JeremyHigdon.com

New Teaching Series for March starts Sunday!

Here at Oasis Church, we believe that the Bible is the God-breathed message to us. It tells us what God has done and is doing and shows us how we can follow Him.

In a lot of our Bibles, the words of Jesus are shown to us in “red” to help draw attention further to what His instruction is. These red letters help the teachings of the most influential man who ever lived stand out as we read the Bible.

Join us for the month of March as we look at some Inspi(red) Letters and study how the life changing teachings of Jesus 2,000 years ago impact our lives today.

Starts this Sunday at the Hollywood Theaters at 10:30am!

The Naked Truth about Affairs...prevention and recovery...

We concluded the month of February (and our teaching series on The Naked Truth about Love and Marriage) this past Sunday by talking about the realities of affairs and adultery in marriage...

It seems like everyday, we hear stories in the news about people breaking their vows and having affairs. People like Tiger, the Edwards, and the infamous former Governor of South Carolina are making headlines for all the wrong reasons and in the process, causing severe damage to their spouses, their kids, their reputation, their bank account, and wrecking countless lives. We ask the questions like "how can they do this?" or "what were they thinking?".

The truth of the matter is EVERY MARRIAGE is vulnerable to an affair...temptation and sin, choices and consequences are real and impact all of us. We must all be aware and proactive in fighting for and defending our relationships... in the words of Under Armor... "We must protect this house!"

Here is the mp3 from this past Sunday....

Download The Naked Truth about Affairs

You can access the whole month of teaching from the media section of www.oasisnfl.com.

I am grateful that Jesus is alive... only in Him do we know how to love, are we able to find the strength and ability to obey what the Bible says is the right way to live, and He is our only source of hope... when it comes to living The Naked Truth in love and marriage, everything goes back to and depends on Jesus!

Put your money where your mouth is...

Last Sunday, we challenged each other at Oasis Church to continue to pray and remember the people in Haiti who are still in the process of recovering from the earthquakes. We talked about Nancy Brickell, one of our own Oasis Church family, who has been down in Haiti serving with Faith, Hope, Love Infant Rescue... here is a link to more info about what she has been doing...

So, we continued the challenge to be a church who does more then pray... after all, our name is OASIS! Now, praying is the most important thing we can do... asking God to do the impossible is the point of prayer and by turning to Him, we realize it's the only way to grow our faith and trust! But, we can't neglect that God's Word teaches us that we can actively join the work of God through serving and giving time, sweat, food, resources, and yes, MONEY!

So, this Sunday, we are putting our money where our mouth is... and challenging our church to give what we can to help the kids and families involved with Faith, Hope, Love Infant Rescue...

• ALL CASH given this week will go to this group that Nancy has been working with...
• you can put it in an envelope and get it recorded for tax purposes.
• This is over and above your tithe to the church... this falls into generous giving!
• If you don't currently give any money back to God or tithe on a regular basis, I want to encourage you to take a step of faith, ask God how much He wants you to give, and make your first gift part of this cash offering for Haiti!!

Let's be a church that is unafraid to put our money where our mouth is... and trust and worship God more then our wallet!

"God, help us to trust You...and we ask that You would use our gifts to meet needs, provide healing, and show Your love to the people of Haiti... in the name of Jesus, Amen!"

The teaching mp3 from this past Sunday at Oasis Church...

Here is the mp3 of this past Sunday at Oasis....

Download The Naked Truth about Relationships

This week, we conclude our series on love and marriage by looking at the reality of affairs... how to protect against and recover from... not something we necessarily want to talk about, but some truth every marriage needs!

Recommended Books on The Naked Truth about Love and Marriage

This Sunday, we will be wrapping up our series on the Naked Truth... while we have been able to talk about a ton of truth in the areas of love and marriage, we have only scratched the surface! It is important to keep learning about ourselves, our spouses, and what God says about love and marriage...

With that in mind, here are some books to go further in study, reading, living, and learning about the Naked Truth...

Download Recommended Reading List for Singles

Download Recommended Reading List for Married Couples

(thanks to West Ridge Church for these lists!)

Pray for one of our Oasis Church family serving in Haiti!

It has been a few weeks since the earthquake in Haiti and the outpouring of support and fund raising... but the need still continues to grow. One of our own here at Oasis Church North Florida, Nancy Brickell, has been in Haiti the last month, serving and leading and doing whatever she can... this week I exchanged some emails with her... please read them and at the bottom of this post, find out what we as a church are doing to help Nancy and the group she works with...

Ok Nancy,

Here's the BIG questions... what can we do to help? How can we pray? What supplies do you need? Can we get stuff to you??

Please let me know what our Oasis family can do to serve and support you!! If you can write me back details or give me a number to call you... whatever it takes!! We want to do what we can...

Talk to you later... praying for you guys!!

Jeremy

And here is her response...

Jeremy, where do I begin? Pray for the people of Haiti. The Haitian's need so much more help than ever before. It is now clean up and rebuilding time. So much concrete and heavy but no big trucks. People are doing it all by hand except the government people.

I came down alone to work with a mission group for 2 weeks at a clinic and hospital. Then I moved to my missionary friend who has an Infant Rescue and have been here for almost 2 weeks. She has gone home to Miami to rest and recoup. I have 35 children under 12 years old, 3 mothers, and 3 staffers living here in tents. I have the workers (nannies) coming to work so they can eat....

Grocery stores are few, only two some ones, so eating MRE's and Feed My Starving Children rice. I have plenty of medical supplies. Thanks for emailing me...electricity has not come back on, which was only a few days anyway, so using the generator to pump water, charge inverter, and do wash (22 babies in diapers), so a lot of gasoline at $8.00 a gallon.
In Christ, Nancy

Here are the follow-up emails...

Hey Nancy,

Do you mind if I share this email with our church?? I think everyone needs to know so we can all be praying for you... is sending you money ok or is that not wise at this time? Is the organization you are helping able to take donations through a website or something?

Jeremy

And once again, here is what Nancy wrote back to me...

Feel free to share the email with the church. The more people praying the better. By the way, the Haitian news reported last Friday, Feb 12, that President Preval of Haiti accepted Jesus as his Lord and Savior. Good news for the people of Haiti since Voodoo had been the National religion.

Money is good and helpful. The mission I have been running for two weeks is, Faith-Hope-Love Infant Rescue. Director is Dorothy Pearce from Jacksonville. She has a blog, dorothypearcehaiti.blogspot.com. She is part of Christian Light Foundation out of Jacksonville also. Their number is (904)732-9567. They collect her donations or you can do it PayPal on her blog....

Also MFI, Missionary Flights International, out of Ft. Pierce, FL is doing free shipping of earthquake relief items if you wanted to send baby formula and disposable diapers to her. You can check out their website at www.missionaryflights.org. Just put attn: Dorothy Pearce.

Better go, generator is gone out so electricity will be gone for the night. God Bless. Nancy

So there you have it....

Oasis Church has someone on the ground in Haiti... and we MUST support Nancy and the group she is working with!

• commit to pray for Nancy and the Faith-Hope-Love infant rescue...
• pray for Klay and Christelle as they are here in the States while Nancy serves
• donate money to the Christian Light Foundation... here is the link to the online donations... be sure to designate it "Pearce-Haiti Infant Rescue".
  
• partner with Oasis and let's multiply the efforts of Nancy and those that she is working with...
  

The Naked Truth about Hot Sex

We had a little tech difficulties but those have been cleared up!

Our series on Love and Marriage continues at Oasis Church. Here is the mp3 of the message from Valentines Day... 

Download The Naked Truth about Hot Sex

Great blog post about marriage from Perry Noble of Newspring Church

We are in the middle of our Naked Truth series... and we are re-discovering the realities of Love and Marriage...

I remembered I had read some great posts on Perry Noble's blog a few months back about marriage... and I finally was able to track them down.. here is the first blog post and I included links to the other posts in the series....

"So yesterday I told you this series of posts was on the way…here we go…HOW do we build a marriage that will last?

#1 – We’ve Got To Have A Solid Foundation

The first thing they did when they began constructing the house next door is make sure the foundation was solid.

Jesus said in Matthew 7:24-27 that we should take the time to make sure the foundation is ROCK SOLID…because WHEN (not if) the rains come and we aren’t solid…the crash is going to be intense.

So…church leader, here’s the question for us today…how much time and effort are we putting into making sure than the foundation of our marriage is solid?  It’s really sad when a church leader spends hours and hours developing a plan for a successful ministry…but won’t put a fraction of that time into developing a plan for a successful marriage.  What is your plan for success in your marriage?

(BTW…if you marriage falls apart, your ministry will too…so it’s worth the effort!)

We’ve GOT to take the marriage covenant seriously!

One more thing…if you are single and in ministry the BEST WAY to prepare yourself for marriage is fall in love with Jesus and do EVERYTHING it takes to stay connected to Him.  AND then don’t settle for ANYTHING less than someone else who does the same thing.

It is WAY better to remain single than to be with the wrong person!

#2 – Follow The Plan

I’ve driven by the house next door several times and have seen the guys actually stop building and gather around the plans to make sure they are getting things done right…that’s not a bad plan for our marriages either…are we building according to God’s plan…such as…

• Guys…are you being harsh with her when you speak?  She’s your wife…NOT your staff member.  (I Peter 3:7)  AND…btw…you should not be harsh with your staff either!
• Ladies…is he feeling respected and admired by you?  (Ephesians 5:33)
• Guys…are you serving her like Jesus served…or is your focus on being served?  (Matthew 20:28)
• Ladies…are you reminding him of a torture device that won’t shut up? (Proverbs 27:15)
• Guys…are you making sure she is completely taken care of, OR are you neglecting her in order to make yourself look good?  (Ephesians 5:25-27)
• Ladies…are you a crown or cancer?  (Proverbs 12:4)
• Guys…are you aware of what a blessing she is?  (Proverbs 31:10)
• Ladies…are you careful or careless in how you speak and how you spend?  (Proverbs 19:14)
• BOTH OF YOU…are you taking care of one another sexually?  (I Corinthians 7:3-5)
• Single dude…are you LOOKING for a wife or expecting to be found?  (Proverbs 18:22)

I could go on and on…but the problem is so clear…to many church leaders are trying to teach God’s Word and not LIVE God’s Word.  And…if this falls apart in our house then it is only a matter of time before it falls apart in God’s house!"

Great insight! Here are the links to part 2 and part 3 and part 4 on Perry's blog posts on love and marriage... it's the Naked Truth that we need to hear!

The Foundation of Marriage... the Vows

 

As we kicked off our Naked Truth Series, we talked the importance of the vows, the promise, the commitment covenant made at the wedding...the cake, the dancing, the drama of weddings are fun, but the most important element (starting from day one) in a marriage is the vows!

Here are some thoughts from this past week's message...

• many of us don't want to see what God says about marriage... 
• Marriage = one man, one woman together forever...
• Instead, we want to take our thoughts on marriage and ask God to approve them... doesn't work that way!

The Naked Truth – Vows... more then words..

• better for worse, in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer... 
• promise to spouse and God is our witness!
• people who are seeking to follow Jesus realize we need to keep our word
• yes means yes... and I do means I do! (Matthew 5: 31 - 37)
• Covenants made with God are very serious... and He takes them seriously!

The good news is, God partners with us to keep this covenant... He knows our struggles, our issues, and His strength can heal and bring a new start and hope to every marriage...

If you have broken the vows and ended a marriage, here is what you need to hear...

• How we treat the vows we made affects our worship and following Jesus (Malachi 2:13-16)
• God hates divorce (broken vows and being unfaithful to a covenant)
• God does not hate people who get divorced...forgives, still loves, and can use you as we turn to Him!
• Divorce is not unpardonable sin... the marriage you are in right now, is God's plan for now... 

Our job in marriage...work and defend that covenant...

• Husbands, wives... defend the covenant and covenant partner... 
• make sure all actions (public and private) will not embarrass spouse 
• protect, honor,
• guard affections and appearances

Covenant marriage... no room for rekindling relationships on FB, flirting at work, fantasizing, lusting, adultery

This is our role as defenders... fight for homes, fight for marriage, don't let enemy take you out!

Our First Birthday...Oasis Turns 1!

This past weekend, we celebrated our first year of being and becoming Oasis Church... Hard to believe it's been a year already (although, on the other hand, it seems like a lot longer!).

So amazed at what God is doing in North Florida and that we get to play a part in it... I am looking forward to continued life-change and growth in year 2 as we continue to follow, and help others follow, Jesus!