TWO BOYS BORN IN BECKLY, WV!

On Mar. 24, 1977 our oldest son, Matthew was born at this hospital. On Aug. 24, 1979, our youngest son, Aaron was born at this same hospital. After being away from the Beckley, West Virginia area for 28 years, Pastor Wes Rigdon of the Lester Baptist Church, Lester, WV invited us to come back for me to speak at their church's Anniversary Revival. Please pray for this 4 night meeting at the same church Coletta and I served in from 1978 to 1981. I am typing this at the Econo Lodge Motel, on Harper Road in Beckley, just about 5 blocks West of the Raleigh General Hospital where we took these two pictures today. It is a special time for us to come back where Coletta and I started our first year in marriage, ministry, and where our two special "Burns Boys" were born. What a blessing!


That's Something to Think About! jimmycburns@aol.com

Fireproof at Liberty Baptist - Van Wert

On Sunday, April 19, Liberty Baptist Church, located at 501 E. Third St. (the former Horace Mann school building) in Van Wert, would like to invite everyone to a free public showing of the much talked about movie Fireproof.

Starring Kirk Cameron and Erin Bethea, Fireproof is the story of a professional firefighter that is an expert at pulling strangers from burning buildings, but who struggles to save his marriage.

Show time is 6:30 p.m., with free refreshments starting at 5:45 pm. There will be free infant and childcare provided.

For more information, contact Pastor Jim C. Burns at Liberty Baptist Church at 419.238.2273, or access the movie’s website at www.fireproofthemovie.com.

ROOF TOP CHRISTIANITY!

I'm sure by the time you finish reading this blog, you will possibly think me to be "unpatriotic." If you think that, you are wrong. I love the United States and I am proud to be an American. I think our country's assets definitely out way our liabilities. The concern of my heart tonight is more about the churches in the United States verses the horrible degree of depravity that now permeates our nation. Matter of fact, I think if the "Church" of America was what we should be, our country would not be in the sinful mess we are in today.

I have visited nine different foreign mission fields. I have also been to "Pastor's Fellowship Meetings" here in the states where some pastors feel it is our job as U. S. Pastors to go oversees and "tell our missionaries" how to "get the job done!" I think we have it backwards. I think it's time we get some folks from South America and Asia to come to our country and our churches and explain to us "how to get the job done" and how we as "Bible Believing Churches" in the U. S. need to get back to the Great Commission of Matthew 28:18 - 20 in the Bible and start doing what the church was founded for. Win Souls to Christ, get people saved, baptize new converts, and disciple these new believers. Honestly, I am tired of seeing people who know better come to church and "pretend." I'm tired of dealing with people who are at church nearly every service, but display no zeal for Christ, no spiritual maturity, and no loyalty to the Bible and to the real purpose for why we are left on earth after we are saved.

Please don't think my "sermon" tonight is all about Liberty Baptist, the church where I serve. I am honored to minister among some of the most loving, dedicated, sincere, transparent, and zealous believers in the world. I love my church and would die for any one of our members. Most of them love the Lord, love my wife and me, and are a great blessing to us. I'm talking about the "American Church." The "Me Church." I could write another thousand words about the huge problems in our churches today, but, let me summarize it up with a recent story I heard from a dear pastor friend in a distant state. His Senior Pastor put out a congregational survey to find out what the church members liked and disliked in order to "improve their ministries." One member shared a complaint that he didn't like the power point slides for the congregational singing, because it didn't have a "bouncing ball" that floated above each word of the song on the "big screen" to help "him" know which word to sing! I'd love to ask that man how many lost souls he witnessed to last week, or even all of last year for that matter. This is what I am talking about. It's not about the computerized "singing bouncing ball" my friend. It's about Jesus Christ dying for your sins, and the mandate we have from Heaven to get this message to every one we can while we can. It's about Jesus saving you from Hell and you helping to keep others from going there.

The pictures above and below are real pictures of a church in a distant Asian country that went to a roof top ten stories high, inflated a child's swimming pool to have a baptism for new converts. They couldn't baptize in a public meeting place on Main Street, lest they all get arrested and the new converts taken to prison. These people are paying a price to get saved and to live for Christ. Their question at the end of a worship service is never, "When is that preacher going to stop?" There plea is, "Can you tell us more?"


Maybe we need to get these folks to come down from their roof and come to America and have them "melt our singing bouncing balls" and show us some true "Roof Top Christianity."

If you are a conservative Bible believing Christian and a church member, why not ask yourself the next time you have your little pity party at church, "What in the world does my pity party have to do with Matthew 28 and the Great Commission?"

Oh one other thing. I'm not telling you where this rooftop church is because I want to protect these Asian believers. Even though these believers don't have a church building to meet in like most believers...the Asian people are eager to hear and study God's Word whether it be on a rooftop, at a hotel conference room, in an apartment, or at a park

Think about this for a while and let's get some "Roof Top Christianity" back in the U.S. Church of today!

Jim C. Burns Email: jimmycburns@aol.com

GOING BACK TO LESTER FOR REVIVAL!

Gal 6:9) And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not. (Galatians 6:9)
Well, I guess I'm kinda in the "car mode" for my recent blog posts. I couldn't find any old pictures of the first new car Coletta and I ever bought together, so, I found this one on the Internet. It's a 1977 Mercury Monarch. Only the one we bought was metallic royal blue with a white vinyl top. We bought it at a Ford dealer in Hinton, WV, and drove it home to Glen Daniel. About a year later, the Lord led us to resign the Coal Marsh Missionary Baptist Church to move over the "holler" to accept the call to minister at the Lester Baptist Church in Lester, WV. (Don't worry. The photo above was not our parsonage)! We were honored to serve the good folks at Lester from 1978 to May of 1981. Those were wonderful days. Matt was about one year old when we moved, and our second son, Aaron, was born while we were at Lester on Aug. 24, 1979. We were able to see the church grow, see many souls saved, and see two children's departments and a teen department start in the church, plus, we were at Lester when the church broke ground and built a new building on a hill at the West end of town right at the edge of Highway 54.

A few weeks ago, Lester's new Pastor Wes Rigdon called me to ask if Coletta and I would return for a four day revival which will take place during the church's anniversary. I have accepted Pastor Rigdon's invitation to come speak, and Coletta and I are so honored after these 30 plus years to go back to the second church where I have pastored to be a part of this special event. Please pray that the Lord will use us to help this dear pastor and his family and this fine church reach more people for Christ in their mission field.

"Thank you Lord for letting Coletta and I serve you together all these years, and for the privilege of being invited to go back to a church where we served 30 years ago for a revival meeting."

MY TREE FELL ON PAUL'S CAR!

Last night, after a couple of late meetings after Awana at the Liberty Baptist Church of Van Wert, Ohio, My wife and I turned out the lights, set the alarm, and locked the church doors. We faced rain and severe wind as we jumped in our Dodge Mini-van, went through the McDonald's drive through, and drove home. As we entered our alley drive way, Coletta hollered out, "Jim, stop! There's a tree down!" I nearly hit the electric line, pulled out, parked in front of our house and went in our front door. I looked out our window and noticed that our tall pine tree between our house and the alley had snapped, blew over and landed on my neighbor's Buick. Part of the tree was also on their back porch. Sorry Paul and Linda.

The good news is that this morning a church member and three friends and neighbors helped Paul and me get the tree off the car, and cut the wood up with two chain saws. Paul's car is scratched up and dented, but thank the Lord, no broken glass. The city was quick to free the power line (it ended up being a large phone line), and cleared the alley, as the phone line was stretched across Main Street, and one pole across Main was so bowed I thought it would break. The police closed our block of Main Street until the phone line was raised. Thanks for the help every body! Thank God, no one was injured or killed.

Jim C. Burns

AN AMISH PLACE TO REST!

"And he said unto them, Come ye yourselves apart into a desert place, and rest a while: for there were many coming and going, and they had no leisure so much as to eat." (Mark 6:31)

Above is a photo of me and our Scottie Dog, Cabbie in front of the Glenhaven Cabin near Sugar Creek, Ohio. (Cabbie stayed in our mini-van in a cage. No pets allowed)! Coletta (my wife) took the picture. We were first introduced to Glenhaven Cabin by Dr. Jim Anderson from Kansas City, who stayed here for a week while preaching a Bible Conference at The Valley View Community Church. The cabin was built about 12 years ago and is owned by a fine Christian couple, Glenn and Esther Troyer. The Troyers live at their nearby farm, and Glenn has also driven a truck. They have become dear friends to us. Although we live in N. W. Ohio, my wife and I love to visit Amish Country in Eastern Ohio. Experiencing a sample of the slow peaceful lifestyle of the Amish and the area's Mennonites and seeing the beautiful rolling hills, farms, and trees near Sugar Creek is tranquil as well as breath taking. Our most recent trip here was blessed with our oldest son and family, Matt, Jenny, and Miley coming to join us for one night and the next day at the cabin.

Glenhaven has become our "home away from home." When Coletta and I become mentally, emotionally and spiritually drained in helping people who are hurting or struggling in their lives, or when we simply become physically drained from the demands of the ministry, we often go to Glenhaven. After visiting Ohio's Amish Country usually two or three times a year over the past 12 years, we have discovered some of our "secret and favorite places" off the main beaten paths that have become great "memory making spots" for the two of us. It is just a peace of Heaven. Both Holmes County, the Sugar Creek area, and just hanging out and relaxing at Glenhaven has always drawn Coletta and I closer to the Lord and each other. So whether you are in the ministry or not, give Glenn and Esther Troyer a call (877)852-4039 and do as Jesus commanded his disciples. "Come ye yourselves apart into a desert place, and rest a while."

I'm Jim Burns, Pastor of the Liberty Baptist Church in Van Wert, Ohio, and that's something to think about! Email: jimmycburns@aol.com

Three Special Church Friends

Page Kittle holding her two little buddies, Lottie Shartzer with our granddaughter, Miley Burns. I snapped this photo just before the strike of midnight at our Church's New Year's Eve Party at 501 E. Third Street in Van Wert, Ohio. What a trio.

I'm Jim C. Burns, Sr. Pastor at the Liberty Baptist Church in Van Wert, Ohio, and this is something else.

jimmycburns@aol.com