In Christ Alone
Lent 2021
Body Life
March 28, 2021 • Rev. Dr. Gerrit Dawson
The spirituality of our interconnectedness in Christ directs us to work out its practicality. We live our individual distinctiveness in concord with other believers. Paul writes with piercingly simple profundity. A body has many parts. Each one is needed. A body won’t work if somehow, absurdly, the hand starts complaining it wants to be an eye. Or if the nose disdains the feet that carry the body. Within our shared life in Christ, we need each other’s unique contributions, and even each others’ different, sometimes difficult backgrounds.
In Christ=In His Body
March 21, 2021 • Rev. Dr. Gerrit Dawson
Being in Christ connects us to one another in eternal bonds. The Lord Jesus does not flatten us into some bland homogenous unity. His Spirit awakens the unique personalities, gifts and insights of each believer. He brings us alive. He also creates a unity deeper than tribalism. Skin color, biology, desire, cash—none of these singly or together are adequate to identify creatures uniquely made in the image of God. We have a better story. We joyfully embrace a shared status as created and beloved.
Living in Christ
March 14, 2021 • Rev. Dr. Gerrit Dawson
Imagine the divine embrace of Father and Son. Then claim how you are included. In that circle. The Spirit has relocated you into Christ. And Christ is in the Father’s arms. We’re gathered home in the everlasting embrace of the God who is love, who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
The Great Yes
February 28, 2021 • Rev. Dr. Gerrit Dawson
Jesus is the meeting place between the promises of God and the faithfulness required of humanity. The people waited for centuries for the LORD to fulfill his Word to them. The LORD waited patiently knowing his people could not ever, on their own, keep his law. The waiting ended in Jesus. He enacted our faithfulness and his Father’s promises. So God and humanity meet in Christ alone. Jesus becomes the embodied fulfillment of all God’s promises to his people. He resets the whole meaning of promises made and fulfilled by what he suffers, what he conquers and what he gives us. All the promises of God find their Yes in him.
