Postmodern Renaissance Culture Revolutionary

How Free Are We Galatians 5:1,13-15 Chomping mad Something really stuck with me in this verse as I was beginning to prepare for this week’s sermon There is a lot to chew on in this section I had to really choke down some tough ideas I really got my teeth into something that seems important, though Verse 15 says, “If you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another” This phrase has seemed challenging to me in the past, but it never really caught my attention In the 61 “one another” passages of the NT, it is the most graphically negative It also seems very difficult to grasp the imagery in the surrounding context Paul is talking about freedom through Christ Specifically, he addresses freedom from being slaves to the tradition of circumcision In a broader sense, he is talking about the liberty we have to live within the relationship with have with Christ But Paul points out that we should not use our liberty fro...

Pigs, Demons, and Tombs, Oh My Luke 8:26-39 The out of context kingdom Jesus felt compelled to leave his comfort zone to bring the kingdom to people who didn’t receive it Jesus began his mission with “the kingdom of God is near” He then began to take this message from one end of the Jewish countryside to the other One day, he decides to go across the Lake of Gennesaret and lands in the region of the Gadarenes For us, this story doesn’t really spark much interest in quickly reading through - Jesus does his thing by casting out some demons On a closer examination, there are some clear signs that Jesus left his comfort zone here First - the Gedarenes were Gentiles - they raised pigs Second - the first place Jesus enters is a cemetery of Gentiles Third - in the cemetery, there is a person who is running around threatening people while naked Jesus casts a multitude of demons out of the man We know that the demons flock into the pigs and the pigs jump off into the water and die The man is re...

Sermon notes for Father's Day, June 16, 2019 Path to Christian Fatherhood 1 John 2:12-14 Father of a different sort Being a Christian father is not so much about raising children in your household Being a Christian father is about training the children in Christ to mature That includes our household children, but also the members of the body of Christ who come into the faith The writer of 1 John addresses three age groups: children, young men, and fathers There are two words for children that both imply immature people The word for young men is pointing to people in the prime of their lives The word for fathers addresses those who have matured Since there can be inferred that there were women involved in this community of faith, we can deduce that children, prime of lifers, and fathers addresses males and females But it doesn’t address these groups in terms of age - it is faith development For the community that the writer is addressing, the body of believers is broken into 3 ...