By Justin Schaeffer

“…our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us froma ll lawlessness and to purify fo himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.” – Titus 2: 13-14

This past Sunday Mars Hill Shoreline kicked off it’s annual Back to School drive to help support the Shoreline School District by providing school supplies, backpacks, toiletries, etc… to students who otherwise couldn’t afford them. I had the distinct blessing of getting to pack my Volvo wagon up so full that I could barely fit in the drivers seat and deliver all of the supplies this morning to the Shoreline Center for Human Services which runs the Back to School Consortium that we are supporting. It was so awesome! They had designated a small office for the supplies and after our first trip in from the car it was apparent that the office was getting too full, so we had to pile everything else up in a larger room. We easily quintupled the amount of supplies they’d received and when I told them we still had another weekend to collect donations and that we’d raised $970 in cash donations on Sunday as well, the lady looked like she was going to explode she was so happy.

I can’t wait to see how our congregation responds next week!

When I pray for our body I often pray Titus 2 that our hearts would be consumed with ZEAL to do good works as Jesus’ possession. It is such a glorious grace to have been freed from all lawlessness and to be purified by His blood and it seams like such a natural outpouring of that grace for our church body to be zealous or eager to do good works in His name.

ALSO! Don’t forget that we’ll be hosting a prayer night for Vision House’s Jacob’s Well project as well on Saturday night August 16 @ 6:30pm. For the past 18 years, Vision House, a Christian non-profit in Renton, has successfully provided supportive housing to more than 520 homeless men, women and children. Plans are underway to build a Vision House in Shoreline to help homeless mothers and their children rebuild their lives. We’ll have a shuttle availble to get to the property where we’ll be praying. Park at Aldercrest Learning Center: 2800 NE 200^th St., Shoreline, WA.