Pilgrim Church

Provocative Parables of Jesus, The Shrewd Manager with Josh Liem

Luke 16:1-8

This week, we take on what scholars would call a notoriously difficult parable.  Why would Jesus tell a story of a boss commending an embezzler?

For reflection & discussion:

1. Have you listened or learned from a person you’d normally write off?  If so, how?  

2. Find a podcast with a host or guest from the opposite side of you theologically or politically, and ask how you might grow in holiness (rather than anger or bitterness) through them. 

3. What’s in your ‘rulebook’? Where might you be tougher or more exclusive than Jesus?  Why do these exclusions matter to you?  

4. What is one ‘limited resource’ (money, time, attention, relationship) that you could steward more shrewdly for the sake of God’s kingdom and neighbour’s flourishing?

Further Resources:

• Carey Nieuwhof Podcast, “Episode 817: Grieving Your Ministry Wounds: Father Ronald Rolheiser and John Mark Comer on Getting Past Bitterness and Giving Your Life and Death Away,”  ttps://careynieuwhof.com/episode-817/. 

• Klyne Snodgrass, Stories with Intent: A Comprehensive Guide to the Parables of Jesus.

Provocative Parables of Jesus, The Rich Fool with Josh Liem

Luke 12:13-34

How much is too much?  What is wealth for?  This Sunday, we’ll sit with the parable of the Rich Fool and his barns— the only parable where God is a character.

For reflection & discussion:

1. Has God interrupted your soliloquy?  Are your thoughts and actions directed towards yourself— your earnings, possessions, accomplishments, enjoyment, entitlements?  Where might be a place to welcome God’s interruption?

2. “Life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.” – Jesus.  How true is this to your view of life?  

3. There isn’t a formula, a dollar amount or percentage, to a life of generosity that Jesus calls us to.  In your current season, what would a generous, non-worried-about-food/clothing/shelter life look like?  What could be one thing to change this month?

Extra Virgin Oil with guest Rev Raymond Seetoh

Matthew 25: 1- 13

Pitch-black shores, extra virgin oil, and an unexpected call. What does it take to stay ready when God’s timing takes longer than expected? Find out this Sunday with Pastor Raymond as we unpack Matthew 25!

Rev Raymond Seetoh grew up in Singapore and met Jesus while in high school in Australia. He’s served as a pastor in both Singapore and Vancouver, and now calls Cornerstone home while also helping with the B.C. Baptist Association. Raymond is married to his college sweetheart, Rhema, and together they enjoy life with their two teenage daughters.

For reflection & discussion:

What is one step you feel invited to take this week in response to the sermon?

An Answer to Job with Guest Dr. Isabelle Hamley

Job 1 (NRSVUE)

What do we expect to find in the whirlwind? Join us to explore the book of Job, and the story of a man who finds that God is much more than he had ever imagined - and learns to live with himself in the process.

Dr. Isabelle Hamley is a minister, speaker, and writer. She currently serves as Principal of Ridley Hall, an Anglican seminary that trains women and men for lay and ordained ministry. She has previously held posts as church leader, university chaplain, chaplain to the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Theological Adviser to the House of Bishops. Her interests include the Bible in the life

Provocative Parables of Jesus, Susanna with Josh Liem

Luke 8:1-15, 18

Jesus explains the parable of the Soil and the Sower, line by line, and his disciples didn’t get it.  What if we’ve misread this parable too?  Join us as we explore what it means to truly listen to the Word of God.

For reflection & discussion:

1. Who is a Susanna in your life — someone whose faithful endurance you've seen, who the world wouldn’t ever hear about?

2. Reflect on your life.  Which soil(s) have you been?  What is your trajectory?

3. What would setting a trajectory for being good soil look like for your life?

4. Take Luke 4:18–19, Jesus' own summary of the kingdom, and ask: Is what I believe and how I live good news to the poor? Am I captive to voices other than Jesus? Am I a healing presence? Who is the oppressed neighbour Christ has come to free?

5. What has God given you to do today?  This week? Year? Decade?

6. The women at the tomb remembered. Three years after Galilee, standing in front of a rolled-away stone, they still had his words.  As a spiritual practice for this week:  write down something you believe God has said to you.  Date it.  Set a reminder on your calendar to look at it in a month, then a year, from now.  

Further Resources :

Ben Witherington III, “On the Road with Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Susanna, and Other Disciples — Luke 8.1-3”, in A Feminist Companion to Luke, ed. Amy-Jill Levine.

Mary H. Schertz, Luke, Believers Church Bible Commentary

Klyne Snodgrass, Stories With Intent: A Comprehensive Guide to the Parables of Jesus

The Good Enemy with Josh Liem

Luke 10:25-37

This summer, we’ll sit with the parables of Jesus without settling for easy interpretations.  And we’ll start with the most famous and domesticated one.  Have you mastered the parable of the Good Samaritan?  Is that a trick question?

For reflection & discussion:

1. Before this week, who did you picture yourself as in this story? The Samaritan, the priest, the lawyer,  the robber, the wounded? Why do you think that is?

2. Who would you find hardest to receive help from? 

3. Who is someone you stopped believing is capable of compassion?  

4. What is harder for you — to give help, or to receive it? What does your answer tell you?

5. How would you go about changing your social media / Youtube etc. algorithm to feed compassion and re-humanization of “the other” — a political or theological tribe that you disagree with?

6. As a spiritual practice for this week: go watch/listen to one long interview with someone you disagree with, and hear them speak for themselves.  Some great interviewers that I recommend: Theology in the Raw, The Carey Nieuwhof Leadership Podcast, The Diary of a CEO (non-Christian).  Imagine their guest as the Samaritan.

The Necessity of Lament in Troubled Times  With Guest Soong-Chan Rah

Lamentations1:1-3


Soong-Chan Rah is the Robert Boyd Munger Professor of Evangelism and Church Renewal at Fuller Theological Seminary. He holds a ThD from Duke Divinity School, with a primary field of study in theology and ethics, and a secondary field of study in American evangelical history. He also holds an MDiv and a DMin, with a concentration in urban ministry leadership, from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, as well as a ThM from Harvard University, with a thesis on the immigrant church. Dr Rah has authored or coauthored over a half dozen books, many of which have won awards. He is an ordained pastor in the Evangelical Covenant Church, and a member of the Academy for Evangelism in Theological Education, American Academy of Religion, and American Society of Missiology. He has spoken widely on the topics of the witness of the church, cross-cultural ministry, and social justice.

For reflection & discussion:

1. What stood out to you most from the sermon, and why?

2. How does this message challenge or affirm your current understanding of God or faith?

3. Was there a specific story, scripture, or phrase that you found especially meaningful or difficult?

4. How can we live this out together in our daily lives or as a group?

5. What is one step you feel invited to take this week in response to the sermon?

The Slow Harvest With Josh Liem

Galatians 6:1-18

We are wrapping up our Galatians series this Sunday!  

After five chapters of fighting for the gospel, Paul gets practical: carry each other, give generously, and don't grow weary in doing good, even when the harvest is slow, even delayed to the resurrection.  Come tired, come weary, come hungry.  Let Christ give you peace and rest.

For reflection & discussion:

1. Think of something you planted, started, or invested in where you had to wait a long time before anything came of it. A garden, a skill, a friendship. What kept you going, or what made you quit? 

2. Who has carried a burden for you that was too heavy to carry alone? Have you ever told them what it meant?

3. Verse 9 says "let us not grow weary in doing good." Where are you most weary right now? What is that weariness tempting you to give up on?

4. Is there a discipline you practice to give yourself “rest for your soul” in Jesus?  Share with the group.

5. Paul boasts only in the cross (v14), a path that costs him real suffering. What do you gravitate towards boasting in, other than the cross and suffering?  Where is following Jesus actually costing you something right now?

6. Picture someone in your own lineage of faith who didn't grow weary of you. What did their love look like? Is there someone you're being asked to do that for now?

7. What is one specific ‘seed to sow’ this week for you?  Think of the 3 layers: friendship/interdependence for another, giving resources or money to the marginalized, and crucifixion / suffering in love.

Christ or Cannibalism? With Josh Liem

Galatians 5:1-26

Something was tearing the church apart, and Paul had to intervene.  This Sunday, we’re in Galatians 5, and Paul has some of the most shocking lines in the New Testament here.  But he also paints a beautiful picture of true flourishing.  Come and wrestle with what it means to be free, rooted, enslaved to love, and who to trust with the formation of our souls.

For reflection & discussion:

1. When you think about the people who have most shaped your faith, what qualities made them influential? Was it what they taught, how they lived, or both?

2. Paul says the only thing that counts is "faith working through love" (5:6), and that the fruit of the Spirit grows from being rooted in God's love — "we are loved to love."   What are your current practices of abiding / receiving God’s love?  

3. What comes harder for you: receiving God’s love, or obedience to God’s way of love?

4. Paul’s ‘works of the flesh’ are primarily relational: strife, jealousy, factions, dissensions— and they’re on the same list as idolatry and sorcery.  Which of these are you most likely to notice in others, and which ones do you excuse yourself from?  (Speck and the plank)  

5. Jesus said that “they will know you are my disciples by your love for one another.”  Is that true of us?  What practices or changes could we make to make that more true of our community?

For further reflection:

1. If you gravitate towards a ‘faction,’ why?  Is the very act of justifying it doing the very thing Paul is arguing against?

2. The sermon ended with a charge: “go and eat with the person you're least patient with, or sharply disagree with — politically, theologically, ethically.” Who came to mind? What's stopping you, and when could you actually do it this week?

Christ Formed in You with Josh Liem

Galatians 4:8–5:1

Who is forming you into the person you're becoming? Paul pleads with the Galatians not merely to believe the right things, but to resist voices that would shape them into something less than Christ. At the center of his anguish is one great desire: that Christ would be formed in them.

For reflection & discussion:

1. Who is someone (real or fictional) that you wanted to be like when you were young? What was it about them?

2. Paul's opponents had real theological reasons and were trying to protect people from political persecution. What makes someone a false/dangerous teacher that needs to be called out?

3. Who are the loudest voices in your life or social networks that promise “if you do A, you’ll get B,” whether in Christianity or outside of it?  What specifically do they do that is convincing?  

4. Who in your life or in this room knows you well enough to tell you a difficult truth?  What would it look like to be a safe place to tell or receive difficult truths?

5. If someone became exactly like you, what would you hope they'd catch?  What would you hope they wouldn't?

6. The Galatian church welcomed a sick stranger and treated him like an angel of God. What does that kind of hospitality actually cost?  What stops us from offering it?

Bonus reflection for your time of prayer:

“Knowing God” as a spiritual practice is somewhat easy to conceive: study, read scripture, contemplate on Christ.  “Being known by God,” Paul’s corrective in Galatians 4:9, is quite a different angle.  What if intercessory prayer was less about making our requests known to God and changing his mind and seeing miracles happen, and more about being known by God?  How would that change your posture and small group time of prayer for one another