We've been digging in to huge issues that affect our life and relationships lately. Why do we do stuff like that? Here's a little bit of a taste of our approach to digging in to big things like this as a community. If you are trying to figure out how to broach those difficult conversations within your own community, it's worth it! Share comments on this episode or reach out to us through our website!

One thing about the past, it taught us how to do things that we can’t unlearn. And some of it is dragging us down. I don’t care if it was the disconnectedness in your family of origin, your addiction to tobacco, meth, porn or gossip, or your bad money management practices…your ruts haunt you yet today. But they don’t have to live in your future. Learning new ways of life is something we can help each other do.

Here's the word cloud created during this message: 

Find this week's message outline on page 2 of the Sunday Paper and other resources like discussion guides at www.jacobs-well.net/leftovers. Also watch for our regular "Leftovers" podcasts where we talk through other ideas and parts of the message that ended up on the cutting room floor.

You can support Jacob's Well as a community and help to bring messages and experiences like this to more people at jacobs-well.net/give. Thank you!

If you are old enough to think about it, you are old enough to have bumps & bruises from life that don’t go away. In fact, ‘bumps & bruises’ probably sounds dismissive to what you’ve been through. But while scars from the past still impact your life, do they control it? Will you let them? This is a hard conversation and we don’t mean to make it sound easier than it is… but the possibility of your future is always greater than the baggage of your past

Find this week's message outline on page 2 of the Sunday Paper and other resources like discussion guides at www.jacobs-well.net/leftovers. Also watch for our regular "Leftovers" podcasts where we talk through other ideas and parts of the message that ended up on the cutting room floor.

You can support Jacob's Well as a community and help to bring messages and experiences like this to more people at jacobs-well.net/give. Thank

Rob begins a series where we review the vision of Jacob's Well in the context of our upcoming 10 year anniversary.

We fail all the time. We fail in our relationships, in our families, and at work. Wherever we go, we make mistakes. It’s part of being human. That’s the bad news. The good news is that we don’t have to carry the baggage of our failures into the future. With effort from ourselves, and a supportive community, we can leave those failures behind.

Find this week's message outline on page 2 of the Sunday Paper and other resources like discussion guides at www.jacobs-well.net/leftovers. Also watch for our regular "Leftovers" podcasts where we talk through other ideas and parts of the message that ended up on the cutting room floor.

You can support Jacob's Well as a community and help to bring messages and experiences like this to more people at jacobs-well.net/give. Thank you!

You can hear Greg Meyer's message from our Christmas gatherings as well as Heidi Esposito reading our adaptation of Chloe Bonfield's The Perfect Tree.  Perfection is a high standard. We've all got expectations of ourselves, the people around us, and the holidays. Let's reflect together on what perfection really means.  

See what else was going on by opening our Sunday Paper and find other resources like discussion guides at www.jacobs-well.net/leftovers. 

You can support Jacob's Well as a community and help to bring messages and experiences like this to more people at jacobs-well.net/give. Thank you!

We learn from hearing each other's stories. The ancient Jewish tradition of midrash takes a story from the Bible, sometimes only a line or few words, and creates a new story around it. The purpose of midrash isn't to try to be true or accurate or not, but to explore the characters and ideas in the biblical text. It is a way of wrestling with God as Israel is charged with doing. This week Melissa Lock plays out the character of the woman from John 8.1-11. Listen to her story.

This midrash is from week three of "Everyone Loves a Baby" entitled, "The Universe in Their Eyes." Listen to that podcast.

Learn more about Jacob's Well Minneapolis on our website www.jacobs-well.net or on Facebook.

Rob works through the inclusion of both men and women in the nativity story.

It has been said that when you are exasperated with your child, go peek at them asleep. You’ll fall in love all over. There are those moments when we look into their guileless, unspoilt eyes and see the stars in which their atoms were formed. The stories of the Bible give us a picture of God feeling the same way about Jesus; the precious center of existence in which life finds meaning. Was he? Are we then too? It’s time to look to the stars and see what the Christmas story tells.

Find this week's message outline on page 2 of the Sunday Paper and other resources like discussion guides at www.jacobs-well.net/leftovers. Also watch for our regular "Leftovers" podcasts where we talk through other ideas and parts of the message that ended up on the cutting room floor.

You can support Jacob's Well as a community and help to bring messages and experiences like this to more people at jacobs-well.net/give. Thank you!