living for eternity today
It’s a simple fact that I can’t give away someone I haven’t first received. I have to have it in order to give it away. I know that sounds pretty simple but so often we fail at sharing something because we haven’t properly invested in it ourselves. This week at Living Word Galena, we talked about forgiveness. The idea was that I’m only going to forgive as much as I’ve been forgiven. If I don’t value my own forgiveness, then I’m not going to forgive others well.
Continue readingThis week at Living Word Galena we took a moment to stop and just be. It’s a pretty hard thing to do if you’re honest with yourself. Not focusing on work or to do lists or meetings or meal planning on running kids around or band practice or sporting events but just stopping for even just a minute to be, simply be.
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In our lives, we have a tendency to feel like we have to choose. Well, in some cases that’s very true. I mean some things in life require a choice, but not everything! Over the next 6 weeks, we’re going to journey through something called the Red Letter Challenge at Living Word Galena. This challenge is all about finding the words of Jesus and seeing where they lead us. So for the next 40 days or so we’re going to do a daily reading together, join small groups and these Sunday messages will chart the course for the week ahead.
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This week we wrapped up our sermon series titled Jesus is Greater. In this series, we’ve discovered how Jesus is greater than everything! This week we take that truth and apply it to our problems and the giants we face. It’s easy to let our troubles and temptations and challenges seem so large that they’re all we see. But what would happen if we stopped looking at the giant problem and started looking at the giant God?
Continue readingWe live in a dog eat dog kind of world. Every moment is about trying to get ahead in life. We need to be better than everyone else in class or in the office. We need to be the best on the team and the number one in the league. We need to even be better than we were yesterday for crying out loud! Nothing is ever good enough. But ever happened to humility? This week we talked about humbling ourselves versus being humbled by someone else.
Continue readingAs Paul wraps up his letter to the Colossians, he does so with an emphasis on prayer. He tells them to pray without ceasing – being steadfast in prayer. I don’t know about you but I’m not the greatest example of a steadfast prayer life. But a mentor of mine who was recently called to be with Jesus reminded me how important prayer was. He told me that prayer not only would shape my life but the lives of those around me. This is why I stopped telling people that I’d pray for them. Instead I just offer to pray with them.
But prayer isn’t just so God fixes things. That’s the easy time to pray. We pray when we need something. We pray when we’re stressed. We pray when we want God to do something. Occasionally we’ll pray a little thank you in there somewhere. But the prayers that Paul talks about here are prayers that start before our feet hit the floor in the morning and go until our heads hit the pillow at night. You see prayer isn’t just for God to do something or thank him for what he’s already accomplished.
Prayer fuels the proclamation of the gospel. Share on XPrayer fuels the proclamation of the gospel.
When we read the bible or share it with others. When we enter worship or leave to go home. When we start a conversation with a friend or start a new school year. When we leave our job for the last time or enter the doors of a job for the first time. In every situation God wants us to call on him. He wants us to ask him for power to be his witness right there, wherever we are. It’s that simple. Prayer is the fuel we need share our faith.
This week we took another chunk of Paul’s letter to the church of the Colossians. Up until this point we’ve seen Paul tell us to follow Christ. He’s been pretty specific about how important it is to follow but pretty abstract about what that looks like in our day to day lives. Here in Colossians 3:18-4:1 he takes time to break this down and applies it to our most critical life relationships.
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Where does your identity come from? Some say it’s what you do. Others say it’s what you have. Still others say it’s what you believe. But what if our identity wasn’t about something that we achieved but something we received. That’s the theme of this week’s message. True identity isn’t about us at all; it’s about what’s been done for us.
Continue readingAs a child it was fun to step on shadows. I thought stepping on someone’s shadow was the same as stepping on them. I would kick shadows and step on them as a way of getting back at someone who hurt me or tease someone who needed a little gentle prodding. But we all know that stepping on shadows isn’t really effective!
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For millennia there has been a constant in the world. It’s the same yesterday, today and will be honestly forever. The problem however is that we tend to not live like we already know the answer. We try to add a little here or change a little there. We make a tweak or a twist and try to put our own little spin on things. But the reality of the matter is in our lives there really and truly is one answer to the struggles, pains, loneliness and other issues we face. There’s only one real place to go where we can find meaning and peace and comfort and connection beyond our ability to grasp.
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