December 26, 2010 • Chris Edmondson • John 13:1–16
Our God is awesome. Our God is powerful. But what does God do with His power? What does an all-powerful God do with absolute power? What do people tend to do with power? Unfortunately, as we look around us, we don’t have many good examples of the use of power to draw from. But when we look back into the life of Jesus, we'll see the purpose of power exemplified.
God is Messy
December 19, 2010 • Chris Edmondson • Luke 2:1–12
Many of us think of a God who is someone like Martha Stewart— someone who wouldn’t dare enter our condemned, messy house. God could and would never use us because we’re just too messy. We’re a mess. And we think that God could never use us until we clean up our messy lives.
What we learn from Christmas is that God does His best work in the middle of a mess. Born in a urine soaked, smelly barn and wrapped up in rags in a feeding trough for animals. Nobody went through the barn and scoured it with Softscrub ahead of time. Yet the King of the universe—the Alpha and the Omega—enters into human history in a little bundle, wrapped in obscurity and poverty and humility, because that is God’s signature.
God is Gift Giver
December 12, 2010 • Chris Edmondson • Psalm 81:8–16, Psalm 34:8, Matthew 7:9–11, Deuteronomy 6:10–12
There is something about watching a child’s face beam as he or she bounds down the stairs on Christmas morning. Racing to the Christmas Tree, they tear into the presents hoping to find the toy that they have been dreaming of. God our Father likes giving us good gifts. But are we going to trust that His gifts are better for us, or are we going to insist on our own way?
God Is Great. God is Good.
November 28, 2010 • Chris Edmondson • Habakkuk 1:1–5, Habakkuk 3, Romans 5:8
God is great. God is good. Almost all of us learned a little prayer when we were 2-years old. We believed that when we were younger. But as we continued to live life, we discovered something. The words of that prayer—the words of that song—didn’t match up with the pictures we were seeing in life. Our problem? Our perspective is too narrow. We’re only looking at what’s right in front of us. And don’t see the bigger picture. We have that problem. So did Habakkuk.
God is Spirit
November 21, 2010 • Chris Edmondson • John 14:15–27, John 16:5–7, 1 Corinthians 6:19
Frustrated as you try to live out the Christian life? Maybe you've tried only to find that you keep falling for the same temptations over and over again. You really do want to live it out your faith, but try as you do, you find yourself unable at times. In this session we'll discuss how the Holy Spirit helps us live out our Christian faith in a surprising way—by living the Christian life through us.
