Common Ground

Luke 10:25-37 But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead.  In the ongoing school of love, there are lessons that cannot be taught, but only experienced. Lessons like trust, forgiveness, who's my neighbor, and what or who is the correct object/person to give my heart to? Lauryn's album is an exploration in all of these things. One day a Pharisee was trying to trap Jesus and he tells the man a parable about a man who had been beat down. The crowd and the man went away amazed at Jesus' teaching. In this new year, we need to examine afresh not only the teachings of love that Christ gave us, but also the example of love that he still gives us. Join us as we worship Christ and grow in love for one another.

Isaiah 25:1-9 For you have been a stronghold to the poor, a stronghold to the needy in his distress, a shelter from the storm and a shade from the heat; for the breath of the ruthless is like a storm against a wall, like heat in a dry place. Jesus said, "In this life, you will have troubles, but take heart, I have overcome the world." Blood on the Tracks is an album of loss and heartache. It's the feeling we all have in this world where we experience trouble. So how can we take heart? How do we anchor our loves and joys to the kingdom of God in this new year? How do we walk through our heartaches as Christ would? 

Luke 2:41-52After three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. 47 And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. 48 And when his parents saw him, they were astonished. And his mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress.” 49 And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?” Guest Speaker: Hans Labor

Luke 2 and Isaiah 9

Matthew 1:18-25 And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. Marriage. The Holy Family. Father, Mother, and Child. When we look at the engagement of Joseph to Mary during the season of Advent it reminds us that God is present even through the rocky and difficult times. This season of the year is hard on many families but particularly on marriages. Join us as we look at righteous man, caught between two nearly impossible choices. 

Luke 1:39-56 And Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant..." What is the source of all of your joy? I mean where does it come from? Joy breaks into the Advent season with the color pink and disrupts the bleak mid-winter with the news of a baby to be born. Mary's soul can hardly take it and likewise, our lives, chosen by God to inhabit the Christ should burst at the very thought of God not just with us, but in us. Glory be to the Father of Lights! Join us as we celebrate this joyful news that "for unto us a child is born! A son is given!"

Matthew 2:1-23 & 11:11-15 When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him; and assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. There is no such thing as a sentimental Christmas. The coming of God comes to us with love that puts on display the violent hearts of men. God coming to us is as an unwanted foreigner. God coming to us is as ticking time bomb putting on display the desires of the flesh and the kingdoms we build. It is not an easy passage to preach through, but we cannot get to the Christ-child without coming to the reality of our own lack of peace. We will light the candle of peace and learn to "wait in a violent world" like men and women who belong to Christ. Join us as we look at the often overlooked Christmas passage of the Slaughtering of the Innocents and grow in peace. 

Isaiah 65:17-66:2“See, I will create     new heavens and a new earth. The former things will not be remembered,     nor will they come to mind. But be glad and rejoice forever     in what I will create, for I will create Jerusalem to be a delight     and its people a joy. I will rejoice over Jerusalem     and take delight in my people; the sound of weeping and of crying     will be heard in it no more."

Isaiah 61:-17; 62:1-5 The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound.  Every sermon has a text. Every message that is a God honoring sermon needs to be rooted in the word of God. Jesus is our model for this. If you find yourself in a church that doesn't use scripture as the source content but rather someone's opinion, you know that you are in the wrong place. We find ourselves toward the end of our series in Isaiah, and we come to a passage that held great significance for Jesus. In fact, it was the text he used for his very first sermon. Join us as we talk about why this passage was so important to Jesus and why it should be important to us. 

Isaiah 52:13-53:12 He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth. Join us as we talk about love. Not since Good Friday will we have discussed this level of sacrifice and peace. Bring a friend who is hurting, who is cast out, who is lonely and broken, or bring yourself in the same state. Christ who is our peace promises to meet us where we are as we lift him up. We look forward to a morning of worship that will cost us everything. 

Isaiah 44:24-45:25 I will go before you and level the exalted places, I will break in pieces the doors of bronze and cut through the bars of iron, I will give you the treasures of darkness and the hoards in secret places, that you may know that it is I, the Lord, the God of Israel, who call you by your name. There is no hurt that you have gone through that God does not want to heal. No suffering that you have endured that he does not want to redeem. No sin so great that he is not standing at the ready to wash it away. Israel was in a desperate place when God flexes his cosmic muscle to declare that "I alone am God and I will give to you the treasures from out of the darkness." Join us as we worship the great and holy king and walk a step closer with him through the darkness and into the light. 

Isaiah 40:1-31 Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the Lord's hand double for all her sins. A voice cries: “In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. It's hard to wait. It's real hard to wait when you are in any kind of emotional or physical discomfort, and yet, Isaiah 40 gives all of us reasons to find joy and hope in the waiting. Join us as we gather to worship and wait. Guest Speaker: Joel Pazmino

Isaiah 35:1-10 The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom like the crocus; it shall blossom abundantly and rejoice with joy and singing. The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, the majesty of Carmel and Sharon. They shall see the glory of the Lord, the majesty of our God. Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who have an anxious heart, “Be strong; fear not! Are you parched? Are you dry? Have the troubles of this world and the darkness of sins shame held you desert of spiritual thirst? Even as God allows Israel to go through exile he promises that days of refreshing are coming, that there will be streams that flow through the desert. Can you resonate with the hope of this promise? God did not abandon his people and he will not abandon you. Join us for a time of worship and open hearts as God's great streams of abundance flow again over his people, giving us hope for the journey.

Isaiah 11:1-11; 12:1-6 The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them. 7 The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. 8 The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den. 9 They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. God has huge plans for this world. The prophet Isaiah drops clues into the final culmination of peace in a way that we could not imagine. Beyond being an Eden-revisited, the Peaceable Kingdom will have a memory of the time of injustice and yet will be a place of total and complete Shalom. There will be no death on God's holy mountain and all of his creation will be at rest together. Yet, we struggle in the here and now with our own inte

Isaiah 7:10-16 Again the Lord spoke to Ahaz: “Ask a sign of the Lord your  God; let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven.”  But Ahaz said, “I will not ask, and I will not put the Lord to the test.”  Have you ever asked God for a sign? Of course, we have all asked God to show himself to us in one way or another, perhaps even in a grilled cheese. However, what would you do if God said he'd give you a sign of his power and control? In one of the most famous passages in Isaiah, there is a lot of conversation going on between God and the king of Judah. The conversation points to a lack of faith and trust in the Lord and we can also relate to that. Join us as we look at God's sign to his people that he is for us and not against us, that he is with us and not far from us.

Isaiah 6:1-13 In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!” How do you feel in the presence of God? A bit unsure of what to say? Super excited like you're spending time with your best friend? Shameful and scared because you don't feel you measure up? Throughout the centuries as the saints and sinners of God have been in his presence, one things is sure, it is a dreadfully wonderful thing. Isaiah is no different. He feels like he's going to die and he says, "Woe is me, for I'm a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips." To be in the presence of a Holy God is no joke, and yet, God in his mercy, transforms his life in this moment and Isaiah is never

Isaiah 5:1-7 Let me sing for my beloved     my love song concerning his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard     on a very fertile hill. 2 He dug it and cleared it of stones,     and planted it with choice vines; he built a watchtower in the midst of it,     and hewed out a wine vat in it; and he looked for it to yield grapes,     but it yielded wild grapes. The imagery of vines, branches, vineyards, and fruit are all throughout the Bible. Jesus would even talk about it time and time again in his teaching on the kind of people that his disciples are to be. We are to produce good fruit. Yet, we all know that the kind of fruit that is produced is based on the kind of care and nurture that goes into the vine and the plant. "You will reap what you sow." However, Isaiah 5 paints a very different picture of God's meticulous care and love that he poured into Israel and yet still produced sour grapes. Join us as we talk about God's love for his children and how we can be the kind of fruit bearing church that God is c

Isaiah 1:1-20 Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth;     for the Lord has spoken: “Children have I reared and brought up,     but they have rebelled against me. The ox knows its owner,     and the donkey its master's crib, but Israel does not know,     my people do not understand.” The book of Isaiah comes out swinging at Israel's sin, and he calls the people of God to a repentance that goes beyond lip service. In fact Isaiah, speaks for God as his prophet and says of God, "Even your prayers disgust me." How did the children of God stray so far from his heart? What implications does this have for our own worship and repentance? The Puritans use to pray, "Lord I need to repent of my repentance" and this passage of Isaiah falls in line with that sentiment. God calls us to an active form of repentance that goes beyond our Sunday worship and gets to the heart of what it truly means to be a follower of Jesus. Join us as we jump head first into the story of Isaiah.

Acts 4:42-47 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts,  praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved. The Gospel of Jesus Christ had its beginnings in House Churches and in the public squares. By and large, we have moved the sharing of the gospel to halls, theaters, and large gatherings. While this is just a reality, what are we possibly missing out on by putting that responsibility onto the professionals and taking it out of our own home? What are we quietly saying by "going to church" rather than "being the church." Join us as we talk about the early church gatherings and dream big about what Christ wants to do in our homes this upcoming year! 

Ephesians 2:11-22 And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. 18 For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God... Life and joy happen around the table. As followers of Christ, we have the chance to offer as much life and sustenance to those who are lacking and we can do that best around our tables. Join us as we talk about our Fall Groups and share the heart of Christ for life around the table.