York Alliance Family of Churches Podcast

Generosity must be a way of life, not just a moment-in-time action. Jesus invites us to leverage all that we have for God's Kingdom purposes, both in this age and the age to come.

We live in a world that emphasizes scarcity, which often moves us toward greed, materialism and discontent. Jesus, however, taught that generosity is the key to both being content and living in freedom. We can only live this way if we shift our perspective away from scarcity towards the abundance of God.

Generosity can't be limited to, but must include, our resources, financial and otherwise. Jesus taught extensively on how we handle our material resources, constantly reminding us that the way we handle them shows what is in our hearts. Far from eliminating the principle of tithing, Jesus taught us to move beyond a fixed standard into a rule of life that reflects the generosity of God.

Our goal as apprentices of Jesus can be summed up in a variety of ways. However, one practical way is that we would become people of love, specifically, the kind of people who both receive and give the love of Jesus. We can only become people who are completely pervaded by love if we love others generously.

What does the church have to offer the world that no other person or organization can? While the church most certainly should meet basic material needs in people, we must always be sure to offer the one thing that no one else can offer — the transformational love of Jesus.

Sacrificial and authentic communities were not anomalies in the early church, and they shouldn’t be in the modern church either. By caring about and for one another, the church becomes a countercultural movement that pours out grace.

Peter’s boldness and example of a life filled with the Spirit was a product of his experience of radical grace after deep failure at Jesus’s crucifixion. God will often use our failures to humble us and help shape us into the image of His Son.

The waiting process for followers of Jesus always contains two key elements: worship and prayer. When we expand our view of worship to a lifestyle and engage prayer as the first and primary work of the believer we are preparing ourselves for the work that Jesus loves to do.

The four-quadrant call of Jesus is something that must be spoken. However, words are not enough. We need to live out the Kingdom in the world around us so that people can experience the Kingdom, not just hear about it.

The beginning of the book of Acts provides a foundation for all that is to come—a clear missional direction, a call to be reliant on God's power and not our own, and a supernatural fusion of the Kingdom of God with the reality of earth. Every encounter we have with Jesus should call us back to engaging these same truths.