From the Heart of the Pastor

           One of the most familiar images the New Testament uses to describe the church is to say the church is a body.  There are numerous ways we could say the church is like our physical body, but one of the most obvious ways is to say there are operations within our physical bodies that while we may not notice them are extremely important.  In the same way there are numerous ministries of the church that go largely unknown and unappreciated.

           One of these areas is our technology and media efforts.  Each week, often unknown to most, a huge amount of work and effort go into the media ministry at Oak Crest.  Israel works hard to not only properly order the worship service, but he spends a great deal of time setting up the PowerPoint slides.  Then, when Sunday finally arrives, we have a team of people who work faithfully in our sound booth to simultaneously run the audio and visual aspects of our services.  Thank you, Danny Hyndman, Craig Rowland, Bruce Field, Jim Tennery, and others who make sure everything runs smoothly.  It is too often the case that we only notice this position when something goes wrong.  They are true servants of the kingdom.  In addition to recording the services, we also video record the services.  Jonathan Pendrich has put in a lot of time securing all the proper equipment and overseeing the proper recording of the services each week.

          That is only the beginning.  After the service is concluded, even more work is done.  Each week Andy Burney spends time editing the audio from the service and posting that audio to the internet on Podomatic and iTunes.  He also makes copies of the service on CD to be distributed to our members who are homebound and unable to attend weekly services.  Jonathan and Andy also oversee the posting of the video recording to YouTube so that we can not only hear the sermons, but see them!  But that may not be a good thing depending on what you think about the appearance of the preacher!

          Trisha Douglas is the source of the creativity you see reflected on our website.  Each week she updates the website with the latest sermons and information.  This is in addition to her over-site of our directory app that she constantly updates.  She and Jonathan oversee the continual updating of our church app too.  She also creates the announcement slides you have probably noticed on Sunday mornings.

          Last, but certainly not least, are Myrtice Phears and Ruth Howard.  Each week they not only visit dozens of people including our homebound, but they take them a copy of the service on CD.  Most of these people do not have access to the internet or apps, but they get to participate through the efforts of these two ladies bringing them CDs.  Myrtice and Ruth also take CDs to various gas stations and restaurants at various times.  Not too long ago a gentleman called me saying he had picked up one of our CDs in a gas station.  He said he had been extremely depressed and struggling with sin.  The particular CD was on fighting temptation.  He said it helped him greatly.  See, that is God using this whole line of gifted volunteers to minister to many.  As one of those men adjusted a volume control on some Sunday morning, they never would have thought that someone totally unrelated to Oak Crest would be the recipient of their service.

          Who gets the credit?  God alone.  To him alone be the glory!  Each of the people I named and numerous others do what they do by the power of Christ at work in them.  They say with Paul in 1 Corinthians 15: 10, “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.”

In Christ, 

Blain Craig