I was reading Rob Bell's "Jesus Wants to Save Christians" this morning and as he reflected that the 10 Commandments were given in such a way that Israel was supposed to remember their deliverance by God and thus act towards others and God himself out of that remembrance, these thoughts occurred to me:
Biblical faith is rooted in Jesus and his actions on our behalf. But in a sense, Jesus' actions are a microcosm of the macro-faith of the entire bible. We're instructed to act like Jesus, to take on his priorities and values, in short, to connect our lives to the already-performed action of God.
But it's always been like this throughout the entire bible! God has always instructed his people to act in such a way that how God first acted towards his people will be seen in how his people now act towards others. This goes all the way back to the deliverance from Egypt and the giving of the 10 Commandments and the law, governing how God's people are to remember and worship God and act towards others, especially "foreigners," "widows," and "orphans."
Our struggle now is to keep our morality rooted in this covenantal perspective so that we don't separate our actions from this deep faith. This is the danger in blindly following commands and seeking a Christian morality among those who don't hold Christian faith. Christian action must be understood and transmitted within the context of God's Story, going all the way back through Jesus to our ancestors in faith.
So their deliverance is our deliverance. We act benevolently towards others not only because God in Jesus was benevolent to us but also because God was benevolent to our ancestors. That is their story and it is our story. We live out this story in our lives when we live by faith. To focus on Christian morality apart from this story makes the morality empty from a faith perspective, even though the moral action may be just and right from a philosophical-moral point of view.
Pay attention to the bible and God's story as you learn it in the bible. Pay attention to your faith, and recognize that your faith and actions tell a larger story and that you are a major player in God's drama of salvation and redemption.
I'm following up my Easter sermon by exploring another avenue where we find ourselves confused and even away from God. On Easter Sunday, we explored how we often struggle to find our way to God because, when we go at it alone, we miss the help that God yearns to give us. It's only when we accept his help and guarantee that we can begin finding our way home.
Another way we struggle in finding our way home is to mistake our true home with our physical home, our pursuit of our own happiness with our pursuit of God's happiness . My sermon on April 19 will discuss how we have co-opted God's dream for the American Dream. In case you missed it in the bulletin, here is the promo for next week:
The American Dream has been exposed: The promise of home ownership and a good, stable job for those willing to work is far from the truth. The requirements of capital, emotional energy, and sacrifices in time and family have taken their toll. We've striven and worked and at the end of the day many of us find...nothing. At the root of this idolatry. We've sacrificed our relationship with God at the feet of our success only to find such a sacrifice hasn't gotten us anywhere.
But what if there is a better way? What if God desires to lighten our loads, bear our burdens, give us new priorities and values, and shape our lives around his dream instead of the American dream? "God has a dream?" you might ask. You bet he does! And it involves you and your happiness. Be with us next Sunday as we explore how God's Dream of new life and true freedom sets us free to live a life focused not on what we can build for ourselves, but what, with God's help, we can build with and for him.
We had a great worship service yesterday. From the singing, to the prayers, to the scripture readings, to sharing in the Lord's Supper together, to the message, God was glorified and I hope you were encouraged and strengthened by being with us.
You can download yesterday's sermon below. Always remember that God has guaranteed your way home to him by himself! He's given you a part of himself, his Spirit, and pledges himself to us by himself! What a great God we worship and serve.
Like Cain, we often find ourselves "east of Eden," away from God's presence. We are overcome by stress, worry, fear, or whatever, and we move away from God trying to solve our problems ourselves. We search and search for the way home, often frustrating ourselves and our faith because we can't quite find it.
But it is God who does the all the work to bring us home to him. He takes the initiative, he creates the plan, he works the plan, he takes the burden upon himself, all for us. And then he even guarantees it to us!
Make your way home to God by following the Rising (Risen) Sun (Son).
God's Guarantee
I taught the teenage bible study last night at church. I find it difficult to teach sometimes, because the material doesn't seem to connect or I don't seem to connect. I often wonder how to incorporate technology into my classes. When we can afford it, I'd like to put a few computers in the teen room to use during class, to interactively answer questions by looking up answers online, or add to a discussion by sharing insights from an article located online.
As I taught last night, I reflected that being able to project slides of images or even text onto a screen would be helpful in providing another outlet for interaction instead of just our discussion. I also wondered how useful projecting a second screen that allowed for real-time Twitter updates would be.
Then I read this article today. Seems I've been beat to the punch!
The article is about an instructor, Cole Camplese, and how he uses Twitter in his classes at Penn State (University Park). Mr. Camplese uses two screens in his classes: one for his own slides and one for live Twitter updates. He encourages his students to tweet feedback, questions, and comments.
This could be a really useful application in churches. Imagine being able to teach a teen class and have their participation go beyond simple discussion to rich interaction via a host of new media outlets: online search, real-time Twitter posts, YouTube video sharing. Imagine how such an approach would allow teenagers to take ownership in their classes and take the lead in discussing and working through the material.
Take it a step further. How useful could providing access to Twitter, projected on a large screen, be during sermons? As an audience listens, they could create a real-time dialogue with other listeners, provide feedback, and ask questions that could become part of a follow-up Q&A time after the sermon. Tweeted questions could also be answered either in real-time, perhaps by an assistant or two who had a copy of the sermon and could relate questions back to the sermon content, or even by the preacher stopping mid-sermon to address a set of questions!
I'm trying to think through the possibilities of this. Hopefully one day soon we'll see the future of how technology can serve the church, rather than seeing technology as the problem, as we do too often in churches.
You're lucky.
I'm getting really amped up about our worship this upcoming Sunday.
It's Easter, and while we talk about the resurrection of Jesus every Sunday, this Sunday in particular is a Sunday that many people pay extra attention to the gospel story that Jesus is the center part of.
I created a sermon handout for Sunday, but because I'm so excited, I'm going to give it to you early. You get an advance copy of these top secret study notes!
Download them, read them, study them, and be prepared on Easter Sunday to see how God's Guarantee spans the entirety of the Bible, from beginning to end, and is God's masterpiece, his plan to reconcile all of us to him.
God's Guarantee Study Notes
In Luke 22:39-46 Jesus goes to the garden of Gethesemane with his disciples. There, he agonizes in prayer over doing God's will. I find two main things going on in this passage: the inability of the disciples to do what Jesus told them and Jesus' absolute focus on God's will.
Jesus told the disciples twice to "pray not to fall into temptation." Yet, the temptation to do their own will, rather than Jesus' will, was too strong. They ended up doing what they wanted to do--go to sleep! While they disregarded Jesus' will, Jesus was deeper in the garden of Gethsemane struggling with his own will, too--but instead of giving in to his will, Jesus offered himself completely to God and came out of his time of prayer resolved to do God's will.
In this sermon, I explore how, like the disciples, we struggle with doing our own will instead of Jesus' and so we need to listen to Jesus when he tells us to pray not to fall into temptation. The temptation we most need to avoid right now is the temptation to give in to fear--fear of a bad economy, of a life spiraling downward, of uncertainty. In those times when we find ourselves being fearful we should remember the teaching of Jesus and pray not to be controlled by fear, but to let our fear go so we can be filled with the love and will of God.
Sermon: Faith and Fear (Luke 22:39-46)
Make sure you're planning to be with us this Sunday (April 12) at 11am. Not only is it Easter, a time to remember the resurrection of Jesus our Lord, but it's also a time to spend together encouraging each other.
Sunday's sermon is called "God's Guarantee." I'm excited about it, and without spoiling it, here's a promo to whet your appetite:
Have you ever wondered why life seems so difficult? Why you seem to have so little control over your own destiny?
It's not your fault...and if you'll let him, God will turn your life around and empower you to live.
Be with us this Sunday, April 12 at 11am to learn how God takes the burden upon himself, how he risks everything, for YOU!
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