With one Sunday in between Advent and the start of the new series, we have planned an extended Scripture reading from Romans 12-16 as way to prepare our hearts and get us ready for Romans. In order to best understand the deep theology of Romans 1-11, you have to grasp the particular situation and relational setting of Romans 12-16. This application at the end of the letter helps give a context and better understanding of the earlier, rich content of Paul's letter. All that is going on at the end of Paul's letter to Rome is not disconnected and actually helps us hear Romans 8 better.
Advent 2019 - Prepare the Way
So much of the Christmas festivity is focused on the Baby and the birth, the celebration and the incarnation – and rightly so. This is the time of year where we stop to focus on God’s lavish gift of redemption and grace through the Word become flesh. But before there is Christmas, there is need for preparation. And before the coming of Messiah, John the Baptist came to prepare the way. Mark’s gospel begins with him. Mary’s pregnancy intersects with him. And as a scratchy, uncanny unorthodox character, John’s words prepared the people of God for the coming Kingdom of God and the dawning of a new age. This Advent season, we too enter a season of preparation. As we listen and learn from John the Baptizer, we are invited to confront the things we may not want to so that we are ready to receive our King.
"Confronting Religion with Love" Matthew 3:4-12 (Prepare the Way)
As we continue tracking the life and ministry of John the Baptist, we are given one final Advent alert about the greatest threat to Christmas and the Christian story. It's not politics or paganism. Rather, according to John the Baptist, the greatest threat to Christmas is religion. During the height of his baptizing ministry, John came face to face with the Pharisees and Saducees coming out to the Jordan River. This prompted a harsh word of rebuke about their presumption and performance. This Christmas, we are invited back to the manger to abandon our religious attempts to please God. Instead, we celebrate the names of love: Jesus (God Saves) and Immanuel (God is with us). Divine love drowns out religion and reminds us of our only hope.
"Dealing with the Darkness" John 1:4-10, Luke 1:76-79, Mal. 3 (Prepare the Way)
The Advent season is filled with paradox and contradiction. As we gather around the glittering lights and beautiful candles, we must do so because of the prevailing darkness. Both exist and both hold true- light and darkness. As we continue into the story of John the Baptist preparing the way for baby Jesus, we run head first into the darkness and discover the coming light. Both John and Luke tease out this theme of light and darkness and remind us through the ministry of John the Baptist that the darkness is confronted best by the light. While Advent is a season that begins in the darkness and requires an honest assessment of the darkness, we celebrate the truth that light has dawned. We worship the Light of the world who calls us to live as children of light.
"Confronting our Expectations of God" Isaiah 40 (Prepare the Way)
"The Messenger" Mark 1:1-8 (Prepare the Way)
In the first week of Advent, we look to the opening lines of Mark's gospel to find his version of the Christmas story. However, instead of finding Mary, Joseph and a baby in the manger, we are simply told about the voice in the wilderness saying, "Prepare the way of the Lord." Over the next month, there are plenty of details that will stir us in the ministry of John the Baptist. But right from the get-go, we discover John preparing the way by disrupting the sleepiness of sin. He calls people into the wilderness, into the river of baptism and into the way of realignment through confession and repentance. As the forerunner to the Messiah, John begins his leveling work by addressing the fundamental need of humanity- the separation that happens from sin. May we listen to his disrupting voice.
(re)new
As summer turns to fall, young and old alike experience a season of fresh starts and new beginnings. It’s not as though everything is completely new, but there is a sense of renewal among us. In a technical sense, renewal holds several shades of nuance and meaning. On the one hand, it can describe the resuming of activity after interruption. Renewal signifies a restart. In other contexts, renewal extends the validity of terms to the present moment. A license, a subscription or a library book can be renewed with a sense of recommitment for the future. And yet, in a different sense, renewal can also be used to describe the renovation of something that is worn out or broken. Sometimes, due to wear and tear, there is need for repair. Restarts. Recommitments. Repairs. Often, renewal involves a little bit of all three. And fortunately, God is the master of renewal.
For the next few months, we are going to talk as a church community about who we are, where we are going and what it looks like to contend for that which matters most. We are a church that declares our pursuit of living everyday so that everyone experiences Jesus and His Kingdom come. And we are committed to see that happen by being and making disciples who are radically transformed by the gospel. For that to bloom in full, we are leaning into the God who is making “all things new.”
"Stories of Renewal, identity, & Community" Hebrews 12:1-2 - (re)new
Renewal of Identity: Part 3 (Personal Identity) - (re)new
"Renewal of Identity: Part 2 (False Identity)" Eph. 4:17-24 - (re)new
As we continue to talk about identity in the process of renewal, we will look at the false identities we so easily entertain. In Paul's letter to the Ephesians, he calls the people of God to avoid the way of the Gentiles and in doing so, repeatedly emphasizes that the core of the battle is in our minds. Putting off and putting on takes place in the thought processes and imaginations of the people of God. In order to fully put on the new, we must be aware of the false identities that have shaped our thinking. These false identities involve the names we called by culture, by others, by our sin and by ourselves. Transformation that stems from the renewal of our minds begins here and reveals in the truth of our real identity.
"Renewal of Identity: Part 1 (Biblical Identity)" Matthew 3:13-17 - (re)new
This week we are shifting our focus from "the real God" to "the real you" to talk about identity. If you come to the Bible and ask the question, “God, who do you say that I am?” you will find numerous answers. In the Scriptures, all throughout the story of God’s redemption of His creation, you will find God time and again calling His people with clarity around who they are. The Bible has clear and serious answers to the question of identity. But among the many names that God calls his own, there is one identity that stands as foundational to them all. We are going to explore the scene of Jesus' baptism to discover how that passage and the idea of being the beloved gives shape to every other identity.
"Renewal of Friendship with God" John 15:12-17 - (re)new
There are many ways a person conceives of God that shapes their relationship with God. While it is true that God is Almighty, All-Powerful, Sovereign and perfect in HIs holiness, the storyline of the Bible reveals that this same God delights in humanity, draws near and even dares to call people His friends. Adam and Eve walked with God in the cool of the day. Abraham is repeatedly called a friend of God. Moses is graced with the chance to speak to God face to face as a man speaks to his friend. David is a man after God's own heart. And then, when Jesus arrives, He flips the paradigm in John 15 and explains that His disciples are not just servants but friends. This week, as we continue to unpack our theme of relational renewal, we are going to explore what friendship might look like as a paradigm for engaging God in the details of every day life.
"Renewal of Listening" John 10 - (re)new
In John 10, Jesus is speaking to his disciples and makes some bold an audacious claims. He takes them outside to the sheepfold to teach them lessons about the Kingdom of God. In doing so, he reveals that the Good Shepherd is deeply committed to a search and rescue mission to round up the sheep that belong to Him so that they may know Him, hear His voice and follow His lead. This, according to Jesus, seems to be normal discipleship: sheep that know the Shepherd in deep and intimate ways, hear His voice and are called by name. A life of discipleship and relational renewal is built on the idea of a God who speaks and a life that listens. This week, we will explore the various ways that God speaks to His people and how we might best know what He is saying.
"Renewal of Presence" Exodus 33 - (re)new
Relational renewal begins a vision for the God for which you have been created. God the Father did not send the Son, Jesus, into the world to obtain right behavior, right thinkers or to obtain an effective workforce alone. The Christian God- Father, Son and Spirit- is a relational community of love that seeks to be with us for His glory. This theme- God with us- is the vision God has for humanity. God loves to be with His people. This week, as we explore Exodus 33, we are given a snapshot of God's heart for us as a New Testament, Jesus-loving, Holy-Spirit filled new covenant people. God's interaction with Moses and the people of Israel as they prepare to move from the wilderness into the Promised Land reveals the priority of the presence of God and a picture of what it can be like- "face to face as a man speaks with a friend." We are a people of the presence of God and everything else finds its place underneath that pursuit. This gift is ours to prize because of Christ.
"A Devoted Community" Titus 3:3-8
"Trellis & the Vine" John 15:1-8 (re)new
As we continue to paint the picture of "Relational Renewal" at Reality Church, this week we will focus on the environments of transformation. Radical Gospel transformation doesn't happen in a vacuum, not does it happen without some structures. In John 15, Jesus uses the life of the vineyard as an analogy for life in the Kingdom of God. He talks in detail about the "life of the vine" - the vine, branches, the Vinedresser, pruning and fruit. However, the hidden and assumed element in HIs teaching is the trellis upon which the life of the vine flourishes. From Jesus' life and ministry, we discover that there has to be structures in place (invitation, community, time, intentionality, and expectation of obedience) to uphold the flourishing life that abiding in Christ brings. The trellis is not the focus or the point. But it is a necessary element to see relational renewal with God, self and others.
"Renewing our Vision/Mission" Mark 1:14-18 - (re)new
Stepping into the first week of this new series, we will spend some time refreshing our vision and mission along with understanding of renewal. As a church community, there are some distinctive ideas that we are committed to contending for among the push and pull of life and culture. Kingdom. Discipleship. Transformation. Jesus invites us to live a different way in a different story. May the Spirit bring renewal among us in every sense of the word.
"Unity for the Journey" Psalm 133:1-3 (Psalms of Ascent)
There are a lot of things in the Bible that God declares to be good: creation, a spouse, and relationships of various kinds. However, something that often fails to make the list is the "goodness" of unity. Psalm 133 begin with the declaration of how good and pleasant it is "when brothers and sisters dwell in unity." Rather than being tacked on as a "nice bonus," the Scriptures speak of the essential nature of unity for the people of God in the world. The psalmist offers us poetic images about the role of unity, the essential nature of unity and insight as to why Jesus would make it the center of his High Priestly prayer for the church (John 17). This week we will explore just how we can pursue this calling that lies directly in the heart of our God.
Psalms of Ascent
It has been said that music can "name the unnameable and communicate the unknowable." Which is why the book of Psalms has historically been such a treasure to the world and the people of God. With incredible poetic imagery, the Psalms express the reality of God and variegated depth of the human journey. While there are 150 total psalms which have been arranged into 5 different books, there are also several different sub-categories of songs in the greater album. Psalms 120-134 represent a collection of songs known as "Pilgrimage Songs" or the Psalms of Ascent. These 15 psalms, written by a variety of authors, represent the songs that Hebrew people traditionally sung as they made their way "up to Jerusalem" to celebrate the holy days in the holy city. Even though we don't currently make regular pilgrimages to the Middle East, we are called to the same journey of faith. We are made for movement toward God in maturity and discipleship. This road of faith is long. At times it is hard and involves unexpected twists and turns. But, as the people of God, we get to do it together with an ancient soundtrack. Their songs become our songs. Their roadmap becomes our road map. And in this musical collection, we find timely reminders for our lives and our shared spiritual journey.
"Childlikeness for the Journey" Psalm 131:1-3 (Psalms of Ascent)
In a world that calls for us to "grow up," Jesus teaches that the way we mature in the kingdom of God is by becoming more childlike. As we spend another week learning from the Psalms of Ascent, Psalm 131 offers a short and sweet reminder about the wisdom of childlikeness for our journey of faith. Filled with beautiful imagery, the psalmist calls us to follow his example of embracing our limitations and cultivating the weaned life. Life as a child of God points us down a different path than the voices of culture. And it is a more beautiful way.