By Darrel Proffitt, Lead Pastor
This weekend a new sermon series will begin.  For three weeks we will look closely at what it means to walk in Jesus' steps of giving and generosity.  This is a topic we look at every year around this time.  Presentation Sunday is on November 16th and the series will prepare us for that day. 
Stewardship is often misunderstood.  The annual pledge campaign is mistakenly seen by some as a way to raise funds.  It is not.  It is about raising faith.  There is a reason that Jesus talked more about money than he did Heaven and Hell combined. Eleven of the 39 parables He tells are about finances.  The reason?  Our finances can either limit the development of our faith or facilitate it.
I hope you will join me this weekend as our short three week series will help us see what is the key is to living a life of joy: generosity.  The happiest most joyful people in the world are those who have learned this truth.  Takers never flourish, only givers do.   That’s what the annual pledge campaign is about, making a decision to use our money as a tool to build our faith.
Please continue to pray for the stewardship and faith of those who make COTHA their church family.  I am excited to see how God will bless us.  My prayer is that all of us will experience a deeper level of blessedness as we live more deeply into the faithful life of a disciple.  I want all of us to be blessed.  God is faithful and will bless all of us who do not let this opportunity slip through our fingers.  See you this weekend!
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By Darrel Proffitt, Lead Pastor
I was reading a blog recently and came across this:
“I’ve had some restaurant people tell me the “church hour”—after the churches finish on Sunday—is one of the hardest hours of their week. Really? That’s sad. I would hope it’d be the opposite.
How’s that for having the mind of Christ? Or being witnesses? Or considering others better than ourselves?
Whenever I’ve asked, well over three fourths of my blog readers identify themselves as believers. So, if you’re in the one fourth who don’t claim Christianity, this post isn’t for you. Sorry about that, but today I’m only addressing the “family”. We call ourselves brothers and sisters. In love, we sometimes gently rebuke one another. That’s what families do.
So, brothers and sisters. Quit being mean.
Consider what you say and the way you say it before you ever say it.
That sounds logical. Biblical. A good discipline even.
Because I can fall into a culture that thinks more about myself than others too. You can too. We all can. We can value our opinion, consider others without our opinion wrong, and talk to people who we know are wrong like they are less human because of it. Sometimes we treat members of our family—people we love—worse than we treat a stranger. I get that.
But, when we are mean it flies in the face of what Christians are taught to do—in the Bible we claim as our guide. And, it’s the kindness of God that leads to repentance. To my knowledge, no one ever comes to faith through meanness. Or watching someone be mean to others.
In fact, there is no “meanness” of God. God is love—even when He’s sharing truth.
And, we are to be like Him. At least becoming more like Him.”
The sad thing about the above post by Ron Edmondson is that it had to be written.  The Bible tells us that the world will come to know who God is by the way His believers love.  We are to be like Jesus who loved and forgave even when He was being crucified. 
I wonder what other people who do not have faith think of God by the way I behave toward others?  Are they intrigued and full of questions about how I can be so loving?  Or are they turned off?  Being mean is wrong but we sometimes fail to understand that there is a conscious force of evil that thrives off of such behavior.  I challenge you to remember that the way we treat others is not just a gospel suggestion but a gospel imperative.

By Darrel Proffitt, Lead Pastor
Our series on the beatitudes continues this weekend. As I was reflecting on how radical the beatitudes are, I became aware of how easy it is to ignore them. We look at them as some sort of “other world” behavior good for some but so far out of the realm of possibilities as far as our behavior goes.
For example look at this “blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.” Really? Meek? Aren’t the meek trampled under foot by the aggressive, “non-meek?” If I live that way won’t I be destroyed by those who find such behavior a sign of weakness?
We live in a world where meekness or gentleness is not thought to be behaviors one would seek. Things are too hard, you have to drive yourself to succeed so why would meekness be an advantage? Doesn’t meekness mean weakness?
God doesn’t think so. He says that the gentle are the strongest people among us. The earth is their inheritance.
Arrogance is related to strength in the way the world defines it. It’s not hard to see. You can see it on social media in a very clear way., especially when a person can remain anonymous. When a person is anonymous, it’s easy to feign strength: through sarcasm, criticism, and a host of other ways. Strength, in the way the world looks at it is prideful, pushy, rude and mean. These people will not inherit the earth.
True power and strength comes from God. God enters our lives and changes our hearts. The result is that we begin to look like the beatitudes. It is a strength that the world knows nothing about but it is the kind of strength that is slowly changing the world. We need to be aware that we will not “naturally” live in the way of the beatitudes. We can’t force ourselves to be that way. Our hearts and desires truly need to be changed. It is only changed when the Word enters us and slowly, gradually makes us like Jesus. We can encourage that change or block it. The choice is ours. When we live more and more into this kingdom behavior we are likely to be hurt. But we are guaranteed to inherit the earth. May God continue to change our hearts so that we can witness to the hard-driving, pushy, tragic world that the “Kingdom of God is at hand.”

By Darrel Proffitt, Lead Pastor
I recently read a description of a comic strip called For Better or Worse. In the comic strip a young boy is playing checkers with his grandfather. The following dialogue takes place:
“Oh, no! Not again!” shouted the young boy. “Grandpa you always win!”
“What do you want me to do?” replied the grandfather, “lose on purpose? You won’t learn anything if I do that.”
“I don’t wanna learn anything,” the young boy said, “I just wanna win.”
This comic strip touches on the essence of how many people live their lives. They just want to win. When applied to the Christian life I believe that holds true as well. We don’t want to struggle; we want things to come easy. But if we pay attention, life doesn’t come easy. It is difficult. Being a Christian doesn’t take that away. We struggle. We are challenged. Yet there is a purpose in all of this. God wants to take us to deeper places where we can grow and live a life that makes a difference in our world.
Sometimes we do win. But winning without struggle leaves us where we began. But to struggle, learn and then win, that will change us. It grows our faith and our usefulness in the Kingdom.

By Darrel Proffitt, Lead Pastor
I recently finished the book Sometimes you Win, Sometimes you Learn by the leadership guru John Maxwell.  I recommend the book because it helps us to see that failure is an important aspect to leading.  Failure is not fatal, it’s just feedback.
 Maxwell reminds the reader of the importance of hope.  A person can live a long time without food, a few days without water but only seconds without hope.  Maxwell asks the question, what does hope do for us? 

• Hope shines brightest when the hour is darkest.
• Hope motivates when discouragement comes.
• Hope energizes when the body is tired.
• Hope sweetens when the bitterness bites.
• Hope sings when all melodies are gone.
• Hope believes when the evidence is limited.
• Hope listens for answers when no one is talking.
• Hope climbs over obstacles when no one is helping.
• Hope endures hardship when no one is caring.
• Hope smiles confidently when no one is laughing.
• Hope reaches for answers when no one is asking.
• Hope presses toward victory when no one is encouraging.
• Hope dares to give when no one is sharing.
• Hope brings the victory when no one is winning.

In other words, hope brings the greatest gift to those who have it.  Hope gives.  When you feel like you have nothing, when your resources are tapped, hope gives us the fuel to go on.  It is inspirational and essential to all of life.
 Do you have hope?  Where do you find it?  What do you do when you experience it?  Hope endures, empowers and encourages.  You can live without a lot but hope is essential.  As Christians, hope is our lifeblood.  Thank God that we have hope in abundance!  God is sufficient and sovereign.  It is in God that we find our hope.

By Darrel Proffitt, Lead Pastor
One of the many things I like about having gone “Orange” this fall for our children and student’s ministries is the way they architects of the curriculum constantly remind teachers, small group leaders and facilitators what it is that we believe.  They place this in all their material, week after week:
ABOUT GOD
God is the one and only true God, yet He exists in three persons: God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. God is the Creator, so everything belongs to Him and is under His control. God is holy, so He is righteous, majestic and loving. God is all knowing and purposeful, so He’s at work to bring about His will. No person, thing or idea compares to God.
ABOUT THE SCRIPTURES
God reveals Himself to us through the Bible, and it is 100% accurate, reliable and authoritative.
 ABOUT PEOPLE
People are made in God’s image and for His pleasure. But everybody falls short of God’s intention, or ideal, for people. In other words, everyone has sinned. As a result, we are all separated from Him, even though He wants an intimate relationship with each of us.
 ABOUT SALVATION
That’s why Jesus, God’s Son, came and lived on this earth, died and rose again. God offers His free gift of salvation to all who believe in Jesus and accept Him as Savior, the only way to be forgiven and reconciled to God. Anyone who accepts this gift is adopted as a son or daughter into God’s family and will live with Him forever in heaven.
 We are using the same wording in the packet we are preparing for all of our Sermon-based Small groups that begin meeting during the week of October 5.  We are doing this to remind us who we are and what we believe.  To be reminded of the very foundation of our faith family is to be empowered to live more fully into who God has called us to be and what God has called us to do.
If you want more information about being in a sermon based small group, let us know at info@cotha.org.

By Sean Nelson, Pastor of Discipleship

Martin Luther was born in 1483 in Germany. His family was classified as peasants but his father was determined to give his son a better life. His father wanted him to be a lawyer but a storm in 1505 altered the curse of Martin Luther. Believing that ST. Anne saved him from the storm he vowed to become a monk. He devoted his life to a Monastery despite the disappointment it would bring to his father. These decisions came from a fear of hell and God instilled by an early education in the church.    
            His Monastery life wasn’t what he thought. It was difficult and the spiritual enlightenment he sought never was found. Along came a mentor who challenged him to focus solely on Jesus and let that become his ambition. This proved to be the stimulation needed for holy discontentment in his life.  Later, Martin received the opportunity to serve the church, which led to more disillusionment. Frustrated and discouraged by the lack of leadership and integrity he witnessed, he enrolled in the University of Wittenberg to escape the madness.  
            This attempt was unsuccessful; he didn’t run away from the madness he was faced it head on.  Time spent reading the Bible helped him see the glaring disconnect between the papacy and the scriptures. Two Scriptures, in particular, changed his life – Psalm 22:1 and Romans 1:17. 
             If you are unfamiliar with how the story ends check it out - http://www.christianitytoday.com/ch/131christians/theologians/luther.html?start=1
            God desires to impact the world around you but he always start from the inside out. All other mechanisms for change are fallible. Working from Salvation is the only spiritual, and logical, result of our life in Christ.  Let God start a spiritual revolt within by reading his word and praying for His will to be done in us.
 O taste and see that the Lord is good. In His presence and with His people

As I was preparing for my small group on Tuesday, I came across this quote about the nature of God: “One must never lose sight of the reality that God is One—one in essence and being. He exists in three persons, yet each is fully and wholly God. The Son is fully God, not a separate God. The Holy Spirit is fully God, not a separate being. So God is truly one in essence because each person of the Trinity is one in essence with the other. But, God is not only one in essence, but He is one in unity. The three persons of the Trinity exist in complete oneness. Each person of the Trinity carries out a unique role and performs unique operations, yet they remain one in essence and one in unity. This is the nature of the eternal God.”
The Trinity is one of those doctrines that many people just throw their arms up in the air and say, “I can’t get it! It doesn't’ matter anyway.” I would suggest to anyone who would feel that way that it does matter. Significantly.
While it may difficult to parse the doctrine of the Trinity completely, to not think about it at all is to be diminished. In the very essence of God there is community and thus relationship: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The implications are profoundly important. While there isn’t space on this blog to dive very deeply into this doctrine, I can suggest to the reader to consider what it means that in God’s very nature is relationship. What does that mean about being created in God’s image? Are we made for relationships? What does it say about experiencing God’s own self? Is it in relationships that we experience God most fully? What does it say about the incarnation? When God became human, what does that say about relationships?
I have my small group tonight. Perhaps our meeting together is more significant than a group of friends connecting. Perhaps in our relationships is a clear glimpse of God.