Gulf Coast Community Church Podcast – St. Petersburg

In the first half of Ephesians 1, Paul praises God our Father for how He gloriously adopted us in Jesus Christ, a plan He had from before the foundation of the world, and a plan rooted in His love for us. A plan which made us heirs of God through Jesus Christ. As heirs of God, we have been called to live a certain way.

In the second half of Ephesians 1, Paul isn’t satisfied that we simply know the glorious truth of our adoption, He wants it to transform our lives into those of true sons who carry on the Father’s business. In order for that to happen, we have to see in a whole new light.

It’s like we’ve been living in houses with an entire side, that which faces God and spiritual realities, having no windows. Maybe a small hole to peak out is all. We have to have large windows installed on that side. Once we can see the realities of our adoption, we can reimagine how the world works. That will enable us to live the new lives God intends for us.

Join us in worship as we continue exploring our adoption as God’s sons and daughters from Ephesians in our series Imagining the Kingdom.

Paul’s opening praise of God for what he has done in the glorious gospel in Ephesians (1:3-14) is amazing. It speaks of our adoption and says much about how it came about. It all revolves around our being “in Christ,” our union with Christ. Yet Paul assumes we understand what this phrase means.

What does it mean to be in Christ? Whenever I see new books on the topic of our union with Christ (our being “in Christ”), I buy them and set out to read them. The authors identify something I also recognize: this is a very important theme for Paul; it appears to be central in His thinking.

However, I find myself somewhat disappointed. Don’t get me wrong, they are usually well written and discuss so many relevant aspects of the topic. They always point out why it is so important but often come up short when explaining what it means. I’ve begun to discover why.

This Sunday as we continue our exploration of the theme of adoption in Ephesians, we are going to take a bit of a deep dive into the inner workings of our union with Christ. It calls us to develop a sanctified imagination of the Kingdom in order to live as God’s children.

Adoption is one of the greatest pictures given to us to understand our relationship to God as the church. Unfortunately, it is also veiled because adoption in the ancient world was quite different than adoption in the 21stcentury. If we are going to imagine the kingdom, a kingdom headed by a Father whose Son is King, we must allow Paul’s understanding of our adoption to paint its picture in our hearts.

While some might think I planned to start this theme of adoption on Father’s Day, but I’m not that smart. However, as I was preparing this week, the thought crossed my mind that this would make a good Father’s Day message (and then I realized…). J. Todd Billings, on the subject of adoption, writes,

“The gospel does not so much offer a low-cost ‘eternal life insurance’ as it gives the tremendous privilege of learning to be children of the King, living into our new identity in a kingdom that is coming forth to us from the future.”

After exploring the marathon of faith in Hebrews 11-13, we now turn to Paul’s letter to the Ephesians where he calls us to imagine a whole new way of relating to God and one another.

Text: Mark 1:15 (CSB Version)

Themes: Gospel, King Jesus

Donna and I spent our first 10 years of married life in Salt Lake City, Utah living with the majestic Wasatch mountains to the east (pictured below), wrapping around a bit to the North and south and feeling as if they were watching over us, and the less towering, arid Oquirrh (oaker) range to the west. Having moved there from the Midwest, initially those mountains, especially the nearer and taller Wasatch range, made us feel hemmed in, a tad claustrophobic. Over time they made us feel safe and protected.

Living in the shadow of a mountain impacts how one thinks about life. As we saw last week, the preacher of Hebrews tells us that we are living before Mt. Zion (Sion) and not Mt. Sinai (Sina). This week we will explore the details of Mt. Zion and what it means to live in its shadow. This will require an exercise of our imaginations when we gather from the harvest fields and when we are scattered back into them.

Join us in worship as we explore what it means to live in the shadow of Mt. Zion from Hebrews 12:22—13:6. May the Lord teach us to imagine life as it really was intended to be in order that we might walk in it. This is the only way we will nurture a Gospel culture.

Photo of Wasatch range by Nic Y-C on Unsplash

Did you know that this Sunday is the anniversary of Christ’s kingdom inauguration? On this day nearly 2,000 years ago the inaugural ball was thrown and the first citizens of the restored kingdom of God were welcomed in with fanfare. The festivities began with wind and fire filling the place. People speaking in languages they did not know but others understood. This Sunday is Pentecost Sunday.

Did you know that Pentecost is relevant to your life as a believer in Jesus? It’s the origin story of the kingdom of which you are a citizen. The preacher of Hebrews says that you (plural), the church, have come to Mt. Zion. When did you get there? You arrived on Pentecost. And here we stand.

Join us in worship as we explore Hebrews 12:18-29 in our series, Imagining the Kingdom. Pentecost (Acts 2) provides the background for understanding the two mountains of Hebrews 12. Maybe you’ve never imagined you were standing at the foot of a mountain, and therefore haven’t considered which one. We will discover why this is important for who we are and how we live.

The story about Simon Peter getting Jesus’ tax money from the fish’s mouth (Matt. 17:24-27) came to mind this morning in prayer (feel free to join us every Friday morning from 6:30-7:30 for prayer at the church office). That story demonstrates this importance of imagining the Kingdom.

Jesus and the disciples arrive in Capernaum (where Jesus lived) and those who collect the temple tax ask Peter if Jesus pays the temple tax. Peter, keeping with his “I’ve got this under control personality,” answers without thinking, “Yes!”

When Peter gets back to the house, Jesus immediately asks Peter, “What do you think, Simon?” Peter’s thinking, his imagination, was exactly the problem. We know Jesus told Peter to go fishing to pay the tax both for Peter and himself, but first He needed to do something more important.

If this story was supposed to teach us, “Jesus paid his taxes,” or some variation thereof, all Jesus needed to do was tell Peter where to get the monies. Story over. Instead, He knows He needs to adjust why Peter imagines Jesus will pay this tax.

In Peter’s imagination, Jesus wasn’t much different than anyone else. Jesus begins with a question about who pays taxes: servants or sons? The answer is obvious to Peter as well as any of us: servants. The sons of kings do not pay taxes. Therefore, the Son of God does not pay a temple tax (the temple is God’s palace or throne). Jesus then instructs Peter that he will pay his tax in order not to offend them, but not because he owed it. Jesus corrected Peter’s imagination. The same action with the wrong imagination was an entirely different thing.

What I hope is becoming obvious in our series, in our discussion of Hebrews 11-12, is that the life of faith is not only about what we do but also about what story we think we are a part of.
Join us in worship as we continue our series, Imagining the Kingdom, beginning in Hebrews 12:1-17.

Oliver Burkeman, author of Four Thousand Weeks, after making a case for the power of patience, suggests that to harness the power of patience the first thing we must do is “develop a taste for having problems.” That may sound familiar (James 1:2-4; Rom. 5:3-4). And it may make you think, “Yuck!” None of us like problems.

However, it may well be that the essence of our existence is to square-off with difficulties—either in persons or circumstances. And what we imagine to be happening in those relationships and circumstances may well have everything to do with how we live.

Join us as we continue our exploration of Hebrews 11 in our series: Imagining the Kingdom. Enlist yourself in the effort to harness the power of a sanctified imagination through faith.