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A big part of how we love each other is in the names we use; how we “label” each other.
" In the ancient world, the gods were thought to be angry. Most of the stories of creation in the pagan world were of the gods fighting and war. The reason we end up with the universe and human beings is the result of their fighting. When the Bible and the stories of scripture come out; it’s a completely different story. The story of scripture has nothing to do with the gods being angry. It has everything with this being in eternity who imagined wanting to share life with someone beyond himself. According to the Genesis narrative, the reason God creates is precisely because of love. This is radical thinking in the ancient world! "
Andrew talks about how God hears and answers our prayers.
Freedom for many people is a kind of commitment to their own simple, baseline impulses. It looks like the classical form of Hedonism. Whatever you have an impulse for – go for it! Sadly, there are people in the context of the church that think the reason we have faith is so God can give us even more stuff than the pagans!
“God did something I didn’t expect Him to do. God is bigger than our ideas. Even though we have theological constructs and understandings, that doesn’t mean God can’t work beyond them. One of the ways we’re going to reach more people for Christ is to quit judging them because they don’t speak our (codified) language….”
Andrew Arndt shares some thoughts on the mystery of God.
Andrew, Ed, and Paul talk about fatherhood from the perspectives of three generations.
Imagine what it would be like if you could actually change. That’s the dream of this business of faith.
The final sermon from the series When God Breathes.
Andrew Arndt continues with the fourth message in “When God Breathes.”
Part three of Ed’s series on the role of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers.
The reason faith matters is because it’s what allows us to participate in this plan, this dream that’s unfolding in the world. We’re in the midst of celebrating the [season of] resurrection. When we ask, “what really took place there?” You have to back up and realize that God, in the very beginning, of this thing, has this wonderful dream to lay-out this world in which He would participate in. We mess it up right in the beginning. Yet, God chooses to chase us and not abandon us – not leaving us to our own demise and destruction. He chooses to jump into the middle of this thing and absorb all of our pain and the stuff we’ve messed up – taking it to the cross and the grave. When He [Jesus] comes out of the grave, something got set into motion that gives hope for the world; and we become part of that hope.
Somehow, when you do what you do as unto the Lord. You realize, this is what God wants. This is God’s will for me to participate – in this kindness, or in this action. That somehow, as we participate with doing what’s good, we get invigorated!
This business of resurrection, that we celebrate today is the most important holiday for the Christian church. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15 that if there is no resurrection; our faith is in vain. The scripture tells us that the reason this is true is because the greatest miracle God ever did was raising Christ from the dead.
Palm Sunday -- When the nation of Israel was jacked-up with hope, the hope was soon disappointed. Not because God didn’t act for them, He did. Rather, because He didn’t act for them the way they had expected Him to act for them. (Jesus came to bring peace. They wanted a conqueror to free them from Roman impressment). One of the messy things about faith is, that is true for us as well. God promises to act, but often the way He acts is not exactly what we wanted….
The whole idea of God’s motive and love for us, is best characterized in the Greek word “agape.” This is a love that is reckless. It is a love that isn’t based upon merit; nor on conditions. It’s a kind of love that’s based upon the person loving rather than that person being loved.
The two sides of spirituality
