9. What is your favorite thing about your church?

So many things. I love the way God uses us to reach people, both at Northstar and at Watkinsville First Baptist. At Northstar, high school and middle school students go on retreats and camps to serve the community, bringing the name of Christ to people through church affiliated service. At Watkinsville, the men's ministry goes on campus at UGA to spread the gospel to young college men in the hope that they would want to grow in faith with Christ and spread the Word to others. "[Go] and make disciples of all nations." ~ Matthew 28:19a. "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." ~ James 1:27

I'm also amazed all the time by how God speaks to us through the messages and the worship. Since the high school group is pretty much all I've known at Northstar, that's where I go to hear the gospel; that's where we dig into the Scriptures to see what God has said about us and about His Son and how to apply the Word to our lives. The same goes for Watkinsville, except it's the college group there: we pick apart the Scriptures verse-by-verse and study with the Spirit's wisdom—not just the Spirit's wisdom in one man, but the Spirit's wisdom in the collective people, as we turn the "college Bible study" into a real discussion-based Bible study. "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path." ~ Psalm 119:105

And of course, the people are great! Most of my closest friends are either from my church(es) or my youth group(s). Church is all about coming together with fellow Christians to worship the God who made and saved us. And when you can call the entire congregation your brothers and sisters in Christ, you can't help but have a close familial relationship with them. "For where two or three come together in My name, there am I with them." ~ Matthew 18:20

But most of all, I LOVE God! I love Jesus! The church would be nothing without Him: "[In] Him all things hold together. And He is the head of the body, the church" (Colossians 1:17b-18a). As the Pharisee Gamaliel prophesied, "[If] their purpose of activity is of human origin, it will fail. But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop these men; you will only find yourselves fighting against God" (Acts 5:38b-39). God makes the church prosper so that we would glorify His name in the world. "Praise our God, O peoples, let the sound of His praise be heard." ~ Psalm 66:8