Member News

November 6, 2014 Member Letter

Dear Brethren,

From all accounts, it was a wonderful Feast at all 40-plus locations! Sharron and I attended two sites in the United States—Orange Beach, Alabama, and Steamboat Springs, Colorado. We very much enjoyed both locations. Each site was unique, but the spirit and attitude were the same! People seemed genuinely excited to be at the Feast. 

The final attendance numbers from the Feast were very encouraging. This year our actual on-site attendance was 9,231 people, compared to 8,745 last year. We also estimate that another 900 people joined us with DVDs and webcasts. This put our attendance over 10,000 for the first time ever. For the first five holy days of 2014, the U.S. attendance showed a slight increase, but the greatest increase during the Feast of Tabernacles came from regions outside the U.S.

I gave the final sermon on the Last Great Day in Steamboat Springs. The meaning of the day was covered in the morning service, so I wanted to make a few overall comments about the Feast, something to take home. I titled my sermon “Just One More Thing ….” If you are old enough, you may recall the Columbo detective series that aired on TV back in the 1960s and ’70s. Peter Falk played a bumbling homicide detective named Columbo who would always outsmart the criminal. His famous line as he was trying to trap the murderer was, “There is just one more thing.”

The point of my sermon was to identify the “just one more thing” from this year’s Feast. Having spent nearly 20 hours over eight days in services, we invested a lot of time in church. So, what is the “just one more thing” that we should take home with us from this Feast? My answer was a deep conviction to improve and maintain our personal relationship with God. That sounds pretty simple, but it’s the most important thing we can do to prepare for the days ahead.

I used the example of manna and Israel to make the point that we need God every day, not just in times of trial. Consider that God could have provided a week’s or even a month’s supply of manna for the Israelites in the wilderness, but He gave them just enough for each day (with the exception of the sixth day). God wants us to come to Him every day. As well, you cannot depend on others and their relationship with God. You must establish and maintain your own relationship. My desire was that after all the sermonettes and sermons we heard (and we heard some excellent messages at both sites where we attended), we must go home from the Feast determined to improve our relationship with God and make Him the center of our lives. That was the “just one more thing” and my attempt to summarize a most wonderful Festival.

As we get settled back in the office after the Feast, there is much news to report. The number of unique visitors coming to our website, LifeHopeandTruth.com, continues to increase. We knew something special was happening back in June. You may recall that as we approached our second anniversary of the website’s launch, we had, for the first time, over 100,000 unique visitors in a single month. During the recently completed month of October, we had a new record of 416,000 unique visitors! The category “unique visitors” is different from “page views” and identifies the actual number of people coming to our site. Of course, it is always possible that one person could be using multiple devices (phone, iPad, laptop, etc.); but even if we discount this total to account for that possibility, the overall increase is still impressive.

The number of page views for October set a new record of 750,000. We have gone from 100,000 unique visitors to almost half a million in less than five months, and we are approaching 1 million page views during that same time frame. Our impact in the world of the Internet is still small, but it has increased exponentially from where we began in June of 2012.

But the real joy for all of us will come when we begin to see new people called into the Church as God blesses our efforts to preach His gospel. In addition to the increase in visitors to our website, we have noticed more messages sent to [email protected] asking about our church services. It is still a trickle, but it has definitely increased. We are now receiving two to three of these each week. Here are a couple of examples of what people have written in just the past week:

“We didn’t realize what we were missing until we came across your website and all the wonderful spiritual resources you have via the Internet. You truly are doing a wonderful job of preaching the gospel and giving guidance to those already within the Church. My husband and I have been listening to many sermons on your website for a few months now. If you didn’t make God’s Word so accessible, I am not sure we would have even known where we were falling short.”

 Another message: 

“I am 23 years old and have grown up in the Church (the Body of Christ.) My family has been in and out of many of the groups since I was a youngster. I’m a single mother of two. I was baptized at 17 years old and have stayed in the faith all these years. I was wondering if there are COGWA groups near my home that we may fellowship with.”

We should all pray that God will call new people into His Church. Our mission is to spread the gospel of the Kingdom to all the world, but it is up to God to do the calling (John 6:44). Our motive for preaching the gospel must not be selfish, nor should it be “from envy and strife” as Paul writes in Philippians 1:15. Paul adds in verse 16 that some “preach Christ from selfish ambition, not sincerely.” Our effort to preach the gospel must come from a burning desire to share God’s truth and to help those whom God may call. The right message, preached with purity of motive, is an important tool that God can use to make a major impact in the world.

Thank you again for your support of the work of God. Our greatest desire is to please God in everything we do. It is a great privilege to know the truth and to be able to share it with others. There is no greater calling in the world today! 

Sincerely, your brother in Christ,

Jim Franks