 Receive + Communion with God
Read Romans 8:31-39 What shall we say about such wonderful things as these? If God is for us, who can ever be against us? Since he did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else? Who dares accuse us whom God has chosen for his own? No one—for God himself has given us right standing with himself. Who then will condemn us? No one—for Christ Jesus died for us and was raised to life for us, and he is sitting in the place of honor at God’s right hand, pleading for us. Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? (As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.”) No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord. Spend some time in prayer giving God glory, honor, and thanks. Relate + Community with others What stuck with you from Sunday’s teaching? Why? Reflect on the Richard Rohr observation: "“There are two ways to be a prophet. One is to tell the enslaved that they can be free. It is the difficult path of Moses. The second is to tell those who think they are free that they are in fact enslaved. This is the even more difficult path of Jesus.” The Greek word allelon means one-another. Did you know that our relationship with others is such a emphasis in the Scriptures? What do you make of this? (See Romans 1:12; 12:5; 12:10; 12:16; 13:8; 14:13; 14:19; 15:5; 15:7; 15:14; 16:6) Do you agree with the statement, “Following Jesus without belonging to a community of Jesus is called not following Jesus.”? Paul intended our ‘one-another-ness’ to be practiced in real ways. Consider Romans 12:6-8, “We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us. If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with your faith; if it is serving, then serve; if it is teaching, then teach; if it is to encourage, then give encouragement; if it is giving, then give generously; if it is to lead, do it diligently; if it is to show mercy, do it cheerfully.” How do you see people using their gifts for others in the church? What are some ways you would like to explore your gifts or grow in using them? Read Romans 7:14 This is Paul’s lament of how sin and death keeps us from right relationships with God, others, ourselves, and the world. How does sin work against allelon? Paul ends Romans with a warning and a blessing. Read Romans 16:17-18 - One final word of counsel, friends. Keep a sharp eye out for those who take bits and pieces of the teaching that you learned and then use them to make trouble. Give these people a wide berth. They have no intention of living for our Master Christ. They’re only in this for what they can get out of it, and aren’t above using pious sweet talk to dupe unsuspecting innocents. and Romans 16:25-27 All of our praise rises to the One who is strong enough to make you strong, exactly as preached in Jesus Christ, precisely as revealed in the mystery kept secret for so long but now an open book through the prophetic Scriptures. All the nations of the world can now know the truth and be brought into obedient belief, carrying out the orders of God, who got all this started, down to the very last letter. All our praise is focused through Jesus on this incomparably wise God! Yes! What are the things from this series that have stayed with you? What got your attention? What do you want to explore more? What action do you need to take? Respond + Commission to action Read Romans. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+1&version=NIV Download the YouVersion Bible App if you have a smartphone. Read Romans, or have the App read it to you! Explore how God has gifted you to serve his plan to create a new community around Jesus. What do you love to do? What are you good at? What are you able to endure? What unique contributions can you make to building up the community?
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 Receive + Communion with God
Read Romans 8:19-22 The whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. For creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For creation was subjected to frustration…and creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the same freedom and glory as the children of God. Spend some time in prayer giving God glory, honor, and thanks. Relate + Community with others What stuck with you from Sunday’s teaching? Why? How do we commonly understand sin? How are these views helpful? How are they hurtful? How do you ‘see’ sin? What do you think of the idea that Jesus’s gift of life is given for everyone (and everything)? What about that idea is hard to accept? Does it change anything for how you see people and the world? Have you ever experienced life in Christ presented as a line in the sand? How did that make you feel (positively and/or negatively)? What does the statement “Jesus is into Reality” mean to you? How is possible to ignore Reality? How is it possible to join Reality? Have you known people who live in a way that does not correspond to Reality? What does that look like? How does the metaphor of Christ like the sun work for you? Are there times when you sense that Christ has already won the war? When is this reality least felt in your life? More Romans passages to reflect upon: Romans 5:18-19 Here it is in a nutshell: Just as one person did it wrong and got us in all this trouble with sin and death, another person did it right and got us out of it. But more than just getting us out of trouble, he got us into life! One man said no to God and put many people in the wrong; one man said yes to God and put many in the right. Romans 8:19-22 The whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. For creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For creation was subjected to frustration…and creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the same freedom and glory as the children of God. Romans 5:15-16 The rescuing gift is not exactly parallel to the death-dealing sin. If one man’s sin put crowds of people at the dead-end abyss of separation from God, just think what God’s gift poured through one man, Jesus Christ, will do! There’s no comparison between that death-dealing sin and this generous, life-giving gift. Romans 8:1-3 With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ’s being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death. Respond + Commission to action Read Romans. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+1&version=NIV Download the YouVersion Bible App if you have a smartphone. Read Romans, or have the App read it to you! Find one practical thing you can do this week that you would never do if you did not have confidence in God. Do one thing that makes no sense unless God is real and Jesus is raised. Do it. Then share that with someone. ReplyForward  Receive + Communion with God
Read Matthew 12:46-50 46 While Jesus was still talking to the crowd, his mother and brothers stood outside, wanting to speak to him. 47 Someone told him, “Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.” 48 He replied to him, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” 49 Pointing to his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. 50 For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” Spend some time in prayer giving God glory, honor, and thanks. Relate + Community with others What stuck with you from Sunday’s teaching? Why? A key idea from this teaching is that Jesus is the new great unifier of humanity. Previously, only death was powerful enough to make us all ‘one’. Now Christ can make us one. Reflect on how these powers (death, Christ) level the playing field for all groups of people. (Recall the key verse in Romans 10:12 - There is no difference between Jew and Gentile—the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”) Family is a gift that helps us form identity and belonging. What ‘families’ do you belong to? How have they shaped you into the kind of person you are? Our innate desire to belong to a family is powerful. What are some of the ways people try to create family beyond their biological beginnings? Paul both affirms and subverts our need to belong to a family. How does he subvert the Jews’ family identity in Abraham? How does he locate them in a larger human family? Romans 5:1-2 says, “Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God.” What do you think of the provocative claim Paul makes, that Abraham was ‘credited’ or ‘justified’ as righteous before he did anything, that it was only his trust (faith, confidence) in God that set him apart? We are counted as ‘saved’ not by what we do, but by the family to which we belong. We receive the free gift of salvation from God by trusting God. What are some everyday ways we live that demonstrate we trust (have confidence in) God? Respond + Commission to action Read Romans. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+1&version=NIV Download the YouVersion Bible App if you have a smartphone. Read Romans, or have the App read it to you! Find one practical thing you can do this week that you would never do if you did not have confidence in God. Do one thing that makes no sense unless God is real and Jesus is raised. Do it. Then share that with someone. 
“Jesus primarily targeted the heart of people. Jesus doesn’t want mirror surface changes because the exterior life can be so deceptive we can play games with appearances but the heart is who we really are and where we live our lives from.” Rustin Smith
Shaping our hearts is important because our heart is who we really are and where we live our lives from. In order to live your life from your heart it takes practice, this isn’t easy, we practice things because they’re hard. It’s important to spend time figuring out how to shape your heart and it’s best done through action, through doing, through practices. Acts 1:14 "They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers." Acts 2:37 When the people heard this(about Jesus), they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” In Acts 1 their action, their to do, was to pray continually and there was only 120 of them and then in Acts 2 (the next day) there was now 3,000 believes and they asked, “What can we do” What have you been doing to shape your heart? What do you need to be doing? Why should we not keep score and not wait? Having a child like faith is key to shaping our hearts. Matthew 18:1-5 The disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” Jesus called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me. Jesus desire for us is to have a humble, honest faith in God, and He used the innocence of a child as an example. Emulating the faith of children, we should simply take God at His Word. As children trust their earthly fathers, we should trust our Father in heaven. Kids have this trust, this faith to follow their leader, they don’t wait, they just do. Sigur Rós - Glósóli from sigur rós on Vimeo. “Glosoli” The name of the song and video, which is actually 2 icelandic words put together, the word “glow” and the word “sun.” So, I believe this video is about being a light to others. Leading them into something that could be hard, unknown, impossible but amazing. “To get what you’ve never had you have to do what you’ve never done” Thomas Jefferson The challenge here is to “do”, to not wait, but find something and do it. |
ReverbEach week, you are invited to use the Reverb discussion guide with family, friends, or a small group for further Scripture readings, questions to ponder, or practices to engage. Archives
December 2018
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