The apostle presents his most elevated teaching concerning the church by speaking of it as a “new humanity” and a “living temple” created by God to manifest God’s will in the world. Tearing down walls and manifesting God’s peace is at the heart of achieving God’s plan to unite all things in Christ. Join us for our “After the Through the Bible”…
Days after entering into covenant with God, the people of God craft an idol while Moses is away on Mount Sinai. God threatens to destroy the people, but Moses intercedes on their behalf and God relents. This story has much to teach us about our proneness to idolatry and about what faithful and faithless leadership looks like. Opening Hymn: For the Beauty…
Christians talk a lot about “being saved” but what are we actually talking about. What is salvation? Why do we need it? And – most importantly – what is it’s purpose? What is it for? In today’s reading, Paul speaks of our desperate need for salvation, of God’s initiative by grace to bring it about, and of what it means to truly…
There is a great difference between what we can do, will do, and should do. What we “can” do reveals our freedom to choose between either good or bad options. What we “will” do expresses our ability to volitionally make decisions for ourselves. What we “should” do stems from an entirely different foundation – it has to do with an ethical guideline…
Following Paul’s explosion of worship, he prays for the churches, beginning with his “unceasing prayer” that God would grant a spirit of wisdom and revelation that the “eyes of their heart” may be enlightened by the Gospel and the great power of God behind it. Paul does not begin with prayers for healing, comfort, or blessings (as important as these are), but…
In today’s story, Jesus seeks to overcome the “confirmation bias” of his interlocutors who seek to trap him with their “gotcha question”. Confirmation bias is the tendency to take in only data that confirms a prior conviction and to discount information that does not conform to what we already believe. We are all guilty of this at times, and the danger is…
The Apostle begins this letter with a long, complex sentence (202 words long in the Greek). He begins with worship in order to give the context for all he is to say from the foundation of the “bigger picture” of God’s great plan from the foundation of the earth to bless by grace and unite all things in heaven and earth in…
All of us are in exile. Some (if not most of us) are in the wilderness. The fears and the frustrations of the desert quickly lead to complaints and murmurings. In today’s story, the people of God grumble in the wilderness and God responds, not with anger, but with the gracious provision of manna. Though the wilderness is not comfortable, easy, or…
Sometimes we can miss the forest for the trees. That is, we can got so focused on details that we lose sight of the bigger picture. The Apostle’s Letter to the Ephesians invites the church to remember and recommit to God’s grand universal plan of uniting all things in Christ. Only by maintaining this grand vision can our individual lives and local…
Differences of opinion and practice can wreak havoc on unity if left unchecked. In today’s reading, Paul addresses a community where differences have done just that, leading to condemnation and condescension. Paul argues that differences should not lead to these things, but rather, be an opportunity to welcome the other and witness to the Gospel. Opening Hymn: Great Is Thy Faithfulness Closing…