Grace in Community

Texts: Jeremiah 18:1-11, Luke 14:25-33

Series: Re-Forming

When it comes to following Jesus, it all starts with…dying? Yes. This is why Jesus urges his hearers to “count the cost.” God is always seeking to reform us, to bring us toward fullness of life. To do that, there are ways in which our old selves – old patterns of thinking, old habits – must be put to death. Over the next couple months we’ll be exploring some of the ways God seeks to reform us, and how we can open ourselves to that re-formation. 

Texts: Hebrews 11, Luke 14:1-14

Series: Messy Spirituality

In this final sermon of our summer series, Pastor Matt preaches a powerful and vulnerable message about what God has been showing him about the meaning of faith. Faith is not when you see a vision and trust that God will bring you there. Faith is when you don’t see where the road leads, and you go anyway, because you trust that the one sending you is good. Listen and renew your faith in him today. 

Text: Luke 13:10-17

Series: Messy Spirituality

We don’t know why physical healing comes in some circumstances and not in others. We certainly know that we are not the ones in control of it. In today's healing story a woman experiences a kind of healing from Jesus even before he cures her of her physical ailment. And this is most often the kind of healing we can give one another. 

Texts: Luke 12:49-56, Jeremiah 23:23-29, Psalm 82

Series: Messy Spirituality

In today’s gospel reading, Jesus says he has come to bring disruption and division! We have been talking all summer about how this world is a mess, and how humans have made it that way. But sometimes God brings the mess, because we in our death-dealing ways need to be disrupted. Where do we need to be disrupted today?

Text: Luke 12:22-35

Series: Messy Spirituality

Last week we learned from Ecclesiastes how "everything under the sun" is hevel - mist, vapor. Here one moment and gone the next. This week we learn another Hebrew word - hesed - that reveals the character of God as the one thing that is dependable, guaranteed, unchanging. Hear God's word today and move from hevel to hesed: from being lost in the mist to being immersed in the love of God. 

Texts: Ecclesiastes 1:2, 12-14, 2:18-23; Luke 12:13-21

Series: Messy Spirituality

“All is vanity and a chasing after the wind,” says the teacher in the Old Testament book of Ecclesiastes. Another translation of the word for vanity is "vapor." If everything created is vapor - here today and gone tomorrow - then we must place our trust in what is not created. In the midst of the vapor of this world, there is only one who holds weight; only one who can be our anchor.

Texts: Colossians 2:6-19, Luke 11:1-13

It can be tricky - messy, even - to figure out what most deserves our focus in following Jesus. There's a concept from the Lutheran tradition that can be helpful in this discernment. It's called adiaphora. Listen to hear more, and to help set your priorities in following Jesus.

Text: Luke 10:25-37

Series: Messy Spirituality

Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan illustrates that loving others is challenging and complex work. We are called to bear fruit – and fruit is messy! But there are such blessings in the mess. Are you willing to get messy?

Text: Luke 10:38-42

Series: Messy Spirituality

Worship & Arts Director Sara Lehman uses music and story to illustrate the connection God creates with us - a God who sings over our mess, inviting us to lift our cracked hallelujahs and lullabies at the edge of loss. In our Messy Spirituality series, we're exploring a love that listens, holds, and doesn't flinch when we forget the melody or the rhythm changes meter. Come worship with us. Bring your mess. It doesn't have to be perfect to be beautiful.

Text: Luke 10:1-11, 16-20

Series: Messy Spirituality

When Jesus sends the disciples out in mission for the first time, he warns them that it will be messy. Not everyone will be ready to receive the good news they have to share. When it comes to our own work, we must be careful not to wrap our identity up with results. On this 4th of July weekend we hear a countercultural message: true freedom is knowing that our worth is not determined by productivity, but by who God has declared us to be in Christ.