Moving help for Trey Turner

Hello River Family and Friends!

If anyone is available on Tuesday August 4th

we are looking for 1 or 2 people to help Trey Turner move.

Trey and his family moved to Wisconsin from Texas.

He is a new Church Planter moving to Wisconsin Rapids.

His household items are currently being stored in a

storage unit up in the Rapids and they need help

moving the items to their new home.

If you will be able to help, please contact Trey @

254-493-1587 cell

or

turner.trey@gmail.com

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EWOMEN Deadline August 9th

The deadline is now August 9th~ if you plan to pay on the 9th PLEASE have cash, before the 9th check is ok Jenn 617-4274 Jenn@PortageChurch.org

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A True Believer is Blameless

"A True Believer is Blameless"

Genesis 17.1

Week 2 of the Sermon Series

10 Signs of a True Believer

Click the link below to go to

Pastor Bob's Blog,

Unmerited Favor

www.PortageChurch.org/Pastor

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10 Signs of a True Believer

"A True Believer Walks Before God"

Genesis 17.1

This week begins our Sermon series of

10 Signs of a True Believer

Click the link below to go to

Pastor Bob's blog

Unmerited Favor...

www.PortageChurch.org/Pastor

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Rivermen Ministry update

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Attention all you River men. I just want to thank you for showing up every Sunday morning and helping us all grow closer to God in becoming the man He desires you to be. Our study time rocks. We give God all the glory for us coming to Him with open hearts and minds as we continue to grow in spirit and numbers. Praise God!!!!! Thank you for your passion to become leaders in your home and in the body of Christ. You rock! Also...

Also Men at the Cross will be here before we know it. November 13Th and 14Th. The men's ministry fund purchased 11 tickets. As of now I have 3 pd for but all 11 spoken for the list is as follows Mike G , Luke G,Brian M, Jesse C, Chris C,Arron R, Matt G, Kylar G, Doug S, Jarrod S, and Gary M. Pastor Bob you will be getting your own I believe? If you told me you wanted one and I did not include you on this list please let me Know. Please let me know if you want to be on this list and also please get your money to me or Anne Z so I can order 10 more. If I do that we get 11 for the price of 10. Question ,can we find 11 more men to go ? I say yes so lets get r done.

We purchased 24 paint ball tickets for all day play and equipment rental we only need to buy the paint which could $15 per person for all day play. In buying 24 tickets we were given 24 additional tickets with no exp. date. Lets talk about this and plan on spending day doing this as a group. Maybe even invite some friends or challenge Grace Bible men's group to a day of paint war. Any Ideas?

We will be having a trap shoot in August sometime I will let you know the date soon.

God bless Mike

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Tara and Elliot!

Great news! Here's the word from Tara:

Elliot Dean Woodruff was born at 9:22pm! So funny, Emily was born at 9:22am! He is 5lbs 10oz and 19in. He is in the NICU since he was having some difficulty breathing. He is on CPAP to keep his airway open but that's it.He is gorgeous and so soft! I didn'get to see even a glimpse of him for 3.5hrs,but it was worth the wait.

Please pray for Tara and Elliot and that his breathing difficulties are cleared up quickly!

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Tara Woodruff

Be praying for Tara. She has been having a rough day and having a very high blood pressure. They have decided to deliver the baby tonight. She is in the delivery area now and will have to wait till btn 7-8 to deliver. It looks like it will be a C-section. She is 36 weeks today. Praise God!

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EWOMEN Conference

Time is running out!!!   If you plan on attending the EWOMEN CONFERENCE in November, the deadline to pre-order tickets at the cheapest price is August 7th   contact Jenn or send your $49 check made out to Jenn Selbach to:   River of Life church ATTN: Jenn Selbach 102 W. Franklin St Portage, Wi 53930

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Block Party - Thursday

Hi Everyone!

The last block party of Family Fest is this Thursday and we have decided to host it at River!!!!!  

So we could use your help in either set-up and especially tear down at 4PM.  We will be setting up around 1:30 and the party will start at 2 and go until about 4PM.

  

We need your help in the tear down because River is hosting the end of Family Fest meal for the workers who have been working all week for us.  So we would like for them to be able to enjoy a meal and talk about the week's stories that they experienced.  So any help at 4PM would be wonderful!  Remember to wear your River shirts!

We are also in need of some grills to cook the meal on.  So if you have a grill that you could bring for Thursday please e-mail (Alisha@PortageChurch.org) so we know.  You can drop it off at River before 3 PM on Thursday.

Also - Feel free to invite your neighborhood families to attend the free block party.

Thanks so much for your help in showing Portage that we love because He first loved us. 

Thanks,

Alisha Turner

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Java for Jesus

Hey ladies, just wanted to let ya's know that the Women's Ministry Team has decided NOT to take the rest of summer off from Java for Jesus. Sorry for any confusion, but we have had a few approach us asking for it, and really wanting it~ so its back on starting this Sunday July 26th!!!  We will still be meeting at McDonalds Playland every Sunday, please arrive at 8:15 am if you plan to eat, we will be starting promptly at 8:30 am   For those of you who dont know what Java for Jesus is... Ladies come together at the playland (kiddos welcome) in Mcds and go over the River of Life Church Devotional, and pray~ Its a great time, and a great way to get to know fellow sisters at River! Please come join us!!!   Thanks a lot for all who have encouraged us to keep this a weekly gathering~ its means so much!   In Christ~ Jenn

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Amber Jacobs had her baby!!!

Welcome Jennifer Hope Jacobs she was born today at 8:05pm weighing 6lb 5oz and is 18 inches long! If you would like to call Amber she is at St.Marys Hospital just call the main # and ask for Ambers room

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Fear or Laziness

The sluggard says,

"There is a Lion Outside!

I shall be slain in the streets!"

~ Proverbs 22.13

This is not what I expected the proverbs to say. I would have expected it to say "The coward says, 'There is a lion outside! I shall be slain in the streets!'" But it says, "sluggard", not "coward." So the controlling emotion here is laziness, not fear. But what does laziness have to do with the danger of a lion in the street? What is the point of the proverb?

The point is that the sluggard creates imaginary circumstances to justify not doing his work and thus shifts the focus from the voice of his laziness to the danger of lions. No one will approve his staying in the house all day just because he is lazy.

But they might sympathize with him and approve his staying home if there were real danger outside. So, to hide his laziness and justify himself, he deflects attention away from the truth (laziness) to an illusion (lions).

If we would be side people - people on the way to being "sages" - we must understand how our sinful human hearts and minds work. One profound Biblical insight we need to embrace is that our heart exploits our mind to justify what the heart wants. That is, our deepest desires precede the rational functioning of our minds and incline the mind to perceive and think in a way that will make the desires look right. It is an illusion to hink that our hearts are neutral and incline in accordance with cool, rational observation of truth. On the contrary, we feel powerful desires or fears in our hearts, andthen our minds bend reality to justify the desires and fears.

This is what the sluggard is doing. He deeply desires to stay at home and not work. There is no good reason to stay at home. So what does he do? Does he overcome his bad desire? No, his lazy heart exploits his mind to create unreal circumstances to justify his desire. He may even believe the creation of his mind. Deception can cross from moral depravity to mental derangement - from deceiving others to deceiving ourselves. ...

Thus Proverbs 26.16 says, "The sluggard is wiser in his own eyes than seven men who can give a discreet answer." Now why is that? Does laziness make people haughty? Not necessarily. But it does make them resistant to any truth that exposes their laziness. So when seven men say, "There is no lion in the street," the sluggard cannot concede. He must insist that his own answer is wise: There is a lion in the street. Otherwise his laziness is exposed for what it is. Thus truth is sacrificed on the altar of self-justification.

Its an old tale. From Cain (Genesis 4.9) to American presidents, truth has been sacrificed to desire, and the mind has been shrewdly employed by the darkened heart to shroud its passions. This is the point of Romans 1.18 - "They suppress the truth in unrighteousness." Truth is held hostage by the unrighteous commitments of the heart. The unrighteous heart then employs the mind to distract and deceive. As Jesus says, "Everyone who does evil hates the Light." (John 3.20) Doing the evil we love makes us hostile to the light of truth which will expose the evil and rob us of its fleeting pleasures. In this condition the mind becomes a factory of half-truths, equivocations, sophistries, evasions, and lies - anything to protect the evil desires of the heart from exposure and destruction.

We are all given to this. Our only home is the transforming work of God in our hearts to free us from the bondage of a hardened heart that produces a futile mind. This is Paul's diagnosis of the "futile mind" and the "darkened understanding" - they are rooted in hardness of heart. "Walk no longer as the Gentiles... in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart" (Ephesians 4.17-18). The root cause is a heart cause, not a head cause. The mind is darkened and made futile by rebellion in the heart.

This does not mean that lovers of truth should stop speaking truth and explaining truth and defending truth. But it does mean that we should pray for God to change hearts so that they can see the beauty of truth and love it - even if it begins with: There is no lion in the street and you are lazy. This devine work is what Paul gives thanks for in Romans 6.17, "But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed." Obedience came from the heart. Thanks be to God. And if thanks be to God, then let prayers be to God. He is our only hope - to escape our own delusions and deliver others.

* Taken from Taste and See Meditations by John Piper

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Fair!! Fair!! Fair!!

Just a reminder that next week is the Columbia County Fair. Be sure to sign up for a time to man the booth and share River's love with our community. Any questions, contact Paul or Kelly Zuelke. Read Full Post»

The Will of God and the Shortcuts of Man

Pastor Bob's Sermon this Sunday was

"The Will of God and the Shortcuts of Man"

based on Genesis 16

"So she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her, “You are a God of seeing,” for she said, “Truly here I have seen him who looks after me.” ~Genesis 16.13

To hear the story of Abram and Sarai,

Click the link below to go to

Pastor Bob's personal blog

Unmerited Favor

www.PortageChurch.org/Pastor

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Pray for Bob Dreifke's bypass surgery Monday, July 13th

Bob is going in for his surgery tomorrow am. He is scheduled to have surgery around 7am and will likely be at the hospital most of next week. He will be at the VA hospital in Madison. I believe he will be having a triple bypass, but they will determine once they get in there. Please keep him in your prayers that all will go smoothly and he will come out stronger for it. He knows God is with him and is at peace about going into surgery.
Thank you all for your prayers!
Karrie and Marlene

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Please Pray For Teagen...

There is a little 2 year old boy in need of your prayers...His name is Teagen Franke. We got a call a bit ago from Jesse Chambers sharing that he was at the beach with friends today and when they left the beach, their son, Teagen stopped breathing. As of 4pm, Teagen is at the hospital and breathing on his own (Praise God) but he is not out of the woods yet. Please pray for his healing and for peace/comfort for his family. Thanks ~ Mike & Faith Read Full Post»

Today is Calvin's 500th Birthday

Today marks the 500th anniversary of the birth of the great reformer, John Calvin (July 10, 1509 – May 27, 1564). Hundreds of thousands commemorate this day with gratitude to God for this man and his influence on the church.

For those of us who embrace the doctrines of grace, we celebrate God's preacher who did so much to teach us even still today. He wrote the astounding work: "Institutes of the Christian Religion" which is cherished to this day.

River of Life is a Calvinist (theologically - all 5 points) church that serves Christ and celebrates the doctrines of grace. The acronym TULIP literally shapes the way we do our marriages, our ministry, and our lives. You can read our reformed theology statement here: http://portagechurch.org/beliefs/Reformed%20Positional%20Statement.pdf

But even those who disagree with his theology should still regard him as a gift to the church. Here is what some of the great contrasts to his teachings said about him: John Wesley called him “a great instrument of God,” and Jacob Arminius considered Calvin “incomparable in the interpretation of Scripture” and recommended Calvin’s commentaries second only to the Bible itself. So learning and benefiting from Calvin isn’t just for the five pointers.

Why was John Calvin so significant? Listen to John Piper (who is doing a conference on Calvin) discuss the importance of John Calvin's life and ministry and how it impacts our life today.

So today we celebrate this man of God who taught us so much and was used by our Lord to remind us what Jonah wrote: "Salvation belongs to the Lord" (Jonah 2.9)

Soli Deo Gloria!

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Columbia County Fair

River's vision:

"Sharing God's love with our community and our world."

The Columbia County Fair helps us fulfill our mission and vision.

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There are still plenty of available time slots to sign up for. Each time slot is 2 hours. We have availability Wednesday July 22nd - Sunday July 26th.

We strongly encourage everyone to get involved!

Get ready to love your community through your kind words, face painting,

balloon animals, tattoos and much more!

If you have questions please contact

Paul or Kelly Zuelke. Paul@PortageChurch.org

You may contact them to sign up or the sheet will be at the

River Opportunities table on Sunday!

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Believing God

Pastor Bob's Sermon this Sunday was

"Believing God"

Based n Genesis 15

~Sometimes God has to change your perspective!

~You might need to change your footing before

you can realize your position

~Sometimes you can't get a clear vision until

you get a new perspective

To listen to the Sermon

Click the link below to go to Pastor Bob's Blog

Unmerited Favor

www.PortageChurch.org/Pastor

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Tara

If anyone would like to call or write to Tara or Emily here is their info.....

Tara Woodruff

110 Georgiana Circle

Madison, WI53716

617-4752

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Please Pray for Tara Woodruff

Tara Woodruff is being admitted to the hospital again. Pray for her mom to have understanding about Emily's emotions. Emily has been through a lot. Tara is due to deliver Elliot August 19th. Please pray that she is able to stay healthy for the remainder of the pregnancy.

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Reminder to kids to practice Memory Verse

John 1:12 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God. Read Full Post»

URGENT - PRAYER REQUEST

River of Life Church family & friends,

I have an urgent prayer request for you. A dear friend of mine and brother in the Lord, Tim Worden* and 21 members of his church (The Vista in Texas*) are in Honduras. They are in hiding as the political events unfold around them. They have a return flight scheduled for today (July 1^st) and are praying that they will be able to leave the country.

Let’s join together and pray that our Lord will lead them to safety and home. Let’s also pray for their families who are anxiously waiting for word of their loved ones' safety.

*Tim and his wife Staci were the couple that Alisha, myself, Jenn & Jarrod stayed with when we went to Texas last year.

Through Tim, The Vista Community Church is also partnering in the gospel ministry with River of Life Church and they sponsor us monthly also.

* Update - they are home safe and sound. thank you to everyone who prayed for them!

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