Hi everyone,

We have two very special services planned for Father’s Day this Sunday.

Our theme for the day is “The Man Cave”.

Retreating isn’t generally celebrated in our world. Mostly we would associate it with weakness, failure, distress, disconnection or disappointment. But life will have those components; most of us wouldn’t go through a week or even a day without some level of those feelings.

The Australian diggers finally succeeded on the Kokoda Track through a series of carefully planned retreats followed by a time of regrouping. This enabled them to hold off and eventually overcome a much more heavily armed, resourced and manned force that was advancing against them.

I don’t think the question we need to consider is whether we should ever have to retreat or not, but rather what we retreat to. King David built an extremely loyal, skilled and effective army on men who needed to retreat.
(1 Samuel 22:1-2 NIV)

David left Gath and escaped to the cave of Adullam. Yes that’s right, there is a “Man Cave” in the bible. When his brothers and his father’s household heard about it, they went down to him there. All those who were in distress or in debt or discontented gathered around him, and he became their commander. About four hundred men were with him. These men were in distress, in debt, disgruntled, fraud rated, broken and disconnected. But their success and restoration was in what and who they retreated to.

A retreat is fine, in fact it’s a necessary part of life. We do have to retreat to a safe place from time to time. Let’s make sure that place is safe and with Jesus. Then we will regroup, find ourselves restored, retired and ready for what lies ahead.

We have a special Father’s Day Service coming up this Sunday. This is a great opportunity to honour all the men in the house and recognize the important role they have within the life of our church, society and in God’s kingdom. We want every man to feel honoured and appreciated this Sunday. There will be fun activities, competitions, power tool giveaways, gourmet breakfast burgers (for the AM service) and a hearty meal (for the PM service), so make sure you invite your fathers, brothers, sons and friends to join us for Father’s Day. This is a great day to bring a friend to Church!

Of course, this service is not just for the blokes. There will be inspiring worship and a message for us all, not to mention fantastic fellowship with our church family!

10am at 8 Petchey St, Bellerive (breakfast burgers from 9:40am)
4pm at 19 Circle St, New Norfolk

See you in the Man Cave.

Ps Dave