“Life Together: Loving Well” (February 19, 2017)

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

“As For You: Reconciled to Reconcile” (October 9, 2016)

from Ephesians 2:11-22

We could agree that walls are important in providing stability, creating a structure that is safe…and yet so often we erect walls that are harmful and divisive.

What if instead of building walls between you and the rest of the world, or adding bricks to those that already exist, you instead began to work to break them down, just as Christ has broken down the walls that separate us from God?

w/ David Hockett

“Body of Christ: as Church” (June 14, 2014)

from 1 Corinthians 12:12-26

We are conditioned from an early age that if we have any hope of success, we need to be set apart.  This is great for those who feel like they are, and a road block for those who feel less than unique in a world that values distinction.
The problem is, our distinction often creates division, so we find ourselves not only suffering the effects of this, but trying to compensate for it by calling for unity in the midst of our diversity.
Paul argues, that as the Body of Christ, we find unity because of our diversity, not in response to it.
How would the church begin to look different; how would your life begin to look different if you saw yourself as one part of the whole, and began to value the parts around that also contribute to the church being the body of Christ?
w/ Vern Collins