Life Application: Who have I hurt?  Am I willing to confess this to God? How do I show favoritism? Who can I pray for who has been hurt or disappointed by the church?

“Whole-hearted faithfulness to God will always require of us whole-hearted faithfulness to the least of Jesus’ brothers and sisters: to orphans and widows, to our naked, hungry neighbors, to wounded and broken left-behind bystanders”.  ~AKM Adam, Oxford University

Life Application: What question is my biggest obstacle when it comes to understanding Jesus as the truth? What question most helps me understand Jesus as the truth?  Do I see questions more as obstacles or opportunities? Why do you think Jesus asked so many questions? What is a question in your life that you would most love answered?  How am I testing what is true?  What question can I ask that will help me discover the truth?  Will you ask Jesus to reveal His truth in your life this week?

Life Application: Have you ever had a defining moment of saying “Yes” to Jesus in your heart and mind?  If not, can today be that day? Is Jesus just a formula in my life?  Or Lord of my life?  Am I trying to become a Christian?  Or can I say with certainty I am a Christian?  How can I better realize that salvation in Jesus is the greatest news in the universe?

Life Application: What is your current perception of “church?”  What step can you take to help us live into GOD’S perception of the church? What step can you take to help First Church become a “supernatural community” where so many different people are united in God’s love? How can our vision of “Transformation in Christ, Changing Lives Inside and Out” be more than a statement? How can it be our reality? Who can you be the church for this week? Who is someone very different from you that you can love, serve, invite, and exemplify Christ’s love? Will you commit to fervent prayer that we would be the community of saints that God intends God’s church to be?

As believers, we are given the Holy Spirit as our advocate to help us live in close relationship with God.

Life Application: How solid am I in knowing what the essentials of the Christian Faith are?  Am I allowing my ability to understand the concept of the Trinity to limit my acceptance of Biblical truth?  What would my life be like if I was more aware of God’s presence? How am I willing to change my life to spend time with God?

Life Application: How am I living an incarnational life? How am I not? Where am I trying to be the hands and feet of Jesus? Where is God calling me to be the hands and feet of Jesus? Spend some time this week simply dwelling on the miracle of the incarnation—that Jesus as fully divine chose to become fully human for us. On this Freedom Sunday how can you support those around the world seeking to be the hands and feet of Christ?

Will you commit to praying for International Justice Mission (IJM)? Will you have a conversation to learn more about what IJM does? What next step can you take to support IJM?

Life Application: What is my perception of sin? In the core of my being, do I trust that God has my best intent? Do I seek to please God to gain favor or simply to please God? What elements of my life am I hiding behind in order to gain security and worth? What part(s) of my life is God in control of?  Which ones is God not in control of? When God asks, “Where are you?” what is my response? How much must God love me in order to give up His own Son Jesus to be the foundation of my life?

Life Application: What step can I take this week to realize how real God is? What step can I take to experience God in a more personal way? What step can I take this week to realize the holiness of God? If you are not already part of a small group would you commit to joining one? Leave a comment on a communication card, call the church office, or email the church office ([email protected]) and we will be glad to help you get connected in a life group.

Life Application:

1) Will I commit daily Bible reading as a foundation of my faith? 

2) Am I a part of a Life Group? (Sign up Sept 9!)

Life Application: How would you describe your love for God?  Is it an infatuated kind of love?  Or a love requiring grit and determination? Do we realize the wealth of love that God offers to us through Jesus? What are we willing to offer to God out of the wealth of God’s love for us? What step of generosity am I willing to commit to over the next year at First Church?

Action step: Out of love, covenant to taking one further step in your commitment to generosity for the next year over what you did this past year.  Please reflect this commitment on a commitment card and turn in.Click here to get a glimpse of what your giving supports at First Church: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFYdNd2_Geo&feature=youtu.be