During my first deacons meeting in March, I met a modern day Mr. and Mrs. Nehemiah. Gary and Josephine “J.C.” Montgomery are the directors of Living Stones International, a faith-based nonprofit that ministers to children of inmates at Wakulla Correctional Institution. They reach out to children of prisoners and reunite them with their fathers through […]
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In the 1980 hit movie The Blues Brothers, Dan Akroyd and the late John Belushi play the role of two brothers who reunite their band to save the orphanage they grew up in. As Jake and Elwood memorably share with anyone who will listen, “We’re on a mission from God.” On Sunday, October 13, nearly […]
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Fewer than four miles away from our church on Sunday, the kingdom of God sprouted and grew just a little bit more. It happened at the Hope Community, where a group of sorority sisters and FBC volunteers gathered to pressure wash a dorm for men. These clients are transitioning out of homelessness into sustainable living. […]
Read More »Lord, prepare us to go into the city, Let us live through you. You are our Creator, sovereign God Show your love through us as we go afar. Lord, prepare us to go into the city Let us praise your name You are God! Let us live to show your name. You are God, Let […]
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If you’re new to Tallahassee, the first time you see First Baptist is not through worship or Bible Study. It’s through the website. Before anyone visits, the first stop on the journey takes place long before they set foot on College Avenue. They visit www.fbctlh.org. When we first met together in April to talk about […]
Read More »As I shared Sunday, Love Tallahassee can be more than a moment. It can be a movement of God when we engage in sustainable Jubilee ministry across our community. Nehemiah was one of the first and possibly only examples we have in the Old Testament to implement a Jubilee year. Jesus embodied the message in […]
Read More »Do you remember returning from vacation, dropping off our pictures, waiting for them to be developed, and picking them up at the store? In these days of instant everything, there was something about that season of anticipation. In the gap between return and development, we had a reason to get together, see the pictures, and […]
Read More »The Nehemiah memoir is a fascinating case study of what happens when an average person working in public life catches a vision for the kind of community his homeland can be. What Jeremiah does as a prophet, and Ezekiel sees as a former priest, Nehemiah does for people who go to work every day. He […]
Read More »In worship Sunday, Sabal Palm Elementary Principal Ray King challenged us with words from Acts 20:35: “In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ” Ray captured […]
Read More »In the fifth century B.C., a bureaucrat from Susa located in modern-day Iran received a message from his family. His religious homeland was in shambles. He convinced the Persian king and queen to finance a scouting expedition to check on the place. Although he had never visited before, he was touched by what he saw […]
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