From The Pastor: it appears that I spoke too soon yesterday: Katrina's effects on the levees around New Orleans is causing flooding that may destroy the city altogether. A massive rescue effort to evacuate the remaining victims of the hurricane is under way, while looters are emptying whatever stores remain. Please remember those who are suffering and the rescue workers in prayer.

God bless You- Pastor Sam Smith

From the Pastor: we thank God for His grace and mercy during hurrican Katrina. Despite the massive damage and loss of lives, it could have been much worse. Let's continue to pray that for those who are suffering at this time. We are packing up and will be loading up our truck next Tuesday (the 6th) and leaving either late Tuesday or early Wednesday, so we should arrive in New Albany somtime Thursday night or Friday. We are excited about the move and are ready to see God Bless the church and our family as we join together to preach the Gospel. Remember to begin to pray for missions emphasis month and for souls to be saved when we have a harvest outreach at the church around Halloween.

God Bless You- Pastor Sam Smith

From the Pastor: Hurricane Katrina has hit the Gulf Coast this morning as a category four hurricane which threatens to destroy New Orleans. Please pray for those in the path of the hurricane, that God may have mercy on them and spare them. Apparently 100,000 that could not evacuate are in the Louisiana Superdome. Last year, FEMA evacuated counties to the south of us and sent many people to the DeSoto county civic center here in Arcadia during hurricane Charlie, only to have Charlie take an unexpected turn and head straight for us (two days after we moved here). Charlie tore the roof off the Civic center. Pray especially that those who could not evacuate would be spared, and continue to pray for those in Miami and Ft Lauderdale who are recovering.

God Bless You- Pastor Sam Smith

From the Pastor: Praise the Lord! Our home sold and closed before hurricane Katrina headed into the gulf and caused a hurricane watch! Pray for people in Miami and Ft Lauderdale, over 1 million are without power. It's hard to imagine what it's like to be without power in Florida in August unless you've experienced it. No air conditioning is bad enough- many are also on wells, and without power there is no water either (we were there last year: no showers, can't even flush the toilets). Also, we have a sermon posted online that you can listen to here:

Right Now Faith Part 1

Right Now Faith Part 2

* You will need to download the google video viewer when promted in order to watch the sermons. This is a free service that google video just started that we are glad to be able to take advantage of. There should be another sermon posted in about a week.

God Bless You- Pastor Sam Smith

From the Pastor: Please continue to pray for us as we are packing and preparing to move. Abbie and Jennifer are doing well, and Abbie is a joy to care for. She is a very peaceful and pleasant baby. She rarely cries and sleeps very well. She got to attend church with her mother last night for the very first time. Every day we get more excited about the move, even though there is a lot of work involved. We know that God is going to bless the church with abundance through His Spirit and use Victory Lighthouse to be salt and light in New Albany. God Bless You, and we look forward to meeting you all in person!

God Bless You- Sam Smith

From the Pastor: please pray for the church we are leaving in Arcadia. We are announcing our resignation this Sunday and our day there will be Sunday the 4th or September. Please pray that they are able to find a good pastor and grow and prosper. Please also pray for our family; we are all very tired with the new baby, and could use strength by the Spirit of God for all the work involved in taking care of a new baby, moving, taking on a new church etc. We thank God that we can call on the Lord in our time of need and be confident that He hears us and answers us.

God Bless You- Pastor Sam Smith

From the Pastor: God Bless the Church in New Albany. We are glad to announce the arrival of Abbie Smith; 8 lbs, 2 oz, 20" long on August 2oth at 3:30 AM. Thanks to everyone for your prayer and patience. Due to the early arrival, we should be able to move up our expected arrival to the second week in September with our first Sunday Morning service on the 11th. We are looking forward to meeting everyone and beginning a long and fruitful time of ministry at the Victory Lighthouse.

God Bless You All- Pastor Sam Smith

babyabbie 

Message from Pastor Sam: Hello and may God Bless you! As you study this weeks devotion and listen to the sermon and meditate upon God's word, always remember that we have life through our faith in Jesus Christ, and that the life that Christ came to give us is abundant, eternal life. Through Christ, we have the victory, not defeat. We have hope, not despair. We are joyful, not discouraged. We are prospered, not in poverty. Never let anyone or anything take away from you what God has promised you. There are trials to endure, temptations to turn away from and doubts and fears to overcome, but when we do, we will receive the reward that God has promised us. So always be strong in the Lord, and in the power of His might! God Bless you and always remember that God loves you!

This Week's Topic: Life In Jesus Christ

Prayer of the Week: Psa 36:7-9 How excellent is thy lovingkindness, O God! therefore the children of men put their trust under the shadow of thy wings. (8) They shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of thy house; and thou shalt make them drink of the river of thy pleasures. (9) For with thee is the fountain of life: in thy light shall we see light.


Devotion of the Week: He is the One who loved me first--when I didn't deserve His love. He loves you, too, and wants a relationship with you. And in John 3:36, we read how we can have that relationship: "Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life." Read the rest of this devotion here.

Sermon of the Week: Listen to a sermon by Greg Laurie here.

Topic of the Day: Living Holy Lives

Prayer of the Day: Psa 51:10-11 Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me. (11) Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me.

Devotion of the Day: The natural will is cold, hard iron, which is not to be hammered into form, but the renewed will, like molten metal, is soon moulded by the hand of grace. In the fleshy heart there is a tenderness of the affections. The hard heart does not love the Redeemer, but the renewed heart burns with affection towards Him. The hard heart is selfish and coldly demands, "Why should I weep for sin? Why should I love the Lord?" But the heart of flesh says; "Lord, Thou knowest that I love Thee; help me to love Thee more!" Read the rest of this devotion by CH Spurgeon here.

Sermon of the Day: Listen to a the first sermon in a series on Holy Living by Dr Joe Stowell of Moody Bible here.

From the Pastor: greetings to the members and friends of Victory Lighthouse in the name of Jesus! We are waiting with great anticipation two important events. First, the birth of our daughter (to be named later), and our new beginning in New Albany. I know that both of these events hold great promise for the future, and we can hardly wait for either one. We appreciate very much your patience and support at this time, and our family is looking forward to meeting all of you in person soon. I am going to try to keep in contact with you via this web-log during the interim period, and if it is a blessing it may continue afterward. God loves you, and may God bless you- Pastor Sam Smith and family.

Topic of the Day: We belong to the Lord

Prayer of the Day: Psa 79:9&13 9 Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of thy name: and deliver us, and purge away our sins, for thy name's sake. 13 So we thy people and sheep of thy pasture will give thee thanks for ever: we will shew forth thy praise to all generations.

Devotion of the Day: One of the essential ingredients of contentment is recognizing that we don't get to make many of the key decisions about our life. Will we be healthy? Will we have money? Will we even have a job? Will we ever get married? God decides those things. We need to willingly submit to God's direction of our lives in grateful response to His overwhelming love for us. Read the rest of today's devotion here.

Sermon of the Day: Listen to a sermon preached by Skip Ryan here.

Jennifer Smith 

Patrick Smith 

Katelyn Smith 

Mitchell Smith 

Pastor Sam Smith 

Topic of the Day: Glorifying God

Prayer of the Day: Psa 86:11-13 Teach me thy way, O LORD; I will walk in thy truth: unite my heart to fear thy name. (12) I will praise thee, O Lord my God, with all my heart: and I will glorify thy name for evermore. (13) For great is thy mercy toward me: and thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell.

Devotion of the Day: It is extremely offensive to God when we don’t recognize him as our Creator, in whom “we live and move and have our being,” or when we see him as an insignificant, powerless little god we don’t need to respect. This was the sin of the people of Israel. In spite of all the miracles God had done to let them see how marvelous, important, and imposing he was, they turned away from him to serve idols. Sadly, most people today think exactly as Israel did. They don’t think it worth their while to get to know God. This is a serious matter, for we insult God when we have such little respect for him. A practical question I have asked myself is this: Since I was created, and redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ, in order to increase God’s glory—his importance, his esteem, his respect, his good name—how can I go about doing this? Read the rest of this article from "Discipleship Journal" here.

Sermon of the Day: Listen to a Charles Spurgeon's Sermon (preached by Tod Magstadt) here.

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From the Pastor: greetings to the members and friends of Victory Lighthouse in the name of Jesus! We are waiting with great anticipation two important events. First, the birth of our daughter (to be named later), and our new beginning in New Albany. I know that both of these events hold great promise for the future, and we can hardly wait for either one. We appreciate very much your patience and support at this time, and our family is looking forward to meeting all of you in person soon. I am going to try to keep in contact with you via this web-log during the interim period, and if it is a blessing it may continue afterward. God loves you, and may God bless you- Pastor Sam Smith and family.

Topic of the Day: Rejoicing in the Lord

Prayer of the Day: Psa 40:16 Let all those that seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee: let such as love thy salvation say continually, The LORD be magnified.

Devotion of the Day: If you're not in the middle of a trial right now, just hang around. None of us can dodge trials. So we need to find out the resources God has given us to deal with trials.
What is a trial, anyway? It's an adverse circumstance that God allows or even brings about in the lives of us His children to deepen our faith. We'll see this week that trials are not designed to sink our boat, but to help us improve our navigation skills. In the words of the Apostles Paul and James, we can actually rejoice when we undergo trials, because we know God is doing something special in our lives. Read the rest of this devotion by Tony Evans here.

Sermon of the Day: Listen to part 1 of "So You're Going Through A Trial" by Jerry Savelle here and part 2 here.