As a tool to help you pray for fire departments and their personnel in Santa Cruz County, we have compiled the following list of prayer points:

1. Pray that firefighters and support staff would be kept safe and that they would have the public’s confidence.
2. Pray that firefighters who need to make “on the spot” decisions would be given wisdom to make the right decision.
3. Pray for firefighters who are suffering stress (when dealing with sudden death, accidents, or major disasters, for example) — that God would give them peace.
4. Pray that firefighters would be able to relax while they are off duty.
5. Pray that the families of firefighters would have God’s peace when their loved ones are on duty.
6. Pray that the families of firefighters would have understanding when their loved ones are under stress.
7. Pray that Christian firefighters would be salt and light to those in their fire stations who do not know Jesus.

As a tool to help you pray for governments in Santa Cruz County, we have compiled the following list of prayer points:

1. Pray that government leaders will come to know Jesus as their Lord and Savior.
2. Pray that the leaders of the various governments in Santa Cruz County will love the truth and have teachable spirits.
3. Pray that government leaders in our county will have wisdom and not lean on their own understanding.
4. Pray for our county’s government leaders to display integrity and the courage to embrace righteousness.
5. Pray that our county’s government leaders will surround themselves with godly staff members and advisors.
6. Pray that God will protect government leaders in our county as well as their families.
7. Pray that government leaders in Santa Cruz County will have compassionate hearts for the poor and downtrodden.

As a tool to help you pray for law enforcement agencies and personnel in Santa Cruz County, we have compiled the following list of prayer points:

1. Pray that officers on patrol and support staff would be kept safe and that they would have the public’s confidence.
2. Pray that officers who need to make “on the spot” decisions would be given wisdom to make the right decision.
3. Pray for police officers who are suffering stress (when dealing with sudden death, accidents, violent crime, or major disasters, for example) — that God would give them peace.
4. Pray that police officers and support staff would have integrity to resist corruption.
5. Pray that officers would be able to relax while they are off duty.
6. Pray that the families of police officers would have God’s peace when their loved ones are on duty.
7. Pray that the families of police officers would have understanding when their loved ones are under stress.
8. Pray that Christian officers would be salt and light to those in their departments who do not know Jesus.

As a tool to help you pray for schools in Santa Cruz County, we have compiled the following list of prayer points:

1. Pray that the gospel will be effectively declared on school campuses in Santa Cruz County.
2. Pray that students in Santa Cruz County will have a hunger for truth.
3. Pray that Christian students in Santa Cruz County will stand firm in their faith and not succumb to peer pressure and temptation.
4. Pray that educators in Santa Cruz County will be humble and recognize God as the source of truth.
5. Pray that outreach efforts to students in Santa Cruz County would be effective and that many students would come to know Christ.
6. Pray that students in Santa Cruz County would be given discernment in the face of deceptive philosophies.
7. Pray that school board members will be given godly wisdom as they seek to direct the education of children and youth in Santa Cruz County.
8. Pray that principals in Santa Cruz County will be given wisdom and that they will walk in integrity, grace, and truth.
9. Pray for unbelieving teachers in Santa Cruz County. Pray that they will come to know Christ.
10. Pray for Christian teachers in Santa Cruz County. Pray that they will have wisdom as they attempt to live out their faith in an environment which doesn’t always accept them. Pray that their faith will be strengthened.
11. Pray that students in Santa Cruz County who feel rejected will find unconditional love in God and in His church.
12. Pray against violence in Santa Cruz County schools.
13. Pray for students in Santa Cruz County who are contemplating suicide. Pray that such students will find comfort in the midst of despair and that the truth of the gospel would give them hope.

As a tool to help you pray for churches in Santa Cruz County, we have compiled the following list of prayer points, inspired by the letters to the seven churches in Revelation 2-3. It’s important to remember, as you are praying for an individual church, that the church is not the organization or the building — it’s the people. So as you use these prayer points, remember that you are praying for the people in the congregation.

Prayer Points From Revelation 2:1-7 (the letter to the church at Ephesus)

1. Pray that the church will be characterized by good works, hard work for God’s kingdom, and perseverance (Revelation 2:1a).
2. Pray that the congregation will not endure evil people and will test those who claim to be God’s messengers by comparing the word of those messengers with the Scriptures (Revelation 2:1b; Acts 17:11).
3. Pray that the church will not grow weary in the face of difficulty (Revelation 2:3; Hebrews 10:32-39).
4. Pray that the people in the congregation will cling to God’s love for them (Revelation 2:4).
5. Pray that the church’s people will maintain the fervor of the first days of their relationship with God and that they will do the deeds they did during those first days (Revelation 2:5).
6. Pray that the church will not see their freedom in Christ as a license for immorality (Revelation 2:6, 14-15; Titus 2:11-15).

Prayer Points From Revelation 2:8-11 (the letter to the church at Smyrna)

7. Pray that the church will recognize the source of their true wealth (Revelation 2:9a).
8. Pray that the people in the church will remain faithful to God in the midst of opposition (Revelation 2:9b).
9. Pray that the church will meet suffering without fear (Revelation 2:10a).
10. Pray that the church will be faithful to God in the midst of suffering (Revelation 2:10b).

Prayer Points From Revelation 2:12-17 (the letter to the church at Pergamum)

11. Pray that the church will be faithful to God in the face of temptation and threats (Revelation 2:13).
12. Pray that the congregation will refuse to participate in idolatry in all its forms and that they will flee from immorality (Revelation 2:14-15; 1 Corinthians 6:18; 8:1-13; 10:25-33).

Prayer Points From Revelation 2:18-29 (the letter to the church at Thyatira)

13. Pray that the church will be characterized by good deeds and that those deeds will increase in number and effectiveness (Revelation 2:19a,f).
14. Pray that the congregation will be characterized by godly love (Revelation 2:19b).
15. Pray that the church will be characterized by faith (Revelation 2:19c).
16. Pray that the people in the church will be characterized by service to others (Revelation 2:19d).
17. Pray that the church will be characterized by perseverance (Revelation 2:19e).
18. Pray that the church will not tolerate false teachers (Revelation 2:20).
19. Pray that the congregation will hold fast to the faith (Revelation 2:25).

Prayer Points From Revelation 3:1-6 (the letter to the church at Sardis)

20. Pray that the church would be alive, not only in reputation but in reality (Revelation 3:1).
21. Pray that the congregation would become stronger in their faith (Revelation 3:2a).
22. Pray that the people in the congregation would continue in good works (Revelation 3:2b).
23. Pray that the church would repent of its sin (Revelation 3:3).
24. Pray that the people in the church would be characterized by purity (Revelation 3:4).

Prayer Points From Revelation 3:7-13 (the letter to the church at Philadelphia)

25. Pray that the church would keep God’s word (Revelation 3:8d).
26. Pray that the church would not deny Jesus’ name and character (Revelation 3:8e).
27. Pray that the congregation would have such an influence in their community that those who originally opposed them and their faith would come to faith in Christ (Revelation 3:9).

Prayer Points From Revelation 3:14-22 (the letter to the church at Laodicea)

28. Pray that the church would not be lukewarm in their faith but would instead be zealous (Revelation 3:15-16).
29. Pray that the people in the congregation would be able to correctly evaluate and understand the state of their relationship with God (Revelation 3:17).
30. Pray that the congregation would respond well to God’s correction and discipline (Revelation 3:18-19).
31. Pray that the people of the church would see intimacy with God (Revelation 3:20).

Finally, pray that the people in the congregation will be attuned to what the Spirit is saying to the church and that they will remain faithful to God until the end (Revelation 2:7, 11, 17, 29; 3:6, 13, 22).

Please use the following links to explore the various resources available on our website:

Newsletter
CommUnity Link offers periodic newsletters which describe credible opportunities for Christians to use their time, talent, and resources to impact our community with God’s love.

Christian Links
A list of helpful links for believers. These are not specific to Santa Cruz County, but should prove helpful to you in your walk with Christ.

Santa Cruz Links
A list of links related to Santa Cruz County. These are not specifically Christian, but we offer them as a service to county residents.

Audio Sermons
A list of links to pages on area church websites where audio sermons are made available for listening and/or download.

CommUnity Link offers periodic newsletters which describe credible opportunities for Christians to use their time, talent, and resources to impact our community with God’s love. You can download these newsletters here:

July 5, 2003
March 1, 2003
November 15, 2002

You can also sign up to receive weekly updates from ChristianCruz.com by becoming a member of our site.

What Are RSS Feeds?
RSS stands for "Really Simple Syndication." It is a technology designed for sharing headlines and other web content. There is a lot more that could be said, but that's the gist of it. Our RSS feed, which includes headlines of Christian events and news items from Santa Cruz County, can be accessed in its three different versions from the "Syndicate Our Site" menu in the right hand column of most pages on our site (if you visit those links, they will look like gibberish, but you will need the addresses for some of the applications referenced below).

How Can I Use RSS Feeds?
There are a variety of ways RSS feeds can be used. Here are the main uses which may be of interest to you:

Syndicate Our Headlines On Your Website
By adding a few small lines of code to your website, headlines of Santa Cruz County Christian News and Events can be automatically added to your website. What's more, the headlines will update automatically - once you've added the code, you won't have to do anything!

To add our headlines to your website, just copy the javascript below into the code of your webpage:

<script src="http://rssxpress.ukoln.ac.uk/lite/viewer/?rss=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.christiancruz.com%2Findex.php%2Fweblog%2Frss_1.0%2F"></script> <noscript><a href="http://rssxpress.ukoln.ac.uk/lite/viewer/?rss=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.christiancruz.com%2Findex.php%2Fweblog%2Frss_1.0%2F">View </a> </noscript>

If you would like to modify the appearance of the headlines on your site, you can place the following styles in the style sheet of your web page (or between tags in the header of your web page):

/* rssexpresschannel controls the settings for the entire listing */ .rssxpresschannel { font-family : sans-serif; text-align : left; } /* use rssxpresschtitle to control the title (ChristianCruz)*/ .rssxpresschtitle { font-size : large; color : #006393; text-align : left; } /* use rssxpressittitle to change the appearance of each individual article link */ .rssxpressittitle { font-size : 100%; line-height : 120%; background-color : white; } /* rssxpressdivider is a special case - it is a single pixel, single column row on the rssxpress channel - to alter it's color, just change the background-color image. */ .rssxpressdivider { background-color : black; } Read Our Headlines In Your Email Or RSS Aggregator
By using an RSS Aggregator, you can view headlines from our website (and other websites) in an easy-to-read fashion and then click through only to the stories which interest you.

The following are some popular RSS Aggregators which may be of use to you (some of these are free and some require a nominal payment). Unless otherwise noted, these applications are for Windows systems.

• Awasu
• BlogMatrix Jager
• FeedDemon
• intraVnews
• Liferea (for Linux)
• NewsGator (integrates with Microsoft Outlook, but not Outlook Express)
• NewsMonster
• NewzCrawler
• RocketInfo RSS Reader
• Shrook (for Mac OS X)
• Sauce Reader
• SharpReader

Read Our Headlines On Your Handheld Device
By using Hand/RSS, an inexpensive application for Palm OS handhelds, you can even read our headlines on your Palm OS device! Just download the free 30-day trial or purchase a license, and before you know it, you will be able to keep up with Santa Cruz County Christian News wherever you are!

If you have a Pocket-PC, try PocketFeed.

We are happy to provide the following tools for Santa Cruz County churches, ministries, schools, organizations, businesses, and individual believers. Some will help you promote your organization.  Some will help us (by helping you to promote ChristianCruz.com).  If there is anything else you would like to see on this page, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Submit Your News & Events
If you would like to submit a news story or event notice which you feel would be relevant to the Christian community in Santa Cruz County, please feel free to submit your story using the form on this page.

Submit Your Link
It is likely that your church or ministry is already listed in our directories, but it would be helpful to us if you could check to make sure. Use the Directories menu in the main navigation menu above to see if your church or organization is listed. If your church organization is not listed, if the address and phone number we have for your organization are incorrect, or if you have a website which is not linked in our directories, please use the form on this page to submit your details.

Bulletin Inserts
Our dream for ChristianCruz.com is to play a small part in facilitating Christian community in Santa Cruz County by promoting unity across denominational and individual church lines.

This website is the beginning of the foundation of those dreams. And you can help us accomplish them!

We have developed a two-sided bulletin insert which you can use to promote ChristianCruz.com so that the people in your congregation can participate in making those dreams come true. To print out a master copy of the bulletin insert, click here. This will launch a separate browser window which will load the bulletin insert in Acrobat format (Adobe Reader required). When you print the two pages, use the Adobe Reader print function (rather than your browser’s print function) and make sure that the pages are printing at 100% (disable the Fit To Page feature if necessary). Then make two-sided copies (printing one page of the master onto one side of your paper and the other page of the master onto the other side of your paper). Cut the resulting copies in half, and you will have a great bulletin insert!

Poster
Similar to our bulletin inserts, we have developed a poster which churches and schools can put on their bulletin boards. Christian businesses can place the poster in their storefront windows.

To print out a master copy of the poster, click here. This will launch a separate browser window which will load the poster in Acrobat format (Adobe Reader required). When you print out the poster, use the Adobe Reader print function (rather than your browser’s print function) and make sure that the pages are printing at 100% (disable the Fit To Page feature if necessary).

RSS Feeds
ChristianCruz.com is pleased to be able to provide an RSS feed from our website. RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication.” It is a technology designed for sharing headlines and other web content.

You can use our RSS feed to include our headlines on your own website, read our headlines through a news aggregator or even your own email software, or read our headlines on your Palm OS or Pocket-PC handheld device. Click here for more information.  If you already know how to use an RSS feed, you can find links to our feeds in the right hand column.

Link To Us
We would be very pleased if you would consider linking to our website.  We have provided a number of suggested text link and banners for your convenience.  Click here for more information.

Advertising
ChristianCruz.com is a one-of-a-kind online resource for the Christian community in Santa Cruz County. If you would like to reach that community with your message, there is no better, more cost-effective online avenue than advertising on ChristianCruz.com. Click here for more information.

Calvary Chapel Santa Cruz
Listen to sermons by Pastor Dave Johnston, aired on KKMC (AM 880) Monday through Friday at 10:30 a.m.

Capitola Community Church
Listen to the previous Sunday’s morning message from Capitola Community’s speaker.

Church of the King
Church of the King has several audio downloads available - from their Monday evening apologetics class, from their Sunday School class, and from their Sunday morning services.

The Coastlands
Weekly messages from The Coastlands.

Community Covenant Church
Community Covenant has a few messages from their Sunday morning services.

First Baptist Church of Watsonville
First Baptist offers an archive of recent messages (including sermon notes) by Pastor David Fields.

Gateway Bible Church
Gateway Bible offers an archive of recordings from their Sunday morning services.

Green Valley Christian Center
Green Valley Christian has begun offering both video and audio versions of their sermons.

Generations
Generations has begun offering streaming audio versions of their Sunday morning messages. Click on the “Freedomaudio Player” link to listen.