Preaching the Word
& loving the people

Scott Family Newsletter – October 2024

October 18, 2024

Make Disciples of All Nations

On November 3rd, I'll be baptizing a man named Mark who began attending our church about a year ago. He just sent me his testimony that he'll read that morning & I was so excited that I wanted to share his sheer JOY of salvation with you. 

Below, I've pasted his testimony into the email just as he sent it to me. Below that I've shared a link to the work Mark, our family, & others are doing in His Good Name here that YOU have the opportunity to be a part of. Just click the link & then when you get to the webpage, click "Read More."

I will refrain from boring you with 53+ years of my biography. What I would like to address, however, is my relationship with God. As long as I could remember, I considered myself a Christian. I didn’t grow up in an overly religious home, but I had an aunt who introduced me to the Bible and Jesus at an early age. As a voracious reader, this soon to be English major read everything he could get his hands on as a teen…including the Bible.

But was I a Christian? I think so. I believed in God. I understood Jesus was my savior. I proclaimed Jesus was my savior whenever I prayed, which was not daily. Yes, I was a Christian. But was I an obedient Christian? THERE is the debate. And I can comfortably say now, NO I was not.

Don’t get me wrong. I believe, all things considered, I had been a decent person my whole life, by human standards. But I had a strained relationship with God. I had a one-way relationship with God. This is all hindsight, of course. It really wasn’t until earlier this year (with the help of Pastor Scott) that I discovered there was A LOT of static on that line between God and me.

I prayed. But my prayers were 1% praise, 1% worship, and 98% ask. Me, me, me. I have since flipped that script. Even with that, I was still doing all the talking. What about listening? Was I reading the word of God? No, I was not. Certainly not daily. And this leads to a Bible verse that sums up what I was missing. From Jeremiah 15:16 …

Your words were found, and I ate them. And Your word was to me the joy and rejoicing of my heart.

I don’t simply read the Bible now. I consume it. It nourishes me. I still talk to God plenty. Now, I am also listening. My life has been better for it. There is no more static on my line with God.

Why haven’t I been baptized already? Simply, in my spiritual immaturity, I didn’t understand its importance. The word of God has educated me.

I would like to share some of my favorite verses that demonstrate why I am here today to be baptized. Why I am here to verbally confess that Jesus is my Lord and Savior.

It’s appropriate to start with the words of Jesus in His instructions from Matthew 28:19,

Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and of the Holy Spirit...

And from Romans 10:9-10, …if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

And finally, currently my favorite passage about confessing, Philippians 2:8-10,

And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.

Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

So now, I publicly proclaim and confess that Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior. Glory be to God and all praise to God for this precious gift of salvation.

Why do I refer to my salvation as a gift? I didn’t. God did! I’d like to close with two beautiful verses from Ephesians 2:1 and 2:8,

And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins.

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God.

https://give.villagemissions.org/donate/projects/project-detail/middleton-nh-outreach-programl.

Dave, Shannon, & John Scott

Living for Him with you,
Pastor Dave for Shannon & John Scott
Colossians 2:5-7
MiddletonGospelChapel.org
ScottFamilyJourney.org
VillageMissions.org