Pastor’s Ponderings—August 2026
To the church of God as found at Marion Salem Church, called to be saints together with those in every place who call on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ: You are miracles of God’s grace and mercy!
You may have noticed a large change between this and last month’s newsletters from previous months. The first page no longer contains my monthly article on the front page. Why? The main reason for this is that we want the congregation to focus on opportunities for discipleship and invitation. In fact, there are many things that are coming up because the school year will be starting in August. This month’s front page focuses on three events that are discipleship opportunities. First is a special presentation of the teaching moments from Jeff Greenway as he prepares for retirement. Jeff has been our conference superintendent for these formative first years of the Allegheny West conference. He shares 10 nuggets for local congregations to take to heart. This video will be August’s devotion for Sunday school on the 2nd. The next item is an opportunity to gather with others in our area to hear from the Associate Conference Superintendent Dan Gildner. This is a meeting at Reynoldsburg Community Church on August 10th. We’re hoping to arrange transportation, so please let us know if you are interested in attending. Finally, Amy is gearing up for the Growing Up study.
All these are opportunities for you to grow as a disciple of Jesus Christ. That’s important, because we can only invite someone to go deeper if we have done so ourselves. We’re working our invitational muscles over the next several weeks for Back to Church Sunday on September 20th. More details are to come, however, we’ll have a fellowship meal following to encourage conversation and relationship building after worship. In the meantime, VBS Presentation Sunday will be August 2nd, so worship will be down in the gym. The weekend before River Valley students return we will be having a special worship service for the blessing of backpacks, students, and teachers on August 16 (that’s a great time to invite people!).
Summer is a great season for growth, not only physically but we can grow a lot spiritually too! Consider how you might encourage others to join in worship or a small group. And as you’re thinking about how, make a prayerful choice on who you will invite. You have opportunity with all that is going on at Salem Church. You have the means with the many learning opportunities in the month of August. All that is left is motive and I pray you are inspired with the urgent need to reach out to save the lost, and make disciples of Jesus Christ.
Blessings
Jason
