from Luke 12:13-21
Is enough enough?
It seems like a simple enough question…perhaps even a bit ridiculous, but when you consider what you really need for this life…is enough enough?
On top of that, when you consider what you have been so freely given in the sacrifice of Jesus so that you might have life…what more do you need?
When does abundance become greed? When does blessing become excess? In Jesus’ parable in Luke’s Gospel, he challenges our tendency to want to “store away” for a future…a future that God has already secured.
w/ Vern Collins
from Matthew 6:25-33
As we enter the season of Lent, we begin by considering St. Augustine’s idea that one of the marks of a Christ-honoring life is that our love is properly ordered….God first, other, even enemies, as well as self. While this seems good and right, the truth is, we spend much of our life loving in a way that is disordered…and at the core, the result is sin.
What happens when we love the things of God more than God? What happens when we use the things God has given us as a substitute for God, or when we turn to those things as a way of escape? When we worry about having, not just what we need, but what we want…and enough of what we want, then we have allowed our love to disorder our understanding of what is necessary in this life.
What if the goal was not all? What if the goal was not even enough? What if the goal was God? What if rather than covering your weakness with excess, you took this season of Lent to rest in your brokenness and frailty and allowed God to meet you in that place?
w/ Vern Collins
from 2 Corinthians 5:16-21
The foundation for our call to relationship with others is found in the relationship made possible by God’s willingness to look at our broken relationship with Him and move to make things right. Not because God had somehow wronged us, but because God is gracious to we who have wronged Him.
We are called to take up the cause of bringing the world around us to reconciliation with God…but in order to do that we have to be willing to step outside of our small worldview and live lives in response to the grace offered by God to us through Jesus.
When we view that sacrifice for what it is and what it accomplished, then our view of the world around us begins to change.
w/ Vern Collins
from Romans 12
Loving well is not like sleep well. IF things go smoothly during the night, if there are no worries, if kids don’t wake you up, if there are no nightmares then maybe you will sleep well.
But loving well should not be left up to such chance. God is not a God of luck, God is a God of intentionality…in the way He loves us and in the way He calls us to love others.
Paul gives us a model for how we are to achieve the kind of love that is a reflection of the relationship from which we were created…the relationship of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
It begins with grace.
w/ Vern Collins
from Matthew 1:18-25
Advent was never just about the single event of the birth of Christ…yes, it represents the waiting, the hope, the expectation…yes it connects us with those who hoped for so long to see God’s promised Messiah…and yes, it now offers us a framework as we wait for Christ to return.
But Advent was about much more than a significant event…Advent IS about much more than a significant event. It is about the Kingdom Christ came to establish. It is about reminding us that His Kingdom is still here and we are called to live in to it…to live into our new citizenship.
Worshipping Fully, Spending Less, and Giving More are all characteristics of the life of a Christ follower…but when we Love All we begin to look a lot more like Jesus Himself.
w/ Vern Collins
from Matthew 6:19-21, 24
In all of the natural world, humans have the greatest proclivity toward collecting things. Sure, there are animals that store away food, but with the intention of consuming it when there is no food to gather. Humans, however, collect things that may never have an purpose beyond essentially taking up space. Whether you hold on to furniture, trinkets, finances, or the latest technology…chances are there are things you have that you simply do not need. And yet, too often, it is the “stuff” that holds our focus more than anything else. Having it. Acquiring it. Longing for it. Keeping it safe. We worry a great deal about things in our world that ultimately only have a fleeting value.
Jesus, on the other hand, suggests that the treasure we store up ought to have an eternal value to them…that instead of storing up treasure on this part, we store up treasure in heaven. When we hold that teaching up next to the simple manner in which Jesus was born into this world, then storing up Kingdom treasure looks a lot less like material investment and much more like becoming preoccupied with the hearts of others.
w/ Vern Collins
from Ephesians 5:21-6:9
How are we meant to respond when there is disagreement with those around us? How are we meant to prove our point? How should we go about winning the argument? How are we supposed to convince others to see things the way we see them?
What if, even in the face disagreement that is so difficult, our goal is not to win the day, rather to offer a new way forward…not a way born out of a rock solid argument, but out of choosing a different posture? A posture of submission…of service.
Perhaps the key to navigating relationship is not guarding what is right, but pointing to what is Good.
w/ Vern Collins
from Ephesians 4:1-16
It does not take long in this life before we begin working to be seen as being worthy…worthy of affection, worthy of attention, worthy of responsibility, worthy of advancement, worthy of acceptance. Too often, we will go to great lengths to prove our worth, and too often come away feeling more unworthy for what we sacrificed in the process.
What if you began to live out of the worth you are already given in Christ? What if you rather than living to prove your worth, you strived to live a life that reflects the fact that you have already been called, “worthy.”
And what would it look like to do that in the context of the Body that is the Church?
w/ Vern Collins
from Ephesians 3:1-13
To have an understanding of Gods’ grace in your life is to know the power of forgiveness, the power of hope, the deep value in knowing that you are loved and desired, and ultimately that the God of the universe is FIR YOU. This is displayed in the lengths God was willing to go to in order to present His Son, Jesus as a sacrifice for your sin, thus opening the way for you to be invited into life with Him.
What if that grace wasn’t meant to stop with you? What if it wasn’t so much about how it makes you feel loved and accepted and believed in? What if you stewarded that grace in such a way that it wasn’t trivialized…rather it was leveraged for the transformation of lives around you?
w/ Vern Collins
from Ephesians 1:15-23
Too often we allow our circumstances to determine our perspective…when you are having a good day or things are going your way, then life is good, right? But, when you’re in a tough season, or you’ve just gotten some terrible news, then life is NOT good.
What if, instead, you allowed your perspective to determine how you view your circumstances?
There is reason to hope…hope that penetrates and permeates any circumstance you might be walking through…and it is a hope born out of the power of the resurrection.
w/ Vern Collins
from Matthew 5:13-16
ou’ve likely heard that Christians should be, “in the world, but not of the world.” This saying comes from something Jesus says in the 17th chapter of John’s Gospel as he is praying to His Heavenly Father on behalf of His disciples. While this saying is not incorrect, too often we have a tendency to view it as the finish line when in reality, Jesus meant for it to be the starting point.
What if you began to think of being set apart as having purpose, rather than thinking about it as simply being sequestered from the rest of the world? Imagine what your life, leveraged in every situation for the sake of the Gospel, might begin to look like!
w/ Vern Collins
from Philippians 2:1-16
The advent of social media makes our ability to share our opinion as easy as the click of a button…and at a time in our history such as this, there is plenty to have an opinion about. Unless you live this live in complete isolation it is likely that sometime in the past week…perhaps even at some point today, you have come across an opinion that you disagree with.
Sure, in the arena of internet we can unfriend, ignore, or keep scrolling beyond those comments and opinions with which we disagree…but what happens when the person you disagree with is sitting next to you in worship, or across from you in your community group…what do we do with the argument against the church that says, “I don’t want to be a part of a group who can’t even get along with each other?”
What if this life were less about winning an argument or proving a point…what if it were less about having the last word, and more about living as if Jesus has already had the final say?
w/ Vern Collins
from 1 Corinthians 12:12-31
In a time in history (in our Western Culture in particular) when we are much choosier with the things we give our time and energy to we are finding that the church is not near the top of everyone’s list the way it once was…and if we are honest, who could blame anyone for choosing not to be a part of the church.
The argument could be made that the church spends too much time trying to police the world around it than it does carrying out Christ’s mission of loving the world around it, serving the world around it, and inviting the world around it into a life changing encounter with Him.
But what if the church were the Body of Christ that Paul talks about in his letter to the Corinthians? What if the church embraced its identity as the hands and feet of Christ in this world, and what if each member saw the incredible value of both their investment in the church and the investment the church might make in their lives?
As we open our “Questions” series, we consider that being a part of the church might just tell you something about who you are, how you should be cared for, and what you could do in this world…
w/ David Hockett and Vern Collins
from 1 Samuel 16:1-13
Have you ever struggled under the weight of wondering whether or not you measure up? Have you ever struggled with feeling like you just don’t have what it takes? Have you given yourself over to people or things in order to try and be seen as worthy, or acceptable?
If any of things are or ever have been true, then know that God does not measure you by the standards the world measures, and God is not looking for the same things in you the world is demanding.
God looks beyond the measurable and looks to the heart…and when you begin to embrace that truth, not only does it change the way you approach God, but it changes the way you approach challenges and the world around you.
w/ Vern Collins
from 2 Timothy 4:1-8
If someone were to observe the way you use your time, what would that tell them about your priorities in life? Too often, the way we use time is not an accurate reflection of what is important to us because much of our time is often dictated by others…employers, educators, children, parents, even friends.
Rather than allow ourselves to become frustrated when time doesn’t play out the way we hope, what if we began to see our time less about what we can acquire, accumulate, and accomplish and more about how we can leverage it for the sake of the Gospel?
w/ Vern Collins
from 2 Corinthians 12:1-10
Think about the amount of time you spend ensuring that you, “measure up,” in the eyes of those around you. Whether it is in the work place, in your relationships with others, as a student…or simply in the things you pursue.
We don’t want to be found lacking…we don’t want to be seen as weak…we often answer the question, “how are you doing?” with, “fine,” regardless of how we might be hurting.
Paul offers us encouragement in what just might be possible if we are willing to embrace our weakness rather than avoid it…perhaps we just might find that God becomes all the more powerful, loving, and full of grace if we are willing to offer Him those parts of us that we would hide from the rest of the world.
w/ Vern Collins
from Romans 1:1-17
What drives you? That question is best answered with the question, “what day is it?” Simply put-what drives us is often determined by the season in life, the predicament, or the circumstance in which we find ourselves. It is determined by the life we seek for ourselves or the goals we have in front of us.
What if all of those things were filtered through a central driving force? What if your life were driven by the Gospel of Christ? What if it informed and determined everything else that drives you?
Week 2 in our series on Paul considers a life “set apart for the Gospel of Christ.”
w/ Vern Collins
from John 15:1-11
A mark of maturity is independence. Whether it is making decisions on your own, setting your own curfew, paying rent, buying a car, owning a home, attaining a job, trying something new, or starting a career, the ability to think, act, care for oneself shows independence…which translates to this world as a sign of maturity.
The problem comes when that thinking or that value system begins to affect our understanding of life with Jesus. No matter how much we accomplish, we are all fragile people living fragile lives.
What if, your maturity in Christ weren’t about exercising your independence, but becoming more deeply dependent on Jesus? In John 15, Jesus calls that, “remaining,” or, “abiding,” in Him.
What would it look like for you to embrace your fragility, rather than try and cover it up with all that you are chasing or accomplishing?
w/ Vern Collins
from Luke 24:36-53
Paul promises in his 2nd letter to the Corinthians that if anyone is in Christ then they are a new creation…he goes on to say that the old has gone and the new has come (from 2nd Corinthians 5).
That is quite a promise for those desperate for change. It is a promise that is full of hope that things don’t have to continue to be as they are…that the struggles we currently have we might just be able to lay down, right? Well, yes…sort of.
What if the change that is promised does not have anything to do with your circumstances, but you within them…or your perspective about them?
We tend to get frustrated when we don’t see the change we long for as followers of Christ, but perhaps we are looking for change in the wrong place.
What if the reality were you were just few adjustments away from experiencing the change you long for in Jesus…change that sets you loose on this world as one who can shape it for God’s Kingdom?
Things change when things have changed.
w/ Vern Collins
from Luke 24:13-35
It is not uncommon for significant change in life to be met with confusion, self-doubt, unrest about how it affects both the present and the future.
Encountering Jesus can be no different. If you’ve given your life to following Jesus and welcoming Him as Savior, then what happens once the novelty wears off? What happens when the music stops, when the weekend is over, when life creeps or crashes back in? Doubt. Fear. Uneasiness. Confusion.
When these feelings start to creep in, guilt is not often far behind.
Take heart…for it is right in the midst of their confusion and fear and doubt that Jesus met the Emmaus road travelers and journeyed with them through it.
w/ Vern Collins
