Serving Schedule

If you are unable to keep your scheduled serving day, please contact the church at least a few days before the service so there is time to find a replacement. Thank you!

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Statistics for Last Week

Financials

• Regular Offering: $1,313.00
• Online Giving: $234.19
• Non-Budget: $111.46
• Memorial: $0.00
• Scholarship: $0.00
• Building Fund: $0.00

Attendance

• Worship Attendance: 46
• Sunday School: n/a
• Youth Group: n/a
• Midweek Bible Study: 4
• Men’s Bible Study: n/a

Please make every attempt to have your kids in Sunday School each week, and your teens in Youth Group.

Important News & Announcements

NEED PRINTED ANNOUNCEMENTS?

Please ask Pastor if you would like a printed copy of the announcements. Thank you.

Stewardship Thought for This Week

Romans 8:12 – “So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh.” We owe the flesh, the world and the devil nothing at all. We are not debtors to these enemies; we are freed by the blood of Christ. We are joyful servants in Christ’s kingdom — servants that He calls friends. We share our Lord’s plans and purposes, and this gives direction and purpose to our lives.

Keep collecting your Teals Market receipts and your Our Family barcodes (sold at Teals) and turn them into the church! We get a percentage of your purchases back and dollars back from Our Family barcodes! Turn them in often by dropping them into the bucket in the narthex.

Do you browse the internet? Do you use a search engine? Of course you do! If you’re using Google or some other search provider, why not instead switch to Microsoft Bing? You can even support St. Paul’s Lutheran Church by switching.

Click the Give with Bing image (left) or visit:

https://bing.com/?publ=BINGIP&crea=MY01TS&form=MY01TS&ocid=MY01TS&programname=OrganicAcquisution-Toolkit&cid=840-416093860

Sunday School/VBS News

Children’s and Youth Sunday School is over for summer, but children and youth are always encouraged to attend adult Bible Study.  Instill a good habit of churchly participation!  Bring them to Bible Study.

Vacation Bible School is slated for Monday, August 14 – Wednesday, August 16^th in the evenings.  We need adults and older youth to participate and help lead.  More information will be coming soon.

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Noisy Offering will be collected this Sunday during the Divine Service. Remember that your loose change helps support our Scholarship fund. The scholarship is awarded to high school seniors who are planning to attend college.

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Summer Bible Study Opportunities

There is no time like the present to be in the Word, studying and growing in Christ.  To that end, we will continue to have our Thursday morning class where we study the Book of Concord.  As Lutherans, we believe the Book of Concord is a correct exposition of the Holy Scripture and thus it’s important we are familiar with it.  Join us Thursdays at 9:00 am and bring your Book of Concord with you.  If you don’t have one, speak to pastor about getting one for you.

Adult Bible Study continues this Sunday at 10:30 with a multi-week study on the Lord’s Supper.  Today we will talk about the theology of the Lord’s Supper and touch on historical practices.  Join us, and bring a bible if you have one! WE WILL MEET TODAY!

Men, join us Thursdays at 6:30pm for Men’s Bible Study. We are studying the Book of Romans.

Lifetree Café will begin in September!  Members are invited to attend, have great social time, and talk about some of the deeper things of the faith.

We will complete our Lord’s Supper study next Sunday with advice and instruction on how to practice the Lord’s Supper faithfully as a congregation.

Morning Prayer @ St. Paul’s

Join us at the church or online every Tuesday and Thursday morning at 7:30 for morning prayer, a short service of responsive prayers, hymns, and readings.

Senior Social Day

Seniors, why not come to the church every 2nd Thursday at 10am for a time of good fun, fellowship and games, coffee and treats, and to meet other Milaca seniors? We’ve got a good group of people but would love it if you could come too! Bring your favorite board game or card game with you and be sure to bring friends!

We will not have a monthly Newsletter during the summer months. Important announcements, schedules, and meetings will be printed/emailed in the weekly news.

Subscribe to the official newspaper of The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod! Visit reporter.lcms.org to get regular updates, notices, synodical news, and more!

Subscribe to the Minnesota North District e-News service! Visit https://www.mnnlcms.org/newsletter to subscribe to regular emails, updates, and more!

Pastor Carlson has been publishing a regular devotion online and emailing it to subscribers. That’s right! This is a great way to start of your day in the Word and prayer. Simply go to stpaulsmilaca.org/subscribe or speak to Pastor, and you’ll start to receive a regular devotion in your email inbox.

Also visit https://www.lcms.org/worship/memory-verse-challenge and memorize a verse of Scripture a day!

The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, 68th Regular Convention is July 29 through August 3. Pastor Carlson, along with a lay delegate from our circuit, will be attending the convention and representing St. Paul’s and our circuit. The convention is in Milwaukee, WI at the Wisconsin Center/Arena.

Pastor will spend a little time at the next quarterly voters meeting detailing the convention and provide for you a list of matters which will be voted on.

To keep up with the convention timeline, to read the overtures, and to learn about the various candidates who will fill positions nationally, please visit LCMS National Convention – The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod. Also, please pray for safe travel for all who are preparing to head to Milwaukee in late July.

EDUCATING A NEW GENERATION OF LUTHERANS… Issues, Etc. is a radio talk show and podcast produced by Lutheran Public Radio in Collinsville, IL and hosted by LCMS Pastor Todd Wilken.  This week’s subjects include: The Movies “Sound of Freedom” and “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny;” An Attempt by Concordia University Texas to Reject the Governance & Oversight of the LCMS; Truth & Tolerance; Female Pastors & the Lutheran Church of Australia and more.  You can listen on-demand at issuesetc.org, the LPR mobile app and your favorite podcast provider.

SCRIPTURE: “We are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh” – Romans 8:12

Debt is not a fun thing. Yet many Americans live in debt well beyond their means and must rely on other sources of income to help offset it. Either that or they live off of government subsidies and contribute to the ever-growing “national debt” which is in the trillions of dollars. Financial debt greatly hinders a person’s ability to live freely, enjoy the fruits of his labor, raise a family, and live without great burden and pressure. Debt creates emotional problems, depression, anger, jealousy and envy, and many other physiological things which do not help the heart or the mind.

This is why debt management agencies, bankruptcy assistance agencies, and the like all make a lot of money off of helping those struggling with debt. No one likes it, and many people suffer so much from it that they are all but forced to seek the help of someone else.

When it comes to our eternal life, every Christian was once in similar but far more formidable debt. And all unbelievers continue to be in debt. It is the eternal debt to sin, death, and the devil that every human soul contends with from the moment of conception. It is such a deep debt that no one can possibly come up with the means to subdue it. This is why God sent His only Son. Christ Jesus was equipped to pay the debt for all humanity on account of His perfect and obedient life, and He paid our debt by dying on the cross and completely wiping out the sinful debt we owed. Without His cross, we would pay our debt off in eternal hell. But because He has died, we are eternally forgiven and owe nothing.

And in our debt-free Christian freedom, let us not go back to procuring such debt which He has paid! Let us not embrace unholy living, fruitless faith, or allowing ourselves to be enslaved once more to sin, death, or the devil. Let us instead live by faith, in freedom, debt-free, by seeking His mercy and favor every day. Let us live by the Spirit of Christ and daily die to the wicked deeds of the body.

“You have made us for yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.“

— St. Augustine of Hippo (AD 354 – 430)