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When things go badly, it's easy to assume God's favor has lifted—and that assumption runs deep enough that entire churches have been built on promising the opposite. Yet in Acts 13, the disciples who have just heard the gospel find themselves filled with joy and the Holy Spirit at precisely the moment Paul and Barnabas are driven out of the district, which raises a question worth sitting with: what if hardship isn't the absence of God's blessing at all?
We've all felt the crash that follows a sugar high—the emotional win, the reassuring word, the earthly success that lifts us for a moment before the bottom drops out again. Paul knew that feeling too, which is why he doesn't merely greet the Ephesians with good wishes but with something that doesn't fade: “grace and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”
We keep chasing what looks impressive—the king like everyone else's, the success the world promises—forgetting it all carries an expiration date, like a freshly cut tree that soon dries out and becomes trash. Samuel falls into the same trap sizing up Jesse's sons in 1 Samuel 16, until the Lord stops him cold: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.
Greg helps us to think about the importance of being in fellowship with a part of the Body of Christ.
Join Pastor Tim as we think about living as those demonstrating Christian unity.
Pastor Tim is celebrating Christmas in July by thinking about how God gives us gifts available all year long, not just at Christmas.
As we return to Proverbs this summer, we look to Proverbs 2. The challenge in seeking wisdom is that the results often take time — are they worth the wait?
The truth of Pentecost is that we live between the Ascension and Jesus’s return, but we do not live between God’s love.
Excitement will only get us so far. To fulfill the mission of this life, we need more.
Pastor Tim helps us think about the next question in the New City Catechism (“What is the Lord’s Prayer?”). How does the prayer Jesus taught us help us to understand Him and His will for us better?
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