Reaching Further

In this third part of our conversation about who God made us to be as a church, we talked about the fact that connecting and growing, while necessary, are not sufficient in and of themselves.  Thank you for taking part in this conversation with us and reflecting on God’s design for your own community.  Don’t miss next week as we put everything together and celebrate the thing that gives it all substance: The resurrection.

 

Reaching Further

Have you ever had a secret that was simply too good to keep to yourself?  It was news that you just weren’t going to be able not to share; you were just going to have to deal with the consequences later?  Or perhaps make this more personal: Have you ever gotten a bit of good news that you couldn’t possibly have not shared with the world?  In our social media-crazed world, some days it seems like most folks think everything is worth sharing.  “I got a promotion!”  “I ran a marathon!”  “My kid is on the honor roll!”  “My dog really like its new bed!”  “I woke up this morning!”  “I’m asleep now (my fingers are set on auto-post)!”  What starts to happen is that as everything gets shared, it can begin to seem like really, nothing is worth sharing.  I submit to you, though, that some things really are worth sharing.  What’s more, some places are designed to help us do that.  And I’m not talking about Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Read the rest…

Lean into God

Happy New Year!  In this New Year’s Eve sermon, we spent the morning talking about the tools we need to find success in our New Year’s resolutions.  More than that, with the help of God’s conversation with Joshua as he was taking over the mantle of leadership of the people of Israel, we talked about the tools we need to help move ourselves in the direction of God no matter what our starting point may be.  Keep reading to see what these are.

 

Lean into God

Today is New Year’s Eve.  A whole year’s worth of activity and life experiences comes to an end with the stroke of midnight tonight.  Now, in a sense, this is a day just like any other.  What significance it has is entirely constructed.  Tomorrow will be Monday just like it was seven days ago and just like it will be seven more days from now.  There is nothing in the Scriptures which proclaims that on December 31st thou shalt get reflective and throw a big, wild party that often ends with total strangers kissing each other amid a thronging crowd of hundreds of thousands.  I’ve read the whole thing a few different times and I haven’t found a single statement to that effect. Read the rest…