Be Kind In All Circumstances

"Let your conversation be gracious and attractive so that you will have the right response for everyone." Colossians 2:6

Whoa! If we let that one sink in, it can hit us right where we live! As believers and followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, we are to emulate him in every aspect of our lives. This means in our daily conversations and correspondence with others. What we say and do speaks volumes about who we are and who we belong to.

Many years ago, when I was a young mom, I had invited my mother up from Knoxville to go to a Christian Women's luncheon to hear Kay Arthur. We entered the banquet hall, which was abuzz with the chattering of several hundred women. We were looking for a place to sit. We started to sit down at a table when one of the women loudly and rudely declared that she was saving those places for her friends. She was not nice about it at all. Her behavior made me question if she was even a Christian.  Not long after that, my husband and I were looking for a church home. This lady was one of the first people I saw when I entered the church. Needless to say, I didn't have a warm, fuzzy feeling about it. Although she was very nice to me then, and I'm sure she did not remember the experience, I never had any respect for her or her Christian walk.

I wonder how many times my careless words and foolish acts have caused someone to question my walk with the Lord? Even though I may have asked forgiveness for them, have I been branded like I branded the woman who treated me poorly? I don't want that to ever be the case. I believe that we need to be very careful about our words. I know it can be frustrating to wait for a long time on a meal in a restaurant, or easy to get annoyed with a slow cashier at the store, but heaven forbid that we cut that person with our tongues. It makes me shudder when I hear that restaurant workers dread Sundays, because they say the rudest people are the ones who just got out of church. That is very sad!

Let's be an encouragement to others with our words. Be kind to one another. Let's have the right response for everyone, so that we honor our Savior.

Pam Archer, Director
Women's Ministry

WOW! October 12th-Kathy Wagner

Kathy and John Wagner

I was born in Watertown, NY and lived in the little hamlet of Harrisville, NY (about 40 miles NE of Watertown). When I was 5 years old my parents died as the result of a car accident. My sister and I moved to a dairy farm in Kingsport, TN, to live with our mother's sister and family. How the Lord prepared me for this is another whole story. I started calling my aunt & uncle “new” mom and dad and my birth parents were “old” mom and dad. Very shortly the new and old were left off and it was Mom and Dad, and my birthmother & birthfather.

While sitting in Sunday School about a year after moving here, my teacher shared the plan of salvation with us. She asked if any needed to ask the Lord to be their Savior. I realized I was a sinner but I was scared to raise my hand and sat there waiting...on what I do not know. Finally my teacher said that we didn't have to pray that prayer there in church, we could pray it at our own homes. Sitting at home that afternoon, I asked the Lord to be my Savior.

Every morning, Daddy would come up from the milking parlor and read Scripture and pray with us before we left for school. When Mother would let us off at the school, she would remind us she loved us and then the very last words she would say were, “Remember to Whom you belong.”

 

I attended Bancroft Bible Camp for at least one week every summer. When I was 13 and able to attend Youth Week, I met this 15 year old named John Wagner.

After graduating from high school, I attended Bryan College (named for William Jennings Bryan) in Dayton, TN. From there I earned my Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education. I taught for a few years at a Christian school here in Kingsport and then worked for an office furniture company. While working at this office furniture company, John and I began to think of each other as more than friends.

John has been a member of ISBC since the early 1990s. So when we married in 1998, I moved my membership to ISBC. The church in which I grew up was a very small church and had an all girl youth group. It was very exciting (and still is) to see both teenaged boys and girls actively participating in the church.

Since coming to ISBC, I have had the privilege of teaching children's Bible study classes, serving in AWANAS, working in the nursery, playing in the orchestra and being one of the children's leaders for the summer Precept studies. It is so very exciting to see children's eyes opened when they realize they can study God's Word for themselves!

One of my favorite passages of Scripture is Psalm 121. “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth. He will not suffer thy foot to be moved: He that keepeth thee will not slumber. Behold, He that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is thy keeper: the Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil: He shall preserve thy soul. The Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth and even for evermore.” (KJV)

Submitted by Kathy Neal

Communications Coordinator