Boy Shot and Killed at Church

[Decatur, GA] A 4-year-old boy, Marquel Peters, was shot and killed while in church at the Church of God of Prophecy, apparently by New Year’s Eve revelers. The circumstances that led to young Marquel Peters’ death are not uncommon on New Year’s Eve.

The boy, playing with a video game, and his mother were waiting for a 12:30 a.m. concert to begin at Church of God of Prophecy near Decatur when Marquel was shot in the head by a stray bullet. Marquel was on the floor, crying and bleeding, when medics arrived, but he died later at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta at Egleston.

The child’s family has called for the person who fired the shot to come forward, but officials said it’s unlikely that person even knows what happened. And police are unlikely to find the shooter unless the bullet is traced to a gun recovered in another investigation.

Investigators discovered Friday the bullet had passed through the roof of the church. It’s not uncommon – though illegal -- for guns to be fired to mark the start of a new year.

Please be in prayer for this family.

Happy New Year!

Today's Quote

Unless God’s people have a clear understanding of where we are headed, the probability of a successful journey is severely limited.

Mainline Churches Declining, Aging and Lacking Diversity, New Study Reveals

Mainline Protestant churches in the United States have declined dramatically since the days of Eisenhower—from more than 80,000 churches in the 1950s to only about 72,000 today, according to a new report released by The Barna Group in early December.

No longer can the six major mainline denominations boast holding the majority of American congregants. According to the report, which was based on several national telephone surveys comparing data from studies conducted in 1998 with statistics from a new 2008 study, membership in mainline churches has taken more than a 25 percent dive. Only 15 percent of all American adults associate with a mainline church today, researchers found.

In addition to addressing the decline in mainline churches, the Barna report also examined the changes in the types of people who attend them as well as in the clergy overseeing them.

For example, the study noted, mainline churches are not doing a good job of attracting young adults and minorities. With more than one-third of mainline attendees being age 60 and above—and with the number of Hispanic and Asian congregants running at only 6 percent and 2 percent, respectively—the mainline church, it seems, is aging fast and not keeping pace when it comes to racial diversity.

One wonders if an aging clergy has something to do with those figures. Ten years ago, researchers noted, the average age of mainline senior pastors was 48. Now it’s 55. According to the study, this occurred because not enough young pastors are entering vocational ministry, and too many older pastors are refusing to retire.

For the full report, visit www.Barna.org.

[from www.foursquare.org - From the President]

Developing Effective Leaders

Developing your team into effective leaders requires more than just explaining how to do something. You must explain the why behind the how. Understanding the science behind a method is crucial to being able to effectively lead in times of unusual circumstance.

When it comes to systems, most rules have exceptions, but you can’t appropriately identify these exceptions unless you understand the principles behind the rule. Teaching rules alone creates carbon copy robots. Teaching principles creates leaders.

The Pharisees lived by rules with such rigidity that they missed the principles and the purpose behind the rules. Jesus knew the rules, but more importantly, Jesus understood the more important principles behind the rules. As a result, He made exceptions that made His ministry dramatically more fruitful and impactful than the office of a Pharisee.

Here’s the challenge – it is much easier to teach the how without the why. Teaching the science and principles behind it all requires the investment of a mentor. Often, it requires modeling. Managers teach rules. Leaders teach principles.

[This is a guest blog post from Kent Shaffer. Check-out his blog: ChurchRelevance.com.]

Enjoy

YuleLog4aCause.org from The Chapel on Vimeo.

Merry Xmas

Does "Xmas" take Christ out of Christmas?

Some people erroneously believe that the term Xmas was devised as part of an effort to “take Christ out of Christmas” or to literally “cross out Christ;” it is seen as evidence of the secularization of Christmas, as a symptom of the commercialization of the holiday (as the abbreviation has long been used by retailers).

Actually, the word “Christ” and its compounds, including “Christmas,” have been abbreviated in English for at least the past 1,000 years, long before the modern “Xmas” was commonly used. “Christ” was often written as “XP” or “Xt;” there are references in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as far back as AD 1021. This X and P arose as the uppercase forms of the Greek letters X and P used in ancient abbreviations for Xpiotoc (Greek for “Christ”), and are still widely seen in many Eastern Orthodox icons depicting Jesus Christ. The labarum, an amalgamation of the two Greek letters rendered as XP, is a symbol often used to represent Christ in Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox Christian Churches.

The labarum, often called the Chi-Rho, is a Christian symbol representing Christ. The occasionally held belief that the “X” represents the cross on which Christ was crucified also has no basis in fact. Saint Andrew’s Cross is X-shaped, but Christ’s cross was probably shaped like a T or a †. Indeed, X-as-chi was associated with Christ long before X-as-cross could be, since the cross as a Christian symbol developed later. (The Greek letter Chi X stood for “Christ” in the ancient Greek acrostic IXOYE ichthys.) While some see the spelling of Christmas as Xmas a threat, others see it as a way to honor the martyrs. The use of X as an abbreviation for “cross” in modern abbreviated writing (e.g. “King’s X” for “King’s Cross”) may have reinforced this assumption.

In ancient Christian art, X and XP are abbreviations for Christ’s name. In many manuscripts of the New Testament and icons, X is an abbreviation for Christos, as is XC (the first and last letters in Greek, using the lunate sigma); compare IC for Jesus in Greek.

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My Christmas CD Pick 2009

My favorite Christmas CD this year is "I Love Christmas" by Bonita Eileen. It is absolutely awesome!

CLICK HERE to take a look.

Our Christmas Card - From Us to You

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Bishop Elwood Matthews Funeral Online

The memorial service for Bishop Elwood Matthews will be webcast live on Sunday, December 20, beginning at 5:00 PM EST.

You may view the webcast by visiting the host church's website at www.findnewlife.com.

Voices of Lee Interview

Candace (Fuller) Whittington (R) from Mentone, Alabama.

Vote For Voices of Lee

Voices of Lee from Lee University has advanced to the final round of the “Sing-Off,” an a cappella competition on NBC. The show aired for the third straight night Wednesday and will culminate in a live finale, Monday, Dec. 21, when the results of voting will be revealed and the winner will be named.

The four-night NBC prime-time special began with eight a cappella groups and has narrowed the field this week to three groups. From these, the nation will choose a winner to receive a $100,000 cash prize and a Sony recording contract.

According to NBC producers, over 800 singing groups were considered as contestants, before eight were chosen in auditions around the country. Those eight, including Voices of Lee, were flown to California two weeks ago to prepare for this week’s “Sing Off” show.

The full episode and other video clips can be viewed at www.nbc.com/sing-off/index.shtml.

Voting will determine the winner that will be announced on Monday evening’s LIVE finale at 8:00 p.m. on NBC. Voting is opened at the end of Wednesday’s broadcast and closes on Sunday, December 20 at 9:00 a.m.

Those wishing to vote for Voices of Lee may do so by land-line, cell phone, text messaging, or email. There is a maximum allowance of ten votes per format:

• For text messaging, text the number 3 to 33088
• By land line and cell phone, call 1-877-674-6403
• By email vote online at www.nbc.com/sing-off/

Voices of Lee

The Voices of Lee, an a cappella singing group from Lee University in Cleveland, Tennessee, is competing on NBC's Sing-Off this week. Tonight they won the opportunity to continue tomorrow night (8:00 PM EST).

Tonight, Candace (Fuller) Whittington (pictured above), sang a great solo with Voices of Lee. Candace is from Mentone, Alabama and is the granddaughter of a former COGOP pastor. She has blessed many local churches in the area with her singing for several years.

If you would like to vote tomorrow night, support the Voices of Lee.

Check them out on: http://www.myspace.com/leevoices.

Be their friend on Facebook: Voices

"Let My Spirit Go" - Elwood Matthews