The final part of Moses’ sermon to the Israelites before they enter the land. A simple message: you need to choose – will you choose God and life, or not and death?
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The final part of Moses’ sermon to the Israelites before they enter the land. A simple message: you need to choose – will you choose God and life, or not and death?
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Apart from the unfortunate incident with Ananias and Sapphira, and a few pieces of brutal persecution from the outside world, the early church community is often pictured as idyllic. Rapid growth, open acceptance, a communal lifestyle evidenced by dynamic Gospel focused times of gatherings.
Over the past couple of years Village Church has changed. It still has the same biblical mandate and focus that existed when we first started – to grow followers of Jesus in inner city Brisbane – and the same DNA that shapes how and why we do things. But Village has changed in size, in make–up, in what we run, who we run it for, how you might be engaged with it and probably a hundred other little ways only you might notice. Some of these changes you might rejoice in. Others you might not. But as with any question we face as Christians, the question worth considering is:
As Christians and a Christian community, how do we grapple with and understand change?
Having done the first half of Acts this year, I want to explore this question from Acts 10–11. What we’ll see is the challenges we’re experiencing, while hard, are nothing new. But the ultimate challenge (as seen in the early church) is working out how the Gospel transforms how we view and react to these changes.
There’s three parts to this discussion.
The first part was already published as a PDF, but if you haven’t read it, you can see it here.
What does a beautiful life look like?
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Our biggest need is to know the love of God.
3:17b-19 – And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
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Paul’s in prison, but he’s got a bigger picture of what God is doing in the world than his own circumstances. He knows what God is doing, he knows that God loves him, and he knows that because of what God has started in the Jesus & the church, the suffering he is now experiencing will one day not exist. (Apologies for the sound quality in the second half of the church. Stuff breaks. If it’s too bad, you can always listen to a Keller talk.)
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The Church is God’s wisdom displayed to the world.
3:10 – His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms.
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In Ephesians 2 Paul tells us what our problem is, what God’s solution is, and what it means for lives in Christian community.
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As Village Church has grown over the past few years, we’ve been privileged to have people from a number of different Christian backgrounds and denominations join us. Some might be used to Sunday meetings that are similar to Village, while others might be used to more music, more extended prayer times, and more moments of quiet reflection.
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While these are good things, they’re not part of our Sunday gathering. Our desire has always been to keep that moment (5pm Sundays) as something which anyone can come along to and not make too great a culture shift in order to hear the Gospel and come to know Jesus. At our Sunday gathering, we have two aims; Firstly, to make it edifying for regulars at Village as we meet around God’s Word, pray and encourage each other; Secondly, to make it accessible & understandable for those who might not know God but come along. This filters down to the language we use, the way we explain God’s Words, how we pray, how many songs we do and how we do them. We want to protect those goals, while keep making sure we’re achieving them.
But one of the beauties of the Gospel is that there is diversity even in our unity. While we have the same God, and we know He speaks to us in the same way through His Word & His Spirit, we also know that we’re all wired differently. So while Sunday is a moment aimed at bringing together the whole Village Church community as a declaration to the world of what God is doing, other events are aimed at appealing to different people who are wired differently.
The Music, Prayer & Praise Night is one of them. It’s an experiment, just as beSpoken was. But our hope is to recognise there are many within the Village Church community who long to sing together more, mixed with having more extended times of praying and thanking God for what He’s done for us in Jesus, as well as ministering to each other through this. So while it’s not something that will appeal to everyone, we’re sure it’ll be a great night for many who are wired this way, as well as many others who aren’t!
So if you’re keen on checking it out, it’s at Ithaca Presbyterian Church tonight, 7:30-9pm.
(Note – as Ithaca are generously letting us use their building, we’ll just be asking people for a small donation as a gift to them. They didn’t ask, but it’s just the generous thing to do.)
The Gospel is the great equaliser, but also the great uniter.
2:8-9 – For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.
2:18 – For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.
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