New Sermon Series
“Just follow Jesus and love one another.” It sounds so simple, so obvious. But life tends to be more complicated. Lots of sermons convey the beautiful truth that God wants a relationship with us and the power of Jesus’s incarnation, death, and resurrection to transform our lives. It’s a compelling message, yet it leaves many of us asking the question: “but how?” How can we practically respond to Jesus’s invitation to follow him, grow to become like him, and do the things that he does? How can we live free in his grace while we allow the Spirit to transform us?
Fortunately, for thousands of years, Christians around the world have found God in various common practices giving us a heritage of wisdom and examples to draw from. These practices are not a set of rules to follow or the secret to pleasing God. They don’t win us brownie points or gold stars. They are simply ways that we can respond to Jesus’s invitation to us. It is not necessary to do every practice all of the time, but if we allow it, Jesus will lead us to the things that will bring us closer to him in the season we are in.
Mark Comer writes in “Practicing the Way” that following Jesus involves three steps: being with Jesus, becoming like him, and doing what he does. There are many ways to be with Jesus: rest, solitude, prayer. Each one helps us to get out of our own way and hear from him. Other practices help us to become like Jesus such as discernment, community, fasting, and scripture. Each one can be challenging and can be done in many ways. We can also practice doing the things Jesus did in ways like service, generosity, and hospitality. In each practice, the accountability and support of community makes a huge difference in our ability to follow through and figure out how to do each practice in a way that works for us.
Join us as we learn about and experiment with ways to experience more of God’s presence.
