Author: Believers Church

January 22, 2020 Believers Church

What a Semester

We at Burning Dog Radio have been working on improving our marketing as well as production work internally. The work has been fun – and interesting. We can always improve on that college radio feel. If you have been in the radio room to get production done as of late – you may have seen new faces in the station. Eric and Grant have been working on Sundays – Eric with the Sunday production and Grant on the Featured Artists segment. Don’t worry, they don’t bite…well….yeah, no they don’t.

Featured Artists

We’ve started featuring artists on the station weekly. If you’re listening, we are playing the featured songs in the 11 o’clock hour M-F.

This has been good in the sense that it adds some texture to the programming, and all of the staff has been involved in choosing the music, creating spots, marketing, etc.

his month we have featured Ben Howard, NF, The Score, and a treehouse wait. Check out our Spotify playlist with the featured songs for January.

Pray for the Station

Please pray for the station!

That we are unified as a group
Since we are a college radio station, we want to impact the students at Stout. Pray that we have a heart to get out there.
That we grow in our desire to follow Jesus (in his plan to reach people, specifically)
For the students and their growth and service in the radio

Burning Dog Radio Staff
January 19, 2020 Believers Church

The Beginning of a New Year

It’s the beginning of a new year and we are looking forward to what God has in store for us. He has introduced us to many different people and brought us to many different places throughout our time here. We have now been spending a lot of time praying and planning for the year ahead.

Street Level Ministries UW River Falls

The students will be returning to the campus in a few short weeks after their winter break. We had the opportunity to meet over the break with the Street Level officers and plan some outreaches and events for the semester. We are hoping to do some tables on campus, a plant sale, broomball with Menomonie and Twin Ports Street Level, and more.

Community Outreaches

We have been using the extra time we have had with the students gone to do some planning, make improvements to the coffeehouse, and do some outreaches in the community. One of the grocery stores in town let us set up a table and serve free coffee. Although there was a bit of a blizzard outside we were able to talk to a decent number of people 🙂 Welcome to Wisconsin winters!

On Sunday evenings we continue to meet for a Bible Study and a meal. We will be finishing up 2 Corinthians soon, and are looking forward to what is next! (I am currently not privy to this knowledge.)

Prayer Requests

  • That the students as they return will come back engaged, and continue to grow in God
  • That we will continue to meet new people and students in the community
  • God’s continued leading in the ministry

February Schedule

  • Sundays: 5pm / Believers Bible Study, 6pm / meal
  • Tuesdays: 6:30 pm / Street Level meal, 7pm / Bible Study

The Blind Munchies Coffeehouse Hours

  • Sundays: 3pm – 5pm
  • Thursdays: 9am – 9pm
  • Saturdays: 9am – 1pm

River Falls Ministry Online

January 16, 2020 Believers Church

Time for Some Reflection

Reflection this time of the year seems natural. Looking back over the last few months has brought about many memories, and reminders, but also the excitement of the things to come. It’s crazy that it’s already 2020 and stop and think that means Street Level is now 22 years old: 22 years of reaching out on UW-Stout’s campus and now, beyond this city and all the way across the world.  

This past fall semester saw the graduation of three of our students. One is already off to the missions field and the others are starting life after college in here in Menomonie. Keep them in prayer! This is the time where important life decisions are made and where all the time spent in Street Level and church and the things God is teaching us is put into practice. 

Winter Breaking

As we rolled into winter break, Street Level has been spending time resting and reflecting on the past semester. We have been spending time reading through blog articles as a large group and discussing topics such as if we are making actual progress or are just moving around in circles. We also spent time praying for the next semester and the students away on break, something that we are learning to do before we move forward headlong into things. To wrap up winter break we will be spending our last meeting this coming Monday to talk about our mission on campus and who we are as a group and what we seek to be as a ministry. 

Another Semester Coming

Of course what would be a spring semester kick off be without a good old fashioned game of broomball? Street Level will be looking forward to spending time with Street Level Twin Ports and Street Level River Falls as they come down to crash in Menomonie on a Friday night the first week of school and then play a good clean game of broomball the next day out at the “lake house”. We have lots to look forward to with a sledding adventure planned with OneLife at the Badlands in Febuary and hopefully no broken bones. We are also hoping to have a few guest speakers come to campus over the next semester to speak to the various Street Level branches, but will be a good opportunity to bring people in from campus.

Pray as we head into the next semester- the ground we cover depends entirely on God but you can partner with us to lift up the plans we have and the unexpected twists that are yet to come to bring fruit and to help us bring Students into a closer, deeper relationship with God. 

January 13, 2020 Believers Church

Along with the end of 2019, we also recently ended two different series that we’ve been in for quite some time. In 2019 we took one Wednesday a month to take a look at the issue of creationism and evolution. We watched a video series titled Unlocking the Mysteries of Genesis. Each month we covered a different topic in the debate between the Bible-believing creationist and the typical secular scientist. We dug into questions like- “What really happened to the dinosaurs?” and “Did we ever experience an ice age.”

These are real questions that people have. For most of us if we are left trusting what we have heard from culture and our time spent in any formal education we would be led to believe that modern-day science is incompatible with the narrative of scripture. The problem is the evidence is not so stacked against the miracle of God’s creation as we might assume. Throughout the year it’s been made clear there is tons of evidence supporting the Bible’s explanation for the world’s creation. There are also reasonable explanations for why the world around us looks how it does. It has been a good reminder that all of us should consider why we are believing what we believe.

Pastor Justin also just finished up his series going through the Gospel of John. We have spent well over a year in this series so it was a bittersweet thing to finish it up. Through this series, we have been given the opportunity to be more fully introduced to who Jesus is, the incredible love of God, the plans that He has for us, our desperate need for Christ, and the realities of what a life spent in pursuit of Him and His mission will entail.

New Year’s Happenings

We went int 2020 with a New Year’s Eve party. We spent the night eating playing games, eating, a little more games, and then a little more eating. It was a great night of fellowship and also a good opportunity to invite some friends from the community. We also had the chance to watch a video reminding us of all that God has done throughout the last year, what he has let us be a part of, and the family that we get to do it all together with. Also, we got to remember that one time when James crashed his bicycle.

After our New Year’s Eve festivities, we gathered back together on New Year’s Day for a mission’s breakfast at Big Apple Bagels. We took some time to enjoy a meal together and talk about where God has taken us in the mission field this year. It was a great time hearing stories of recent trips. We ended our breakfast being reminded that God has placed each of us in the mission field and that all of us have a role to play.

Looking Forward

Street Level is in the midst of making plans for the upcoming spring semester both in Superior and in Duluth. Please keep Street Level in prayer as we schedule, plan, and seek God for His direction in our outreach to the local college campuses. The start of the semester is always an exciting time for us. We are looking forward to seeing what lies ahead for Street Level in the Twin Ports.

January 10, 2020 Believers Church

It’s no secret that Christians are supposed to be “missional”. We read about it and talk about it and think about it. But many Christians aren’t personally convinced that they’re being it…and perhaps you are one of them. You’re not sure how to do it, or what it really means. You’d really like to be used by God, and to varying degrees you try, but you’re not sure if it’s actually happening. You wish God’s will was clearer, and you wish you had more evidence that you were truly in it. But, as it is, you’re not satisfied with your performance. You don’t feel too missional at all. And you don’t feel very radical either. And sometimes, you start wondering if you’re even being remotely biblical.

THE MOTIVE:

“A worker’s hunger drives him on” (Pr. 16:26)…

People naturally start to feel hungry when they don’t eat enough food. That’s usually how we know it’s time for supper. In the same way, Christians get famished when they lose sight of God’s will. They might stuff their lives with religious activities that look spiritually nutritious, but they’re left feeling empty anyway. The real “food” of a Christian is to “do the will of Him who sent us”, and some of you are getting hungry. In spite of the fact that you’re busy at church, and diligently reading your Bible, you feel a pang. Your appetite is growing, and becoming harder to ignore. You really, really want something to eat.

It’s no secret that Christians are supposed to be “missional”

Good intentions, however, as sincere they may be, won’t always get the job done. Countless men & women have discovered within themselves a strong desire to live an effective life in their community, yet go no further than that. People like this want the satisfaction of spiritual vitality, but they aren’t engaging their community unless it’s in a group setting, sanctioned by the church. They’d like to be an effective Christian witness, but they aren’t winning souls to Christ like other people seem to be. They want the fullness of a fruitful Christian life, but their branches are still barren.

THE MANDATE:

“Go! …I will be with you as you speak, and I will instruct you in what to say” (Ex.4:12)…

In most cases, the reason for spiritual malnourishment like this, is fear. A hunger-suppressing dread that helps people avoid the real meal, and still live with a relative amount of comfort. They aren’t as healthy or as happy as they could be, but they aren’t exactly dying either, and so their spiritual life remains the same: Humdrum & hollow.  

If you are apprehensive about sharing the truth with intimidating people, join the club. Moses did his best to avoid it (Ex.4:13), Jeremiah complained about it (Jer.20:7-8), and Paul asked for prayer on it (Eph.6:19). From beginning to end, the Kingdom of God has been stocked with people who are challenged by their charge. Being missional comes naturally to no one, but if you’re waiting for this to become easy, you’ll be waiting for a long time.    

THE MISSION:

“The fields are ripe…I sent you to reap” (Jn.4:38)…

In John 4 the Disciples had gone in to town for food, leaving Jesus behind at an isolated well. He’s all alone. There was little, if any opportunity whatsoever to be missional at that point. Until, of course, a spiritually destitute woman just-so-happens to show up. Jesus, not one to believe in ‘coincidence’, then commits a massive cultural faux pas, by initiating a conversation with that strange woman (a Samaritan nonetheless). Jewish norms forbade such interaction, but Jesus made the decision in that moment, to do “the will of God who sent Him” instead of abiding by man’s self-protective customs. God wanted Him to say something to that otherwise repulsive woman. So that’s what He did.

And, as you would’ve anticipated, things got painfully awkward.

The Disciples were rendered nearly speechless when they returned and saw what was going on. They did their best to reduce the inherent tension of Jesus-style evangelism by “urging Jesus to eat”. They just wanted to hurry things along so they could feel ordinary again. Jesus’ men wanted to get themselves out of the situation as fast as possible, because they couldn’t stomach the social pressure, and had no real appetite for that kind of work. They preferred to go hungry.

Sound familiar?

THE MEAL:

“Lift up your eyes and look” (Jn.4:35)…

If you’re feeling useless & unsettled about the contributions you’ve been making (or not making) to Jesus’ mission, you’ve got an important decision to make: Either ignore the conviction, or do something about it. I would encourage you to eat. Stop letting fear suppress your desire to engage the people around you in meaningful dialogue, and let yourself be fed by it. Even when there seems to be little, if any opportunity whatsoever to be missional, lift up your eyes and look. You’re not as alone as you might’ve thought, and it’s no coincidence that you are where you are.  

If there really is more work to be done in God’s Kingdom than there are workers to do it (Luke 10:2), it follows that God would gladly supply you with as much work as you have hours to fill (Matthew 20:1-7). It’s useless for us, like His Disciples, to try and get Jesus to quit forcing us into clumsy social situations. The awkwardness of Christian evangelism is the very food He’s urging us to eat.

So, how hungry are you?

“Blessed are those who are hungry…they will be filled”

Jesus has offered to share His “food” with anyone who’s willing to eat it. His style of mission & ministry might not be the most appetizing to your eyes, but there is nothing like it to so nourish your soul. If you’re feeling weak and unsatisfied in your spiritual performance, you need to dine with Him. A growling stomach won’t feed itself, but it’s usually enough to get something out of you, isn’t it?

The mission of God is, and always has been, for people like you and me to reach others with the truth. Those strange, repulsive, socially intimidating people that we’re surrounded by. You can share Jesus with anybody you want to…any time…any where…any one. Nothing will fill you up like that.

It’s time for supper. Let’s eat.

(Click here to watch an inspirational story about a Christian kid who was hungry for more, faced his fears, and was filled beyond measure for “doing the will of God who sent him”)

January 7, 2020 Believers Church

365 Gospel-Centered Devotions for the Whole Year

Mornings can be tough. Sometimes, a hearty breakfast and strong cup of coffee just aren’t enough.

The most potent encouragement imaginable: the gospel

Forget “behavior modification” or feel-good aphorisms. Tripp knows that what we really need is an encounter with the living God. Then we’ll be prepared to trust in God’s goodness, rely on his grace, and live for his glory each and every day.

Download an excerpt

There are copies waiting now for you to pick up at the Central Desk! There is a variety of other devotionals also available.