Group Work

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Some things are just better experienced together. As we continue in our series, Authentic Church, this week, we are talking about the importance of community (something that will be a part of the next two entries in the series as well). Up first in this journey-within-a-journey is the importance of worshiping the Lord together. Worshiping together acts as the glue that holds the rest of the things that make the church the church together. Using a psalm of David as our guide, let’s explore why worshiping together is so important.

Group Work

In 2014, the Kansas City Royals made the postseason for the first time in nearly 30 years. They earned their official postseason birth in an incredible wild card play-in game against the Oakland Athletics. The game took place on Noah’s birthday. My dad was actually at the game, sitting on the front row behind the inside corner of the A’s dugout courtesy of a good friend of his. He even held up a sign wishing Noah a happy birthday that got put on camera. Watching from home, I stayed up pretty late to see the finish, but when we gave up the lead late in the game, I gave up and went to bed. I couldn’t bear to watch yet another disappointing season come to an end. In the middle of the night, though, I checked my phone and saw that the game was not yet over. I quickly turned the TV on and hit the record button to be able to watch how it actually ended in the morning. It was an awfully exciting time. 

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Digging in Deeper: Matthew 13:10-13

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“Then the disciples came up and asked him, ‘Why are you speaking to them in parables?’ He answered, ‘Because the secrets of the kingdom of heaven have been given for you to know, but it has not been given to them. For whoever has, more will be given to him, and he will have more than enough; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. That is why I speak to them in parables, because looking they do not see, and hearing they do not listen or understand.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

One of the arguments of the original postmodernists was that a literary text had no fixed meaning. Rather, the meaning of a certain text was whatever the reader wanted it to mean. In other words, everything was interpretation and no interpretation was incorrect. Everything was dependent on the perspective and experience of the individual. Of course, none of those guys seemed to have appreciated the irony of arguing that nothing could really be understood in one way while wanting to be understood a certain way, but we’ll leave that alone for now. Today, I want to look at something Jesus said about how and whether people were understanding Him. He acknowledged many folks might not, but His reasons were not postmodern. Let’s talk about it.

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Digging in Deeper: Exodus 23:6-9

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“You must not deny justice to a poor person among you in his lawsuit. Stay far away from a false accusations. Do not kill the innocent and the just, because I will not justify the guilty. You must not take a bribe, for a bribe blinds the clear-sighted and corrupts the words of the righteous. You must not oppress a resident alien; you yourselves know how it feels to be a resident alien because you were resident aliens in the land of Egypt.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Sometimes you come across a passage of Scripture that seems pretty straightforward on an initial reading. A bit closer of an inspection confirms this, but it can also help us see what made sense in the beginning with a little more depth and clarity. These verses once again remind us of the inherently just nature of God’s character. Let’s talk about what’s going on here, and then put them in the bigger context of the larger passage here at the beginning of Exodus 23.

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Digging in Deeper: Exodus 23:4-5

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“If you come across your enemy’s stray ox or donkey, you must return it to him. If you see the donkey of someone who hates you lying helpless under its load, and you want to refrain from helping it, you must help with it.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

I love watching America’s Funniest Videos. I can sit for hours and laugh myself silly watching video after video of people doing crazy things or reacting to things in hilarious ways. The best videos, though, are always the ones in which someone probably gets hurt. There’s just something about a little kid hitting a ball right back into dad’s midsection that you can’t help laughing at. The misfortune of others is an easy thing to laugh at. When the other is someone we consider an enemy, though, the mirth can turn into a bit (or a lot) of schadenfreude. Yet how we treat our enemies matters. God has thoughts about it. Let’s talk about one of those thoughts right here.

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Morning Musing: Exodus 23:1-3

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“You must not spread a false report. Do not join the wicked to be a malicious witness. You must not follow a crowd in wrongdoing. Do not testify in a lawsuit and go along with a crowd to pervert justice. Do not show favoritism to a poor person in his lawsuit.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Justice is hard to obtain. It’s so hard that when someone manages to achieve it, we tell those stories. They get splashed all over the newspapers. Well, that’s not really true anymore. They get splashed all over the Internet. They get made into movies. They become urban legends. Yet this isn’t how things should be. We serve a God who is just. How do we know? Well, because we keep running into passages like this one. God cares about justice and wants His people to care about it as well. Let’s talk through yet another example of this in a law He gave to Israel.

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