Brad Thomas

“We here at St. Paul strive to be a welcoming family of faith, serving others,
while growing in Christ.”  

When you attend weekly worship, you will become familiar with that vision
statement.  As you ponder its goals note the word “strive”.  Synonyms
include endeavor, strain, toil, and labor  - just to name a few. 
“Strive”defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary is as follows:

“To devote serious effort or energy”

The word “strive” is appropriate because anything we devote to the cause
of the gospel will ask much of us - it should require serious effort and
energy.  The impact of worship, bible study, service and fellowship within
the church has a larger goal - the world outside the walls of St. Paul. It’s
always my hope the world around us is both held to account and made a bit
more like the kingdom because we live our faith where we spend most of
our week - outside the church - in engaged, social acts of discipleship.
 
In 1739, Methodism’s founder John Wesley made the following observation
about religious practice among Christians:

“Solitary religion is not to be found there.  “Holy Solitaries” is a phrase
no more consistent with the gospel than “Holy Adulterer.”  The gospel of
Christ knows of no religion but social; no holiness but social holiness. Faith
working by love, is the length and breadth and depth and height of
Christian perfection.”

You’re invited to look through the website and discover how the St. Paul
family strives to connect our faith in Christ with the world around us in
transformative ways.  It’s our hope yours will be one more hand on the
plow.