from Psalm 51
Walter Bruggemann says of the Psalms: “On the one hand, Israel’s faithful speech addressed to God is the substance of the Psalms. The Psalms do this so fully and so well because they articulate the entire gamut of Israel’s speech to God, from profound praise to the utterance of unspeakable anger and doubt. On the other hand, as Martin Luther understood so passionately, the Psalms are not only addressed to God…They are the voice of the Gospel, God’s good word addressed to God’s faithful people.”
Where do you need to be given permission to be honest with God? With what you are feeling. With your frustration. With sadness, or disappointment, or fear, or anger. With great joy and thanksgiving. This summer journey with us as the reality of what it means to be human collides with the goodness and unending faithfulness of God.
w/ Ben Fitzgerald
from 2 Samuel 12:1-10, 13; Psalm 51:1-4, 10-12; John 8:1-11
The season of Lent is a time of reflection. It is an opportunity to examine our lives before God and invite the Holy Spirit to reveal to us those things that are hindering our relationship with God and with those around us…and it is an opportunity to invite God to go to work in our lives…the hope which makes all of this possible is the Cross of Jesus toward which we are journeying.
But what if Lent wasn’t just about seeking forgiveness for and repentance from our sin…what if God was able to take our mess and redeem it? What if it’s not just about doing away with something, but about God taking our lives and turning them into something beautiful for His Glory?
In our 4th week of Lent, we consider perhaps one of our greatest obstacles to our relationship with God and with those around us…the unbearable weight of our guilt and shame. What if, in being honest about those things for which we are guilty, we could find freedom from the shame that keeps us far from God and isolated from others?
w/ Vern Collins
from Psalm 51:1-17
Paul writes in his letter to the church in Galatia that, “it is for freedom that you have been set free,” and challenges the believers there to no longer be yoked by slavery…and yet, many of us walk around bound by the weight of our failures and our sin.
We bear it to the point that we become experts at hiding it…
But what if freedom is found, not in hiding it…but by being willing to be honest about those times when we miss the mark?
What if in choosing freedom, we are also choosing to look more like the church Jesus imagined?
w/ Vern Collins
