Elder Michael Gowens
Bethany was blessed to have Elder Michael Gowens be with us during the September annual meeting along with his wife and their two girls. The attendance was good and visitation from sister churches and friends. The singing was Spirit filled and the prayers were heard and answered for the series of services. Brother Gowens brought a series of four messages. On Friday night he preached about “Living Epistles” from II Cor. Cor. 3:3. As the children of God, we are all writing a letter by our daily walk and conduct that is read by others. We trust it is a good letter that honors God and we will continue to add good news to this letter as we attempt to serve God to the best of our ability
On Saturday morning, we had an unusually good congregation in numbers for Saturday and Elder Gowens was blessed to preach from John 1:16 on “Being Filled With The Fullness of God.” May we all be filled with His grace and the fullness of the Godhead (Father, Son, and Holy Ghost) each and every day. Don’t be drunk with wine wherein is excess but be filled with the Spirit. Saturday night Bro. Gene York prepared an excellent fish and chicken supper with all the trimmings and the sisters of the church and its friends had plenty of other food and deserts for everyone. Bro. Gowens brought a message on “Angels” Saturday night from Hebrews 1:4 as Jesus by inheritance hath obtained a more excellent name than the angels. Bro. Gowens explained the origin of angels and their purpose.
Sunday morning we had good congregation attendance for the final service of the meeting. Once again the singing was Spirit filled and the message of Brother Gowens was Spirit filled as well. He preached on the subject of “A Happy Home” from Psalms 127. What makes a good church home and a good family home according to the scriptures. There is much to do for the children of God who have been the recipients of saving grace. Jesus said, “If ye know these things, happy are ye if you do them.”
The church was dismissed by prayer and adjourned to the lunchroom where once again we were provided with fish from Saturday night and a table full of other excellent food to satisfy our natural appetite as we had already had our spiritual appetite satisfied. I trust we all will have many good meditations and memories of this meeting in the coming weeks. We all said our goodbyes to Bro. Gowens and this family and they were off back to their home in Calabash, NC. You can find Bro. Gowens sermons for this meeting on the “audio sermons” page of this website.–September 12, 2015–Elder Larry Wise
You can see many more photos of the September annual meeting by clicking on the Annual Meetings Page under September 2015. 
