Titus 2:11-3:8

Acts 8:9-25 – How did the early Christians hold onto hope in the midst of persecution and cultural upheaval? Today we look at how the hope of the early Christians came from a personal experience of the Holy Spirit, and their enduring faith was fueled by this unassailable truth. To contrast, Luke throws a new character into the story, Simon the Magician – who seeks to photocopy hope and faith through rites and rituals, without a changed heart–but ends up with a faint impression that cannot mask a bitter heart. Does Simon change? The story is unclear, as if Luke is challenging us to enter the story and ask the same question of ourselves: Has Jesus changed our hearts?

Acts 7:58-8:8 – Today we look at how the church moved from pain to joy by giving their pain to Jesus. How do we give our pain? We 1) feel it 2) face it 3) move forward through it and 4) make a life that will last through it. This takes a mindset undaunted by mystery, a clinging to what God has revealed about himself to us.

Matthew 2 – Christmas Eve is a night often spent emphasizing God coming to be with us. But we can miss that God is also for us. The true Messiah is the Divine-Human King who comes from outside humankind to save us from ourselves. Becoming one of us, he continues God's mission to leads us back to Himself. In the text this week, Matthew shows us that everyone in the Christmas story is united in being first for the Messiah so they can then be for the world. This changes our role to a passive one, where God is for us no matter what or we we go– to an invitation for everyone to live their lives accompanying the Messiah.

Exodus 33:7-23 – In order to know God, we must first be known by God. This is the counter-intuitive bedrock for Christian Love. So often we skip being loved, and try to go straight to loving others, or loving God. Then we burn out, because inside we are empty. Our love is betrayed because it is a performance, an act and inside we are barren. The Old Testament is a story of God showing Israel his face through his redemptive love. When Israel allows God to see them and know them, they begin to see him more and more clearly–expectantly awaiting his redemption of mankind through a Messiah, a man who will become the True King. As we yearn for the Messiah this Advent, we, like Israel, are invited to listen and follow God's command to "Be still and know that I am God".

Psalm 146:1-10 – We all have a deep need for peace. Life is a search for it. Often it comes in strange moments. Today we'll see how the Bible promises peace for the follower of Jesus. It is available. The problem is that any honest person will look around and see the stark differences between the promises of peace that God gives and the reality of their lives. This is the great challenge of living with hope, in faith, and actually finding peace. Psalm 146 gives us a picture of a "blessed man" who searches for peace in the right places, and speaks to his soul to listen to God over what he sees and hears in the world. As he does, he, like those who formed the Book of Psalms during the Exile from Israel, finds his deep need for a king who will be the true Prince of Peace.

Joshua 24:14-18, Judges 1:1-2, Judges 1:19-21, Judges 1:27-35, Judges 21:25 – The second week of Advent, we meditate on “faith” or preparation for the coming King. We’re also moving through biblical history, trying to see the story of the Bible from a bird’s eye view and feel its progression and themes. The book of Judges is a grisly book full of the worst of human nature: violence, vengeance, tribalism, nepotism, civil war. How did it get here? We find in Joshua 24 that it starts off so well. Unfortunately, the devil often works in “death by a thousand cuts”. In Judges we experience a cautionary tale of the destructive nature of spiritual compromise. We’ll consider three expectations to hold to live a life of faith. First, we ought to expect permanent plans but impermanent communities. Second, we ought to expect trials, battles, or what I like to call: “kitchen work”. Third, we should expect, and contend for God’s favor.

Psalm 8:1-9 – We invite you this week, regardless of your church background, to embark with us as we join countless generations of humans who have been searching for the Good King. Throughout history we have looked for rulers who we can look up to, imitate, and who will lead us to the good life. Using the timeless legend of King Arthur as a springboard, this advent we will embark across the biblical storyline from the beginning to the end of the Bible: Genesis to Revelation. In these six weeks we'll be seeking wisdom from the ancient and continuing story of humanity's tumultuous relationship with the divine leadership of the merciful, redeeming rule of God.

Acts 6:8-7:60 – For a man about to be stoned, Stephen's Speech recounting Old Testament History seems at turns boring, awkward, and opaque. What is he saying? The High Priests are accusing him of blaspheming (basically high treason) against the Temple and the Law of Moses. Why respond the way he does? This week we'll see how Stephen curates his shared Jewish history with the High Priests to show how the true God-ordained aim of the Temple and the Law was always to reach the whole earth. Stephen gets under the Temple Priests "motivated reasoning" to dismiss the Christian church by showing how God never intended for the physical Temple to be be the center of salvation history. That place is for Jesus Christ. In doing so, we will look at how we as Christians are prone do the same thing–calling people to come to our church building–instead of going out to reach people where they are with the witness of Jesus and his love.

Acts 6:1-7 – Tabatha encourages us to put our own unique gifting, time and energy into building up the body of believers we call the church. When we chose a church or are challenged in our commitment to a community, we often misunderstand the nature of church altogether. We are asking what a community can provide for us, but our burning question should be, "how can I support the greatest need of this community?" It is in this trial and error of serving need that we will find chances to discover our calling and purpose.