Live piano postlude response 12-21-14

Live worship postlude 12-14-14

Live piano worship response 12-14-14

Blame

Everyone has times of starting over.  In this message I share how important it is to let go of our blame stories and start telling stories of what God, whose intentions for us have never change, has done and is doing in our lives.
Thank you for listening to this message "When I Start Over"

click here to listen to "When I Start Over"

Live piano postlude 11-30-14

God's Love Language

Thanksgiving is one of our love languages of God.  For the follower of God we are to be a spring of thankfulness, in all things give thanks.  This is not pretend happiness for life is often too difficult, too confusing and far to fragile to live in a make believe thankfulness.  This is a thankfulness that recalls God intentions for us and remembers that nothing can separate us from his love.  This is a thankfulness that sets its eyes on thing above, not ignoring the things below, but also not letting the hours become greater than the eternity we are promised. Often we evaluate reasons for thankfulness on our circumstance or on the actions of those around us.  Thanksgiving for the follower of God is rooted in remembering the intentions of God not the actions of the moment.  In the moment we have very little perspective, in fact, in the light of eternity which God fully sees, we can only see a dim little blink of eternity.  This dim view often oppresses our giving of thanks and can even misdirect us into blaming God for circumstances and actions that do not seem to align with his intentions and promises.  Psalm 105 is a great help in guiding us toward being a people of thanksgiving.

1Give praise to the Lord, proclaim his name; make known among the nations what he has done.  2 Sing to him, sing praise to him; tell of all his wonderful acts.  3 Glory in his holy name;  let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice.  4 Look to the Lord and his strength; seek his face always.  5 Remember the wonders he has done, his miracles, and the judgments he pronounced,

So here is our guide to thankfulness for the follower of God;

Give praise
Proclaim his name
Make known what he has done
Sing to him
Tell of his work
Glory in him
Rejoice in him
Look to him
Seek him always
Remember what he has done
Be thankful

Pastor Eric

Jesus The Son Of God

Jesus; who is he, why is he here, and why does that matter to us?  Sermon Podcast

Listen to Jesus Son of God sermon podcast

Live piano worship response 10-12-14

Transformed

Corinthians 3:18 And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

Spiritual transformation in Christ is the process of moving from self worship to Christ centered self denial, to be completely surrendered to follow Christ in all of life.  This is a supernatural work that is done over time, in partnership with the Holy Spirit and our ever increasing submission to God.  

Lasting transformation does not come from experience alone.  Experience just makes us older, evaluated experience can be used by the Holy Spirit to guide us in transformed paths of righteousness.  Lasting transformation also does not come from knowledge acquisition alone.  Knowing the right answer does not mean we live in obedience to that truth or that our behavior and attitudes will confirm these right answers.  We may know that Scripture says we are not to lean on our own understanding, but we wrestle with threads of unbelief as our behavior is informed by our feelings and our own understanding and not Christ dwelling in us and leading our thoughts actions, attitudes and desires.  Threads of unbelief in our life, perhaps unformulated skepticism distorts our thoughts, actions and choices.  To say that we trust Jesus and then live not intending to obey Jesus is an illusion of what could and should be a Christian life.

If we do not intend to be inwardly transformed, inwardly changed so that obedience to Christ is our natural response then we will not be changed.  The problem is not that spiritual change is not possible, the problem is that far too often it is not intended. Spend some time with God as you exam your intent toward transformation.  Ask the Holy Spirit to help reveal if your intent when you come to church is transformation or is your intent leaning more toward fellowship and feelings.  I have found this, fellowship and feelings are not discarded when we continue to surrender more and more of ourselves to God, but rather fellowship and feelings become more significant, more meaningful and more of a spiritual blessing in the overflow of a life being transformed into his image with ever increasing glory.  

These words from Charles Wesley help us describe the transformation that is available to each of us - let's continue to be transformed.

Long my imprisoned spirit lay,

Fast bound in sin and nature's night

Thine eye diffused a quickening ray

I woke, the dungeon flamed with light

My chains fell off, my heart was free

I rose, went forth and followed Thee - Charles Wesley 

Pastor Eric

Live piano worship postlude 09-21-14

The Healing By The Pool Of Bethesda

I had the privilege to preach on the healing by the pool of Bethesda found in John 5:1-15.  As we see Jesus interact with this man by the pool, we learn much about disabilities, generosity, the indelible  image of God that is imprinted on every person every where, and the encouraging truth that time is not the enemy of hope.  click here to listen

Live piano worship response 07-20-14

Live piano worship postlude 06-29-14

A Biblical Description of a Courageous Life

Consider this outline of Romans 12:9-21 as it provides a Biblical description of a courageous life, transformed by the grace of God.  

Just think for a moment, what if a group of Christ followers lived out this shared intention by the power and grace of God? What if a church courageously lived a spiritually transformed life directly upheld by the hand of God?  What if this was true of us?

Roman 12:9-21 outline

Letting love be completely real
Abhorring what is evil
Clinging to what is good
Being devoted to one another in family-like love
Outdoing one another in giving honor
Serving the Lord with ardent spirit and all diligence
Rejoicing in hope
Being patient in troubles
Being devoted constantly to prayer
Contributing to the needs of the church body
Running after hospitality
Blessing persecutors and not cursing them
Being joyful with those who are rejoicing
Being sorrowful with those in sorrow
Living in harmony with each other
Not being haughty or prideful
Not seeing yourself as wise
Being at peace with everyone, so far as it depends on you
Taking no revenge, but leaving justice to whatever God decides
Providing for the needy
Not being overwhelmed by evil, but overwhelming evil with good

Angry Jesus

I was blessed to be able to share in this great series Pastor Dave has started on The Gospel of John.  In this teaching we look at the sign of Jesus clearing the Temple in John 2:12-22.  What does this sign actually point to?  What does it teach us about God?  What if Jesus cleared the Temple because you are so valuable to Him that he wants nothing to stand in the way of our worship of God?  Thanks for listening.

Click to play - Angry Jesus

As Long As Nobody Gets Hurt

art by Erin Clemons

I was blessed to be able to share this message about the deception and potential for hurt in the false narrative: "I want to do what I want, when I want, with who I want - as long as nobody gets hurt"  How has this false narrative hurt you or those that love you?  Thank you for listening.

play -  As Long As Nobody Gets Hurt