We often do not believe that people can change… and here is the most painful part… because of that, we do not believe that we can truly change.

We may say we do aloud, but our thoughts run counter to our words…

We trap ourselves, and others, in defined categories, past actions, and concretized ideas, and leave little to no room for them… or us, to get out.

But according to the Scriptures, Rocky was right. Everyone can change. No one has to remain the same.

God says that we can rise to a New Way… no matter the history we have behind us.

We believe death impossible to overcome.

We may not say it. We may even say the opposite, but if we are honest, we know this to be true.

And yet before us, in what is arguably one of the most fascinating series of events recorded in the Scriptures, John, who became as a little brother to Jesus, gives us *proof*, perhaps difficult proof for those who have not come to trust Jesus, but proof nonetheless, that death is not impossible to overcome.

If we had time we could look at the various historical and documented items that support the historicity of the Bible, and the unlikeliness of it even presently existing if not Divine in origin, but today we will all have to have faith for a moment—or at least enough doubt in our suspicions—to accept that these words are history and not fiction.

And according to these words… Jesus defeated death and promises the defeat of death for any who trusts in Him.

We want to know the mind of God without hearing and heeding the Spirit of God.

Now, maybe you are here and you would not consider yourself a follower of Jesus, and you would say, “I do not know, or even believe that there is a God.”

Fair enough, but can you be honest enough and admit that if there is a God, most of us want to know Him on our own terms... not on His.

God should be able to be known, we think, in a way that does not require a deep and abiding affection; a rich and obedient relationship; a rooted and communal faith; or the persistent and pervasive presence of the Holy Spirit.

But as Paul transitions the thrust of his communicated hope for the Corinthians from the Cross to true wisdom, he instructs them and us: The mind of God can only be known through the Spirit of God.

If you want to know what, why or when, with respect to God’s thoughts, then you must be tapped in completely to God’s Spirit.

Church In The Wild | Hidden Wisdom | 1 Corinthians 2:6-13

We desperately long to know the meaning of life, which can only be discovered in the mystery of God.

And the problem with staking our interests and dollars, it seems, in an industry that promises to do so through books like The Secret and The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success, is that they all are seeking to show the meaning of life by circumventing the mystery of God.

Yet God has shown us the depths of His mystery, in what we naturally see as a most foolish act.

The mystery of God is revealed in the madness of the Cross. Jesus, His being revealed to the world and His being crucified on the cross, unveiled for humanity God’s past, present, and future.

Jesus, Saviour of the world, is the clue to all the secrets of God. Indeed, He, in His death and resurrection, is the key that unlocks the secret to life itself.

Church In The Wild | Mystery Of Secrets | 1 Corinthians 2:1-5

We believe the key to life is to be elevated in this world.

You see, our world is full of those who have been designated as either ‘somebodies’ and ‘nobodies.’ Our world—and sadly our churches—is filled with those who themselves and society have deemed either worthy or not, famous or not, desirable or not, high or low, and these classifications injure all involved.

But this is not how God intended it to be, no. God intended that every human being bear His image, and display His dignity, whether anyone has ever heard of them or not; whether anyone considers them worthy or not; whether anyone thinks them special or not.

And God goes even one step further… He seeks to show how the world will work when His rule is fully manifest in it—God chooses those low in the world to be elevated in His Kingdom.

Church In The Wild | Status | 1 Corinthians 1:26-31

We think we can hold tight to the wisdom of this world, and the scandal of the Cross.

But that is just not possible. In order to truly live a life shaped by the Word’s of God and the good news of the Gospel, everything has to take a backseat. We can only have one primary lens through which we live and evaluate life… through which learn and determine what right and good and true.

This goes without saying, but this is not a campaign against intellectualism or a campaign against a thoughtful approach to faith, it is a call to have God and the Gospel be our plumbline in every way, even as we mine the depths of our intellectual capacity. Why?

Because to believe the gospel [truly believe it] is to have a total transformation of how we see all things. It is a conversion of outlook and imagination, and all of our beliefs, thoughts, views, and values must be transformed by the foolish, scandalous, weak death of Jesus on a Roman Cross.

Church In The Wild | Scandal | 1 Corinthians 1:18-25

The behaviour of Christians often empties the Cross of its power. The behaviour of Christians often empties the cross of its power. What do I mean by this? I mean that so very often it is not Jesus with whom my friends who do not follow Him, have a problem... it is with us… His people… the Church.

It is our behaviour, our infighting, our hypocrisy, our conflating faith with politics, our individualism, our lack of follow through, our prejudicial actions, our bigotry, our racial, ethnic, socioeconomic, and social mobility segregation that make people outside of the Covenant Community suspect of those inside… suspect of the God that they say they serve, and suspect of the Cross and the power it possesses.

And yet, there is one behaviour that may, above all, be the source of the great majority of that suspicion—how totally divided Jesus’ supposedly one Body appears to be.

Just last year I was speaking with a new pastor friend of mine. He called me to tell me that he had decided it was time for him to retire. He is older, but not old. The church he was leading has incredible potential and already does some incredible work.

When I asked him “why now,” “why so suddenly,” his comment was sullen but firm, “I just never really recovered from the split we had years ago. I am tired.”

For a number of reasons I will not go into detail, but suffice it to say that the church had divided along lines of allegiance to certain leaders, and because they could not reconcile, there was a significant split that cost the church not only the momentum in their ministry, but their witness of the power of Jesus’ death on the cross.

Division in the church diminishes the power of the Cross.

Church In The Wild | One Family, Indivisible | 1 Corinthians 1:10-17

We really believe that God does not have enough Grace for us. We really believe that Grace will fall short of something in our lives, past, present, or future.

In fact, if we can just have one honest moment here, We are often held captive by our past, confused about our present, and fearful of the future. We have done too much. We are too bad... too weak... too inconsistent. We will never be enough.

Hear me, each of those sentiments is wrong. Those are lies. There is no such thing as too much for Grace to cover. There is no such thing as too weak… confused… inconsistent for Grace to cover. There is no such thing as being enough or a future version of yourself that is somehow more worthy. God’s Grace is abundant for it all… for us all.

God gives grace to cover our past, strengthen our present, and secure our future.

Church In the Wild | Grace & Peace | 1 Corinthians 1:1-9

What type of church would Renovation be, if each one of us lived with a posture of becoming “All Things To All People” so that we might save some? How would our homes and our communities be different? Our text for today keeps us in Corinth, but in Paul’s 2nd address to the Corinthian church, we get a chance to see how they were reminded of their call and the importance of their COMMUNITY.

We seem to have an issue with evangelism. The question we need to ask ourselves, why? Why is it, that one of the central disciplines for the Christian life has become utterly distasteful? Why is it, that the thought of us going into our places of work, school, or social interaction and specifically finding an opportunity to do evangelism causes us great discomfort or anxiety.

I think if we are honest with ourselves we all know the answer,

We are overly concerned with our present and wholly unconcerned with peoples eternity.

When was the last time we thought about our co-workers eternity? When was the last time we thought about our neighbors eternity? I’ll be the first one to bleed, as a pastor the gravitational pull of this gig is towards Christians. And to my shame, I have gone months without thinking about my neighbors eternity.

But the scriptures paint a very different picture for us. For the disciple of Jesus, our lives should be one of perpetual evangelism. That

For the sake of saving some, we fight for common ground with all.