Imago Dei Community Sermons

Garry Friesen preached this morning from John chapter 1. The book of John introduces Christ relationally, as part of the Trinity co-existing with God forever. John quickly moves to the point that this Jesus became flesh and dwelt among us. The question so many of us ask is "how are we going to know God if we can't see him?" Scripture teaches us that if we've seen Jesus, we've seen God. We get to see Jesus through the pages of Scripture. If you want to talk about God, or to know God, you must turn your focus to Jesus. All along the way God has been with us. But it is only in his becoming flesh (the incarnation) that we are able to know him. What a gift. What a relational gift! John 1:1 - 18

Christ became poor so that we might become rich. In light of this, a way to enter into the advent story this year is to give away what we have to those in need. This is the very nature of God…giving himself away relationally to us who are in need. Living in the imago dei, we should also become givers like this. What does this actually look like for us this year? How about not buying anything for someone that they don’t NEED? How about learning to give RELATIONALLY? There are huge needs in the world that we can redistribute the money we save towards. Here is a short list of places we will be sending money: Local Initiatives: 1. Binsfield Middle School 2. Local Ministries (Refugees, 3 oClock People, etc) Global Initiatives 1. Serve Life – Asia -micro enterprise loan initiative 2. World Vision – South America -providing Alpacas for long term income opportunities 3. World Vision – Africa -wells 4. LaHash – Africa -“Renew”; sex worker relief ministry in Keny

Matthew 1:1 - 6

Colossians 1:1 - Colossians 4:18

The gospel is not bound to any given culture. It is a-cultural. It can enter any specific culture and engage with different redemptive windows of that culture. This is our philosophy of ministry at Imago Dei in a nutshell. However, when the gospel enters a culture, in addition to redeeming aspects of it the gospel also critiques pieces of the culture that are opposed the values of God’s Kingdom. This is what it means to live a prophetic life. We see this type of critique in the incarnation itself. Herod’s Kingdom (the culture in which Christ literally showed up) was one driven by the values of mass wealth, power of military force, greed, and personal gain. Christ enters this culture through poverty, weakness, dependency, and sacrifice. This is the biblical picture of advent. How does our current celebration of Christmas reflect this incarnation? That is, does our experience of the advent season match the biblical values of the gospel? What can our advent season look like this year if we intentionally choose t

If we claim to be a Christ follower, then we are following the Prince of Peace. Why is it that when the world is looking for peace, the church is not typically a place they seek advice? Could it be that we really have no clue about what it looks like to be peace-makers? It is not quite that simple though, because our Prince of Peace is also described as bringing a sword. What is that all about? It appears Christ walked a tightrope of tension being a peacemaker, and turning over tables. Not very many modern day examples come into mind. Martin Luther King is perhaps one example of a man, sticking to his convictions of truth, who walked this tightrope well. Most of us fall victim to one or both of two common temptations; judging others, or enabling others. The Apostle Paul is a biblical example of a man who walks the tension between peace and truth-telling in integrity. At Mars Hill, in Acts 17, he brings truth (the whole truth) to the Athenians in a peaceable way. Paul imitated Christ in several ways. First of

A common thread in anyone’s life that has a valid claim as one following the ancient paths of devotion is a gospel shaped life. This entails having a living doctrine of the gospel that transforms your life. Doctrine is often accused of being dry, sterile, or even dead. But a true Christian doctrine is exactly the opposite. It has a blood stained cross and an empty tomb at its core. Christ’s substitution upon the cross for us should not be a boring concept. It is more than a story to tell at Easter. When embodied, it brings life in all its fullness. When we look to the Bible, there are at least four radical things that the gospel does when we truly encounter it. 1. It provides forgiveness. The pressure of carrying our own sin is what goes wrong with most religions. We cannot be further shaped by the gospel until we offload the tendency to carry our own sin. We offload this at the cross. 2. It removes any condemnation. Even if we offload our sin at the cross, most of us struggle with the guilt that’s left behin

Proverbs 3:5 - 6

Hebrews 11:23 - 29

Luke 9:23-26

Acts 2:41 - 47

Mark 5:1 - 20

Romans 16:1 - 27

Romans 15:14 - 22

Romans 14:1 - 15:9

Jesus talks about the Kingdom of God in multi-faceted ways. It is dynamic. It is living. It is experiential. It is a reality! Those of us that constantly ask, “how much longer?” are missing the current reality of the Kingdom. Jesus teaches that the Kingdom of God starts small…like a seed. So often we are looking for the big things, because small seems insignificant. But it is precisely here, in the seemingly insignificant areas of our life, that the Kingdom of God is breaking in! So often, we are caught looking the other way…waiting for the bigger and better reality. In addition to starting small, another reality of “Kingdom Seeds” is that they have to die. This is the mess of the Kingdom. In order for a flower to become beautiful, it must go through a process of dying. The seed dies, goes into the ground with decomposing dirt (which is a larger dying process) and eventually comes to new life that is beautiful. It’s interesting to note that God grows this new life. We cannot grow a plant, we ca

In the gospel according to John, Christ shows his full extent of his love by washing his disciples’ feet. This is an act reserved for the house servant (or slave). Jesus immediately follows this up with the ultimate act of service upon the cross. In his letter to the Philippians, Paul shares a hymn that captures Jesus’ heart—one of humble service to the point of death. Christ has set an example for us. Indeed, he calls his disciples to follow his example of humble service. But Christ also proclaimed the Kingdom of God vocally to thousands during his years of ministry. What does it look like for us to walk in the tension between service and proclamation? Instead of clinging to our “rights” or our reputation, we are to lay those aside and view others as more important than ourselves. When we become more and more infected with the heart of Jesus we will have a broken heart for our co-workers who do not know Christ. We will begin caring about our neighbor who drives us crazy with their idiosyncrasies. This will l