Hello Brothers and Sisters,

2020! What a Year! An important year for the sufficiency of Scripture.

The ink barely dried on our 2020 New Year's resolutions when - Wham! Everything changed. The year revealed just how vital the sufficiency of Scripture is for both church and family life. Holding fast to the Word of God is the only reliable way to make your way through the social earthquakes. Since March, the government has attempted to usurp God's authority over these two great institutions' functionality. For the first time in our lives, the government told the church when it could meet and how many could meet. We have been told we must stay six feet from one another. They ordered us to stop singing, playing instruments and observing the Lord's Supper. They required us to wear masks.

At Church and Family Life, we ramped up our communication more than ever – even though almost all our conferences were canceled. We did hold our annual marriage retreat in February, and what a joy it was. We did not realize it would be our last in-person conference of the year.

That was it, no other in-person events for the rest of the year. But our video studio started bustling.

We launched Biblical Thinking on COVID-19 to help folks think correctly about what was happening, with sessions on “pandemic”, “quarantine”, and many other timely subjects.

We gathered pastors from all over the world to discuss what was happening. We were processing the issues in real-time, trying to understand how we should respond biblically. We had six online discussions with pastors to grapple with what was happening in their states and how to shepherd our flocks. We discussed things like: Is it loving to social distance?, How a Plague Brought Times of Refreshing, When to Disobey the Government, Dying & Death: All you need to know to speak the truth, Advice for Families, A Christian's Response to this Unfolding Crisis, and Issues and Opportunities.

In general, the churches that stuck with the biblical patterns commanded in the Bible have prospered. The churches that allowed the government and the surrounding culture to define their gatherings together suffered painful reversals.

Since Ridgecrest Christian Conference center canceled our National Conference, we rescheduled Theology of the Family for May 20-22, 2021. We will also have a singles conference right before that on May 19-20 called Holiness to the Lord.

Instead of altogether canceling our national conference, we conducted an online conference, Jurisdictions Under Fire – Church, and Family in the Balance.

The BIG NEWS in 2020 was our name change. We love the new name because it communicates our mission much better. It hits to the heart of what we've always been about, Church and Family Life – Proclaiming the Sufficiency of Scripture. Establishing Jesus Christ as the Lord of the church and family zeroes in on society's most significant vulnerabilities. We believe more than ever that preserving these two jurisdictions according to the Word of God is the most important thing we can do at this juncture in history. We believe that the central conflicts for the soul of Christianity will be fought on the battleground of church and family life.

We also sent two NEW BOOKS to the publisher. They will be in our hands in January. They are, The Family at Church – How Parents are Tour-guides for Joy and When to Disobey, Case Studies in Tyranny, Insurrection & Obedience to God.

It was a year of responding to previously unimaginable forces upon us. It was an exciting year - and it's not over yet. This we know: Scripture is sufficient for church and family life, and we have lots of work to do to continue to explain what this means.

Please consider helping us strengthen churches and families. We hope to expand our reach significantly in 2021 by expanding Regional Facilitators, publishing and personnel to reach more churches and families.

Scott Brown
President - Church & Family Life