will be awesome. I would like to put in a reminder that March 23 is Mikes Birthday he will be turning 30. We will be having dinner at the Macaroni Grill On VA Beach Blvd at 6-6:30. So if anyone would like to give words of encouragement balloons with old man on them feel free. You all are more then welcome to join us for dinner thanks so much.
Love ya Jess

In the Beginning....

Well, this is it. The first post of our new bible talk blog. In fact, the bible talk itself is new having just had our first meeting this past Friday at our (Tiff and I) house. The meeting went great (you may disagree) and we were able to decide on a date, time, and location for our bible talk:
Date: Every other Firday
Time: 7:00 pm (bible study starting at 7:15)
Location: Mike and Jessica's House (Thank you!!)
Tiff and I are very excited about this new beginning and look forward to many great bible talks in the future. Good news already for the group. We have grown!!! Victoria and Courtney are joining the group (very cool). We are definitely happy to have them.
As far as this blog thing goes, I will e-mail everyone an invitation to be a team member for the blog. Just follow the directions and sign up (its free). Once your a team member you can make your own posts. The goal is for people to post up their quiet times, good news, or just some encouraging words. Whatever you like. This will also be good for our brothers who are out to sea, so they can just check the website to see whats going on in the group. Also, at the beginning of every week I will make a post with an update of what's happening in the upcoming week. Everyone got that. Good.
Thats all for now. Everyone have a great week.

2Co 4:17-18 For this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, (18) as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

Peace to all.
Rob