Greetings from

THE RIVERS OF JOY BAPTIST CHURCH

IN MINFORD, OHIO

WE ARE A BAPTIST CHURCH, ALWAYS WILL BE.

The Pastors and Teachers teach the Word of God

We stay on text and not usually no not chase rabbits

While the Pastors teach from the KJV we believe its a great translation.

The Pastors teach the sovereignty of God in all things.

We are Pastors and Elders lead church.

THE OBJECTIVES AND PURPOSES OF OUR CHURCH ARE LISTED BELOW.

 THE PASTOR'S BLOG CAN BE FOUND AT THE

END OF THE COMMENTS.

Pastor/Teacher Charles E. Whisnant

Pastor    William "Bill" Bower

Music:    Johnny Edwards

 JOIN US THS SUNDAY 

October 25, 2009

Satan's Deception To Eve

 SUNDAY MORNING BIBLE STUDY

Thank you for your visit to the site.  My name is Charles E. Whisnant.  Rivers of Joy Baptist Church called me to be their pastor/teacher June 27, 2008. Bill Bower became  one of our asso.  pastors January 2009, and Bob Temple, Sr,  came on board in March 2009.  And as of 2009 Charles Whisnant, Bill Bower, and Bill  Aldridge and Bob Temple made up our church leadership (elders) team.  Also Johnny Edwards is on our team in the music. Johnny has been a preacher/music evangelist for a number of years.  So we are blessed to have these preachers in our church to provide teaching and bibical counseling,  and ministry to the members of our church.

FOOTNOTE:  I am the protector of this site, and check every person who is a "friend". No one will get pass me, hopeful.

THE PURPOSE THAT AS A PREACHER WE TRY TO ACCOMPLISH IN OUR PREACHING

Thus Experimental Preaching has a 4-fold concern:

1. First, there is concern to bring the objective truth of God's Word to bear on people's hearts.
It is not preaching of someone's personal experiences, or storytelling, or giving of one's testimony, but the preaching of biblical truth from the Bible as your the sole authority. Proclaim the whole counsel of God's Word whether people want to hear it or not. Truth is never to be preached in a vacuum. You must address their whole person - mind first, and through the mind, the conscience, the affections, and the will.

2. Second, there is a concern to address people's experience of the truth under consideration.
We must do this whether their experience is right or wrong, healthy or unhealthy, biblical or unbiblical, godly or ungodly. We must take the realities of peoples lives seriously and relates to their actual experiences (joys, sorrows, hopes, fears, aspirations, and disappointments). They sense the relevancy of the Word of God and leave feeling that the preacher has spoken to exactly their situation.

3. Third, there is a concern to lead people to an experience of the transofming power and grace of God in regard to that truth.
Preaching that only gives out knowledge could better serve the people by handing the an USB drive for them to take home and read. The aim must be to give is to give them a knowledge of the truth that leads them to encounter the God of truth himself. People ought to have a presence of God and a glimpse of his majesty and glory.

This makes preaching theocentric (God-centered), not anthropocentric (man-centered). The preacher's desire is that people will be enabled by the Spirit to experience something of the grace , glory and power of God. Preaching out to uplife, ennoble and inspire them as they are drawn into the presence of God Himself.

This also makes the preaching Christocentric (Christ-centered) because only in christ can aperson have access to God, and only in him can they find grace to help thm in their time of needs.

Such preaching must also be Pneumocentric (Spirit-centered) . It is utterly dependent on and deeply conscious of the empower, trasforming, sanctifying work of the Spirit. Without this there can be no encounter with the living God.

4. Finally, experimental preaching is marked by a concern to stimulate greater godliness in the hearer.
Godliness, in all its fullness, is the end goal of such preaching. It aims to bring people nearer to God, give them a deeper and truer knowledge of Him, urge them toward greater conformity to His will, and enable them to serve Him more fully and consistently in their daily lives.

CHECK PASTOR/TEACHER CHARLES' BLOGGER GrowByLearning and Website GrowbyLearning.  Two websites filled with articles and photos. 

A brief backgrown of the Rivers of Joy

Quentin King, founder of Portsmouth Baptist Church 50 years ago, started the ROJ B in 1992 with a group of people who had previously been members of his church at PBC.  Then Kelly Cinereski came as pastor for a few years, then he left. For a period of 18 months the church had tried to come to an agreement on a pastor with no success.  One young man  Bud Patrict tried for a  time to work with the church.  \

Finally after loss of membership and near closing its doors, and after Bob Temple came to help out, and ask me to come with him, I preached for three weeks in July, and then the church voted Charles Whisnant as pastor/teacher of the church.

UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT

• We are still Baptist, but we are under a new system of operating the church.
• We are still independent, we are not with any fellowship.
• We still preach from the KJV but we do not believe 1611 or any of the other dozen versions of KJV is the only word of God has for the Christians. We believe that we can use other translations that or translation from the orginial Hebrew and Greek.
  
• We are not a pastor control church, we have a group of godly Pastors/Elders who direct the church.  Charles Whisnant, Bill Bower, Bob Temple and Bill Aldridge
• We believe the preaching of the Gospel should include the whole word of God.
• We believe that the preaching should be expository rejoice preaching/teaching.  Preaching is to include teaching of the text. We teach from one book of the Bible at a time.
• While we do not have altar calls or invitation at the end of the service, we beleive each person should respond in their spirit to the message and worship.
• Our primary purpose as a church, is to worship the Lord Jesus Christ, we are to preach and teach the Gospel and the whole Bible. 
  
• We believe in reaching people with the Word of God, yet at the same time, we focus on each member of the church for discipleship.
• 
  

Now it has been a year in July that we came to ROJBC  and we are doing just great.  We have a  few new members, and are rebuilding and reestablishing the ministry under new management.  As you read the purposes and goals and objectives of the church, I hope you will visit us sometime.

Joining us in the last year:

Charles and Charity Whisnant

Bill and Mary Bower

Pauline Lemaster

Richard Lemaster

Kindra Tumbston

John and Peggy Hall

John Hall Jr.

Bob Temple

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If I have observed anything by experience, it is this: a man may take the measure of his growth and decay in grace according to his thoughts and meditations upon the person of Christ, and the glory of Christ’s Kingdom, and of His love.”

- John Owen,

Check out the Pastor/Teacher's  web sites:   www.cwhisna.blogspot.com 
Check out our website  GROWBYLEARNING 

Sound biblical preaching does the following nine things that individual Bible reading, memorization, and meditation does not:

1. Good preaching rescues us from our self-deceptions and blind spots, for left to ourselves we tend to ignore the very things in God's Word that we most need to see.
2. Preaching brings us before God's Word in the special presence of the Holy Spirit, who indwells the gathered church.
3. Good preaching challenges us to do things we otherwise would not and gives us the will to do them.
4. Good preaching brings us into the place of corporate obedience rather than merely individual obedience.
5. Good preaching contributes to spiritual humility by disciplining us to sit under the teaching, correction, and exhortation of another human. Relying on ourselves alone for food from the Word can lead to a spirit of arrogance and spiritual independence.
6. Good preaching gives a place for a spiritually qualified person to protect believers from dangerous error.
7. Preaching and listening is a uniquely embodied, physical act. It literally puts us into the habit of having "ears that hear." There is something to be said for this physical act of listening and heeding.
8. Good preaching does what most Christians are not gifted, trained, or time-endowed to do: interpret a text in context, distill the theological truths that are universally true, and apply those truths in a particular time and place to particular people in a particular church—all this with the help of resources informed by 2,000 years of the Church's study that average Christians do not own.
9. Listening to preaching has a much lower threshold of difficulty for almost all people.

When we preach our task includes the need to make a string of words clear.  We don’t have to start with an uncial script, but to all intents and purposes, we practically are.  Listeners hearing a string of verses often grasp very little first time through.  As we preach we look for ways to emphasize the main thoughts, we look for ways to demonstrate how the “support material” in the text explains, proves and/or applies the main thoughts.  Without technical jargon, our preaching needs to verbally achieve the formation of something like a clausal layout in the minds and hearts of our listeners.  Certainly, by the time we are done preaching, they should not see the text as a string of random words or thoughts . . . it should be much clearer than that!

Our past is our past. We desire to start a new beginning. We are still a Baptist Church.  The difference is the style of ministry we desire to have.  The style of ministry starts with the pastor. 

We have the same church building, some of the same people, the differences will be seen in the preaching and teaching, and the methodology of ministry.  As pastor/teacher I take a different approach to ministry. 

FIRST:   Preaching and teaching is first and foremost  is my objective.  Currently I am preaching from First Thessalonians (note the oulines on the blogs)  and Philippians. Primarily I give the interpretation of the verses I am teaching from. My objective is to tell you what the passage of Scripture is saying to us.

SECOND:  THE PASTOR/TEACHER:  Teacher, counselor, shepherd, equipper to the local body of believers in the church.  Ephesians 4:11-16 is our objective as a Pastor, Preacher, and Teacher.

THIRD:  THE LOCAL CHURCH PURPOSE:  Prinarly: exalting Christ, what God says rather than what we thinking others will think. The HEAD OF THE CHURCH:  Jesus Christ, the Whole Word of God, not the Church CONSTITUTION.  MEMBERS:  Every member is equal in importance, and those who are members are those who attend the local church on a regular basis.

FOURTH:  BASIC MINISTRY: Eqipping, training, meeting needs, rather than conducting services.

FIFTH:  PRIMARY CONCERNS:  God's glory and people.  We desire to grow in attendance and have a nice building and great singing, and reaching those who are not saved, or don't go to church, but not by means of entertainment or evangelism in the services. But rather to stimlulate to love and good deeds, encourage and equip the saints.

SIXTH:  WHAT YOU WANT SEE US DOING:  Begging, pleading, sweet-talking, high pressure. 

SEVEN: WHAT YOU WILL SEE US USE:  The Word, prayer, Holy Spirit, Spiritual gifts, and ministries, and trusting God to raise gifted individuals, faithful, available, teachable people. Determine needs, then TRUST GOD to work through HIS people.