Citizens Weekly

For those who dread the Christmas season, be encouraged. The grief, angst, disappointment, loneliness many of us sense this season speaks precisely to why Jesus came -- to bring light to the darkness we know too well. As an American church, we falter at lamenting. If this season is difficult for you, do not hold your breath until the New Year. Lean in. Share your ache with the church. Even Father God "yearned" for reconciliation with His children, a sentiment He shared with Jesus (our Reconciler) and the Holy Spirit (our Comforter). Let's learn bring our lament well into our Advent celebrations and waiting.

The word itself causes us to pause and consider what God may be saying even when we don’t fully understand. Individually and collectively exhaling and leaning into the arms of our Father will help prepare us to enter the Advent season. SELAH isn’t working, it’s pausing. It’s intentionally taking a deep breath to consider. Treasure, be in the moment, present and aware of God, of ourselves and those around us. Let us be encouraged to create space to SELAH.

From the Series “Acts.” The Teaching team hosted a panel discussion overviewing questions submitted by Citizens on the book of Acts. 

From the Series “Acts.” Despite the way things feel and seem at times, and against all odds, we can have hope in hopeless situations. We can have hope when things look horrible. Faith isn’t measured in our ability to work up some emotional or mental power to believe, but in our ability to surrender to the faithfulness of Jesus.

From the series "Acts." Evangelism has become a dirty word. Our generation believes that sharing one's faith in Jesus is antiquated at best; at worst, it is wrong. So how do we obey the Great Commission of Jesus while recognizing the current cultural climate? Is there a way to reconstruct evangelism?

Despite being hunted, beaten up, and locked up, Paul is at peace and unshaken because he has rooted his hope in the resurrection of Jesus, which lit the flame of God's redemption of all of creation and history. Despite being at the mercy of his circumstances and a corrupt empire, Paul knows that both he and that broken world are caught up in the growing fire of justice and a world-made-right fueled by that resurrection.

God gave us our five senses to help us experience Him, His world and His scriptures. The Lord uses our prayerful imaginations to energize scripture reading and to help us to remember that much of what was real is left out; the voices of the main characters, the people in the crowd, the silence, the volume, the smells in the room or city, the architecture, the onlookers holding hands or leaning on a beam, the posture of the protagonists and the glances of the eyes, the babies crying in the background or the heat or cool breezes that would come and go... As we continue in our study of Acts chapter 23, our hope is that we can awaken our senses to God through His word.

From the Series “Vision v.2021.” It isn’t enough to have a correct mindset or orthodoxy of the church. We need a proper orthopraxy of what it means to live as the church in the Way of Jesus, in 2021, in Bryan/College Station. If we are dead to sin and alive in Christ, how does this drive our wants, loves, and longings? What would it look like if transformation happened in Bryan/College Station, not because we believe the right way – but because we live and love the right way?

From the Series “Vision v.2021.” We all know what community looks like at its worst, but what does it look like at its best? The good news of Jesus is that we can be reconciled to God, but it doesn’t stop there. The full gospel reconciles us to one another in the context of community. But what is a community, exactly? Most of us long for it, some think we know what it is, but how do we know when we’ve really reached the Graduate Level Community that Jesus longs for us to have? 

From the Series “Vision v.2021.” When you think about church, what are some of the things that come to your mind? Jesus and the writers of the New Testament had very specific things to say about church. How is Citizens defined, and what are some of the core elements of our culture, and how will we saturate Bryan/College Station with the love of Jesus?