Welcome to the web page of the Detroit area chapter of the Intercontinental Church of God. Serving God's people in south east Michigan and north west Ohio.

We meet every Sabbath (Saturday) at 1pm at the "FAITH OUTREACH CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST". Occasionally we have schedule conflicts and meet at an alternate location.

Please feel free to contact us.
 

The following story is worth the read

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John is the kind of guy you love to hate. He is always in a good mood and always has something positive to say. When someone would ask him how he was doing, he would reply, 'If I were any better, I would be twins!'

He was a natural motivator.

If an employee was having a bad day, John was there telling the employee how to look on the positive side of the situation

Seeing this style really made me curious, so one day I went up and asked him, 'I don't get it!

You can't be a positive person all of the time. How do you do it?'

He replied, 'Each morning I wake up and say to myself, you have two choices today. You can choose to be in a good mood or ... you can choose to be in a bad mood

I choose to be in a good mood.'

Each time something bad happens, I can choose to be a victim or...I can choose to learn from it. I choose to learn from it.

Every time someone comes to me complaining, I can choose to accept their complaining or... I can point out the positive side of life. I choose the positive side of life.

'Yeah, right, it's not that easy,' I protested.

'Yes, it is,' he said. 'Life is all about choices. When you cut away all the junk, every situation is a choice. You choose how you react to situations. You choose how people affect your mood.

You choose to be in a good mood or bad mood. The bottom line: It's your choice how you live your life.'

I reflected on what he said. Soon hereafter, I left the Tower Industry to start my own business. We lost touch, but I often thought about him when I made a choice about life instead of reacting to it.

Several years later, I heard that he was involved in a serious accident, falling some 60 feet from a communications tower.

After 18 hours of surgery and weeks of intensive care, he was released from the hosp ital with rods placed in his back.

I saw him about six months after the accident.

When I asked him how he was, he replied, 'If I were any better, I'd be twins...Wanna see my scars?'

I declined to see his wounds, but I did ask him what had gone through his mind as the accident took place.

'The first thing that went through my mind was the well-being of my soon-to-be born daughter,' he replied. 'Then, as I lay on the ground, I remembered that I had two choices: I could choose to live or...I could choose to die. I chose to live.'

'Weren't you scared? Did you lose consciousness?' I asked

He continued, '..the paramedics were great.

They kept telling me I was going to be fine. But when they wheeled me into the ER and I saw the expressions on the faces of the doctors and nurses, I got really scared. In their eyes, I read 'he's a dead man'. I knew I needed to take action.'

'What did you do?' I asked.

'Well, there was a big burly nurse shouting questions at me,' said John. 'She asked if I was allergic to anything 'Yes, I replied.' The doctors and nurses stopped working as they waited for my reply. I took a deep breath and yelled, 'Gravity'.'

Over their laughter, I told them, 'I am choosing to live. Operate on me as if I am alive, not dead.'
 
He lived, thanks to the skill of his doctors, but also because of his amazing attitude... I learned from him that every day we have the choice to live fully.

Attitude, after all, is everything .

Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.' Matthew 6:34.
After all today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday.

 

Intriguing News

Quoting Scripture banned in library community room

'What next? Will board keep patrons from reading Bible?'

2008 World net daily Source

Quoting from the Bible has been banned in a community room at the public library in Clermont County, Ohio, and now a couple who sought to use the facility for a financial planning seminar have brought a court case.

"What's next? Will the library board attempt to keep patrons from checking out Bibles and reading them on government property?" asked Tim Chandler, a legal counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund, which is working on the case involving George and Cathy Vandergriff.

The couple asked for permission to use a public facility at the library to hold a financial planning seminar with the Institute for Principled Policy.

Under the use policy for the facility, the meetings rooms there "are available to all community groups and non-profit organizations engaged in activities that further the Library's mission to be responsive to community needs and to be an integral part of our community," according to the lawsuit.

"When the Library's meeting rooms are not being used for library-related programs, the rooms are available for non-profit use by community groups. The groups may use meeting rooms for private meetings or to present programs for the general public," it continues.

However, when Cathy Vandergriff asked in person to use a meeting room for a financial planning meeting, the conversation with the library employee took an unwelcome turn.

"When Mrs. Vandergriff indicated that the seminar would be a free ministry to the general public, the employee asked if she would be quoting the Bible in the presentation. Mrs. Vandergriff answered that she would be using the Bible, and the employee informed her that the Library's Policy would therefore not permit her to use the meeting room," the ADF said.

When she followed up with a written request for the use of the facility, an employee again warned about the ban on quoting from the Bible, and the written rejection soon followed. It carried the hand-written notation: "Contact Mr. Vandergriff will be quoting bible versus [sic] explained our meeting room policy."

The ADF's complaint, filed last week in U.S. District Court in Ohio, requests a declaratory judgment, preliminary and permanent injunctions and damages and costs for the action.

"The … Clermont Public Library Board of Trustees … is prohibiting plaintiffs from engaging in expressive activities in a generally available public forum solely due to the religious viewpoint of those activities," the ADF said.

The library did not return a WND message requesting comment.

The complaint cites alleged violations of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution including the right to free exercise of religion, and the 14th Amendment's equal protection and due process clauses.

"The library has no compelling reason that would justify excluding plaintiffs from these generally available public facilities solely on the basis of the religious nature of plaintiffs' speech," the complaint said.

"Refusing to grant this group permission to hold a seminar at a meeting room in a public library because they planned to quote the Bible is about as blatantly un-American and unconstitutional as you can get," Chandler said. "Christian organizations shouldn't be discriminated against for their beliefs."

"The denial sends the message to the Vandergriffs and other Christians that they are not deemed a valuable part of the community. Christians have the same First Amendment rights as anyone else in America," the ADF's Kevin Theriot added.

"Any government policy denying equal access rights to a group simply because it intends on quoting Bible verses does not comport with the Constitution. This is a financial planning seminar, and the library has previously allowed meetings that discuss financial planning. The fact that they may quote Bible verses during the meeting does not legally matter."

The Institute for Principled Policy planned to sponsor the two two-hour seminars for 10 attendees April 18 and 19 at the library using Larry Burkett’s Crown Ministries materials.