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A few weeks ago Josh ended the discussion by asking the questions, "Who are we in God, Who are we in Family, Who are we in our Work/community, and Who are we in ourselves?"
This past week we explored the first part of the question, who are we in God. It was a beautiful time of reflection and meditation that was closed with a time worship. We had a slide show going of verses that speaks of who we are in God, and what God thinks of us.
One verse that I found to be extremely beautiful was, " How weighty to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! I try to count them—they are more then the sand; I come to the end —I am still with you." Psalms 139:17-18
God Loves us so much He calls us sons and daughters, His bride, His friends, and so much more good stuff.
As we continue to wrestle with who we are in God lets Ask and seek, continually knocking on Gods door begging Him to show us. Asking God to show us who He is, asking Him to revel His secrets to us.
The more we know God the more we discover who we are are. As we discover who we are we are truly able to live out who we were created to be. Jesus said he came that we may live life abundantly. As we know Him and know ourselves our life becomes more and more whole. As we draw closer and get to know, the Author of life we can partake in the song that God started long ago when He began to unfurl His plan of redemption for all things. We can join God in the sacred dance of love and reconciliation and invite others to join with us as we press in closer to our LORD. How great is the love the Father!
I'll end with a quote which I read the other day from a Jewish scholar Abraham Joshua Heschel "In sacred deed, we echo God's suppressed chant; in loving we intone God's unfinished song. No image of the Supreme may be fashioned, save one: our own life as an image of His will."
Grace and peace,
Chris
Who are we?
Thats a question that we often ask ourselves. When we ask we are usually looking in the wrong direction and possibly asking the wrong questions to find the answer.
This Thursday night we explored a little more in depth of who God is what the Word reveals about His Character. We talked about the idea that Our view of God effects and shapes our of ourselves. When we look at the beginning of the story, we see that God created and said that it was good. God created us in His image and said that it was good. So if we are made in Gods image and have bits of Gods character placed inside of us, maybe we should be looking to see who God is, exploring Gods character, and seeing how it lines up with us and our passions and or maybe just what we are good at and what we like to do.
Those of us that grew up in the institutional church often times put a divide between what is sacred and what is secular. Sunday is Sacred but the rest of the week is secular, singing worship songs is sacred but other music is secular, playing on church sports teams is sacred but others secular, working for the church is sacred but working in other institutions is secular. Hear is an interesting thought, God worked 6 days to create His Good world, his Kingdom, and rested one, so why do we often work one day to bring His kingdom and rest the other six?
I think its time that we get rid of that wall we've built. In the beginning God created everything, EVERYTHING. Does that make everything sacred? When God freed the Israelites He continued to create, or at least continued to reveal what He had already created. He showed the Israelites the Law, or Torah. And taught how to live in community. When we study Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus and Deuteronomy we see that God taught the Israelites how to do agriculture, how to do business to care for the oppressed, how to do justice, He taught how to be family, instructed how to do preventative health and sciences, He showed the details in design, and even showed them what true religion was, caring for the widows and orphans.
In these few books God set up all the spheres of society, all the parts needed to have a functioning group of people live together. How beautiful is that!! If God made all the spheres of society, maybe they are supposed to be sacred as well. If we look into the character of God maybe we can see traces of His character that He desired to instill in every sphere of society. Lets remember He wanted this people to be a reflection of Him and to do things drastically different then the other nations. If God cared only about the way we do religion then it would make it much harder to look different in life. But God cared, and still does care, about all these spheres we find ourselves in.
On Thursday night we asked the question why did Jesus come into the story. Why did the author of the story need to write himself into it? Some of the reasons we said was that he came to bring forgiveness, to show us how to live, to show us who God is, to reconcile all things unto him, and destroy the works of the enemy. If Christ came to reconcile all things unto him, then it would seem that he is tapping into what God had originally set up with the Israelites in the wilderness. Christ came proclaiming jubilee, and to fulfill the law, not destroy the law. After Christ, came the Holy Spirit to give us the ability to walk out in the things God showed the Israelites. To reengage in all the spheres of society. To partner with Christ to destroy the works of the enemy in everything. To be a part of Gods Redemption plan over everything in heaven and earth. As we see today if these spheres of business, education, health and science, justice, art, family, and religion were supposed to display who God is then they are terribly broken systems today. Christ came to bring forgiveness, but to also start reconciling all these things and more back to him, so we can be a blessing to all families on earth.
This is where it gets really tough but really exciting. The fact that God cares about everything we do. That fact that we are supposed to look different in all things. But we don't have to do it alone, because Christ came to make it possible for us to do it.
We roughly walked through the idea of business and Gods character in it. How God might want to move though business and display who He is to the world. How God is just and a provider, so business could be structured to display that, and more. We wish that we had more time to then walk through all of the spheres of society like this. As the weeks go on we will be diving more into this idea of God wanting us to reengage in His creation, all of His creation.
As we grow as a group, lets continue to seek God's direction for where and how to move. Lets continue to focus on Jesus and keep Him the center. Lets dream big and strive to live radically different, with a radical love. Our God is good but he is not tame, He is Wild! Lets strive as a community to reflect this God we believe in, and figure out what it means to put flesh and blood on this Gospel.
I'm really excited about what God is doing in us and though us! Thanks everyone for being apart of this little tribe and wrestling these things out with us!
Grace and peace,
Chris
(If you are interested in going more in depth into the spheres idea and wrestling our your own sphere, I'd encourage you to listen to the podcast linked below, there is also a PDF you can download. And please feel free to bring it up on Thursday what you are learning and discovering so we can wrestle together. I get stoked talking about this stuff! Check out the Patrick Dodson link to left for more topics on teachings on this stuff)
Patrick Dodson: God's Nature, Your Work
(for a shorter not as good version as me)
The story continued this past thursday. Last time we met we left the story where God stepped back on the scene. We left off where God had just ransomed a group of slaves out of Egypt, being led by a man named Moses. God stepped in because once again He wanted to dwell among the people that He had picked to bless, and love the people in the world. God wanted these people to represent Him, and His characteristics of mercy, love, justice, generosity, health, teaching, and oh yeah loving.
On Mt Sinai this God who calls himself I AM, or I will be what I will be, gave these people the Law. It was a code of life that was supposed to bleed into every aspect of life, from the way they worshiped to the way they cooked, even to the way they washed their hands and stayed clean. It was a radical way of life. This God of their ancestors wanted them to live radically different from all the other nations of the earth. He was going to be there King, He was going to be their first love.
Not only was Mt Sinai the place where the Jews were given the law, a gift from God, but it was also in a sense a marriage, a deep convenient to God. Israel saying they would be faithful to God and God saying He would fulfill his covenant, as He had already been doing.
On Thursday we continued with this story. All through out the story shows the mercy and justice of God. Israel continued to neglect the widows, orphans, and aliens of their land. They oppressed people and when they were supposed to love and bless people. They sacrificed their children to foreign gods, and forgot the law, a good gift, that God had given them.
Through out this story God continued to send people to tell the people of Israel to repent and turn back to Him. All God wanted was for them to turn back to him and follow his law and they would then once again be restored to the place of blessing all nations. But they continued to not listen and did worse and worse things.
Eventually God got fed up with trying to give these people His good and perfect gifts of full life, so He send nation after nation to take them over. Eventually God was silent for 400 years. He didn't speak a word to anybody. For the Jews this must have seemed like the end of the world.
We stopped the story there, but what comes next is the most beautiful thing of the story. The story didn't end when Assyria, Babylon, Greece, and Roman conquered these people time after time. But the story continued when the author of the story decides to write himself into it. The God man is born into the story. After 400 years of silence God begins to once again fulfill His covenant to Abraham.
I tried to recap Thursday as best I could, but it is pretty hard to tell a couple thousand years of history in one blogpost.
I'm really excited about the direction we are heading. The story we are continuing to write here in philadelphia, as we wrestle with what it means to look different in this land we live. What it means to be a people that live with a radical love and generosity for the poor, oppress, aliens, widows, and orphans. I think God is moving in pretty awesome in our community, and wants to move in this city pretty bad.
grace and peace
Chris
This week we were able to share a meal with some new comers. It was a good time, followed by a joyful time of joy telling.
Sometimes its good to just tell or listen to a story. This past week we had a great time of sharing bits of our stories. We shared what God has done or what God is doing or just what is hard in our life.
In the Old Testament, after God ransomed the Israelites out of slavery He continued to tell them to tell their stories to the next generation, and to not for get the works of the LORD. He went so far as to give tell them to have week long parties, celebrations, and feasts(I guess those are all the same thing...) to help them remember the way God had moved in their lives.
Often times in our culture its hard to slow down and just remember, and share. Sometimes the best possible thing we can do is remember and share, for some reason it encourages us and encourages those listening. I think a reason for that might be because my story isn't just mine, your story doesn't stop with you. But my story is your story, all the good and all the bad, and your story is my story all the beauty and all the pain. We have been talking about "the story" of God and asking how we fit into this story, because it isn't over yet. I think it is so important that we don't forget our story is apart of Gods story. Some would say that with our lives we are continuing to write the book of Acts. The acts of the apostles are now our privilege to walk out in. We inherited their stories and the next generation will inherit ours. How awesome is that!
As the weeks and months continue lets continue to remember and share. Not forgetting where we came from and not losing site of where we are going. Reminding each other that we are part of a grand story of redemption and beauty.
Well com padres' until next,
Grace and Peace,
Chris
