Message From Pastor Ken Rico Welcome to the St. Petersburg Community Church website. We are in the process of updating the entire site to better reflect our fellowship and inform you of who we are and what we sense the Lord is leading us to do. Our purpose is to glorify God by becoming more like the Lord Jesus Christ and making Him known to a fallen world that has rejected His Truth and does not understand their need for salvation and surrender to the God who created them. We want to passionately pursue our relationship with Christ and support and strengthen each other in the same pursuit. We recognize that we are just a part of what God is doing in our city and want to challenge and encourage our companions in Christ who also love Him and are seeking to build His Kingdom. Our core values are: Celebrating the Lord in Worship, Caring for one another in Love, Cultivating a heart of Discipleship, and Communicating the Gospel to a lost World. Our focus is to know the Lord and His Word and our emphasis is to grow in Grace and Knowledge of the Lord ( IIPeter 3:18) by individually putting Scripture into practice in our personal living. Christ tells us that the Truth sets us free (John 8:31,32). Free from sin, self, past, present, future, destructive habits, relationships, and associations, negative patterns of living and influences. Accountability to God’s standard of Holiness, His Word and each other is the method used to achieve His Purposes.
We invite you to participate with us as we discover, learn, pursue, and grow in His Will (Romans 12:1,2) and seek to bring pleasure to God’s Heart (Colossians 1:10; I Thessalonians 2:4; I John 3:22; Galatians 1:10; Revelation 4:11). Hebrews 11:6 says it is impossible to please God without faith and the first step to becoming what He has created you to be is to trust the payment Christ made on the Cross for everything you have ever done or will do wrong, past, present and future. The Lord is a Holy God and has an absolute standard. For us to have a relationship with Him, be part of His Kingdom and eventually get to Heaven we have to meet His standard. Unfortunately, all of us are sinful people, everyone has sinned in our actions, words, thoughts, attitudes or motives (Romans 3:10, 23). God requires perfection, but none of us can achieve or attain that. However, because of His Great Love, the Lord has provided the way for us to know Him now and live with Him in Heaven later. God sent His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to sacrifice Himself for our sins b the Cross and sheddingy dying on His Blood so we can be cleansed of the sin that comes between God and us and be free from its penalty (Romans 6:23). We escape eternal death because of Christ’s death and receive His Life in an exchange because He rose from the dead. All we can do is trust that payment. We can add nothing to the provision Christ has made for us: keeping the commandments, joining / attending a church, being good, making promises, praying, giving money, being water baptized, or anything else that results from our own efforts makes us acceptable to God. There is nothing that we can do that will make the Lord Love us any more or less. No sin is too great for the blood of Christ to cleanse and forgive. If you have never done that, you can do so right now as you are reading this by talking to the Lord and telling Him you realize you are a sinner as He has said and that you are trusting the payment that Christ made to cleanse you, forgive your sin and give you a relationship that starts right now with Him. If you are doing that or need to talk with someone about your relationship with the Lord, please contact us, we are eager for you to know the Gracious, Great and Good God we know, love and serve. If you have already done that and want to be part of a fellowship that is serious about all these things then contact us, we are eager to assist you in anyway we can to make spiritual progress and become an effective tool that the Lord can use for His purposes. My phone number is 727-385-3640, call anytime, leave a message and I will return the call as soon as possible. Our desire and prayer for you is summed up in II Thessalonians 1:11,12. For His Flock, Pastor Ken Rico