Opportunities and Intentionality
There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. Ephesians 4:4–6 This past Sunday many of us drove down to Cascades Camp to join folks from Creekside and many other churches, to worship together as the 4th of July Family Camp concluded. We decided to do this about a year ago and we have already decided to do it next year. Many of my pastor friends think I’m crazy to do this. “Wait,” they ask, “you close the doors...
Read MoreDo Your Best and Give Yourself a Break
By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. Hebrews 11:8 If Jesus calls says his burden is light and his yoke is easy, how come so many folks come to church and regularly feel beat up? How come so many feel pressed upon by a heavy burden and a choking yoke? Something does not line up. Either we need to change Jesus or we need to change church. The easier of the two is to change Jesus — changing church is really, really hard. Thankfully, though it is often attempted, Jesus cannot be...
Read MoreLet’s Stay So We Can Go
See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland. Isaiah 43:19 Last Sunday was a blast! Great worship, mixed and mingled with the family business of dreaming and thinking about what’s next for us as a church. Specifically, how purchasing the building we worship in can help move us more fully into the mission God has called us to. I got goose bumps when JD announce that vote to move forward was unanimous. I am so excited to see what God does next! It was great to be joined Sunday by Stephen Hsiao,...
Read MoreCalled To Hope
Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. 1 Corinthians 15:58 As followers of Jesus we are a people of hope, called to experience the hope of Jesus and to be the hope to a world in desperate need of hope. Our hope flows from the reality that God has conquered death and has set in motion a project of restoration, a new creation if you will. This restoration project is underway and will one day be realized in fullness. The Kingdom of God has been...
Read MoreEvangelism: Ordinary Attempts
What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned to each his task. I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. 1 Corinthians 3:5–7 First A Few Stories: 1. I once talked to a woman who told me that she had suffered massive persecution because of their evangelism over the years; fired from work, friends lost, names called — even once coming to blows with someone. In response to my surprise at...
Read MoreThe Problem with Evangelism
And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age. Matthew 28:16–20 The Church began with a few people, most of whom ran away scared and afraid when Jesus was arrested. And then Jesus rose again. The people who ran and the few who did not, saw him, touched him, ate with him and then were commissioned by him to go...
Read MoreWomen, Men & The Restoration of All Things
Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”...
Read MoreWhat turned you?
“How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”” (Romans 10:14-15) When the disciples set out from Jerusalem after Jesus’ resurrection they had a clear objective in mind. They were sent, to preach the “Good news” about Jesus having risen from the dead. When Jesus rose from the dead he proved that the military might of the...
Read MoreWhen God Became King
Matthew 28:16-20 After Easter, Christian life should really start to make logical sense. Things should get clear. A lot of times it seems that questions like “what should I do with my life?” and “what kind of person do I want to be?” or even “what should I do today?” get bogged down in the mess and mire of everyday life. You might be asking yourself those questions, or questions like them and hearing back a hundred voices, all singing in their own key, none of them harmonizing with the other. Your job, your spouse, your politics, your Facebook friends, your phone bill, your clothes, your...
Read MoreCalled to Freedom
Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Colossians 3:1 It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery. Galatians 5:1 God wants you fulfilled. God wants you satisfied. God wants you to be “okay” — more than “okay,” he wants you to experience life beyond your your greatest imagination. Jesus said that he came so that we might have “more and better life than you ever imagined” — imagine that. God wants you to thrive, not...
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