Welcome to the Mariners Church Life Group Leader podcast. This weekly conversation is designed to equip and resource youth to build a healthy life group community that studies God's word, practices spiritual rhythms, and changes the world together. Welcome back to the Life Group Leader podcast. We are excited to be continuing in the UR series.
This has been a great kickoff to our fall. Been so grateful for what God has been doing. He's clearly bringing people to himself this season. We have just been so blessed by the people who are part of our church in what God is doing, not only at Irvine and Huntington Beach, but my gosh, we've now launched four new congregations and God is just gathering people all across Orange County.
And it is so fun to have this unifying series where we get to look at what our true identity is in the person of Jesus. All too often do we get our identity confused by our job, our status, our friends, the people that were associated with the money in our bank account. So many things are vying for what our identity is, but the reality is for those of us who follow Jesus, the most secure thing about us is sound right here in 1 Peter 2, verse 9. And I love that this whole series is hinging on that passage.
Now a quick note before we get into this week's discussion between Jeremy and I, I just want to say that if you're at our Huntington Beach congregation and are one of our life leaders, you'll find that week three for you is titled his servant, but week three for all other congregations is his bride. And so on this podcast episode, we're going to be covering the content for his bride. And just the reason for that switch is, Eric is actually going to be teaching his servant live this weekend at Huntington Beach. And we're going to do a volunteer expo.
And then next week, we're going to talk about his servant on this episode. And we're going to give a little bit more information about the volunteer expo, actually at the end of this episode. So apologize if that feels a little bit confusing. In short, this episode is about his bride.
And that's for all congregations other than Huntington Beach, but Huntington Beach, my friends, you get the blessing of having Eric with you this weekend and a volunteer expo. And so we're praying for you. We hope that you have a really good time. All right, Jeremy, you want to lead us into this week's discussion looking at his bride, what's kind of the overarching goal, where we had in this week?
This week we're looking at how God has declared us holy. And even though we still struggle and stumble, but we're holy because he's given us his righteousness. This isn't anything we've earned. This is a blessing.
This is a gift. And he calls us to be his bride and he's robed us in his righteousness. And as his bride, we're to live faithfully to him. We're to live out this holy life in relationship with him, living out the fact that he's given us a new identity in our relationship.
And as a result, it changes the way we live and we relate to the world around us. It's a funny concept when we think about being his bride, because what we're talking about here is being a church, that the church is the bride. And so it's funny as we find ourselves as part of the connection as individuals, but really it's a collective picture, right? Is that kind of where you think we're heading this weekend?
Yeah, absolutely. And I love that you hit that right up top, because sometimes for people who maybe aren't married or for guys in general to hear like, what do you mean, I'm his bride? Like this is hard for me to kind of wrap my mind how this is gonna apply to me. And yeah, that we see throughout scripture, this imagery used both in the Old Testament and New Testament of how God's people are described in this covenant relationship with him, much like marriage.
You see all throughout the Old Testament, when there's depictions of Israel going astray, there's the prophets used language of adultery and unfaithfulness. And so this relationship and commitment with God, as his people collectively, we collectively are the bride in relationship with God, that language is just throughout scripture. And it really changes the way you read scripture once you start to recognize it. One of the lines that when we had Eric on the podcast a couple of weeks ago, he talked about this week and it has stuck with me since this picture of when we recognize that we are his bride and designed to be holy and set apart from everything else in the world, the one thing that can interfere with that holiness is sin.
And his like overarching goal for this week was that we would be so against, so anti-sin, because the last thing that we would wanna do is sustain the bride of Jesus. Isn't that his powerful language? That's so beautiful. And that's a powerful way to look at it because so often this idea of holiness that we're gonna talk about and an idea of like being a Christian, is it what I do, is it who I am, it's this combination of both.
And you see in the marriage, in a marriage, you're not looking at things or you shouldn't be in a healthy marriage, you're not looking at your life, like what do I have to do now that I'm married, what can I not do now that I'm married? But out of your love for one another, you're seeing this new life that you have together where you're still yourself, but you're now set apart from the rest of the world for this unique relationship that you get to share with one another. And there are things that you do, but it's out of that joy, out of that love, out of that commitment for one another. And ideally, not out of this like but dredging sense of duty, right?
Absolutely, it's gonna be a good conversation. I'm excited to see how this shapes up in our life groups as we just kind of discussed this concept together. Are there any tips or anything that you would encourage our leaders to do in preparation for this week? Yeah, I would, as a leader, think through just some of those weddings that you've been to, maybe your own wedding if you're married.
And just kind of put yourself back in some of those moments of times where either your own wedding, if you're like me, my own wedding is kind of a blur. I really don't remember a whole lot of my own wedding. It's just like, I remember like keep your knees. Just because it was so long ago, right?
Yeah, yeah. I mean, it was 19 years ago, but just, I mean, just so much adrenaline. And I was basically like trying not to pass out and like, okay, don't lock your knees, don't embarrass yourself. But putting yourself back in those places of just remembering some of those feelings that you had, either at your own wedding or when you attend other weddings, actually performed a wedding this past weekend.
And just to remember what it's like to go through those vowels and see people coming to that point of just being excited to give themselves to one another in marriage in this commitment, just, I would really encourage leaders to think back to those types of moments for themselves because it can really enrich the conversations that you have in your group when we can kind of make those connections. Right, so we're really talking about remembering the sacred ceremony parts of a wedding, right? I think it's important. Even as I sit with couples, I'm preparing to do a wedding over the next two weekends, they're two different weddings.
And as I sit with couples, I love to just help them remember that, yeah, this is a party, this is a celebration, absolutely. But really it's talking about a sacred union where there will be those vows and promises made. And it is with the intent that we can keep this relationship pure and holy, right? It's designed that these vows are guardrails and protections in order to ensure that this relationship is healthy from this day forward, right?
The wedding day is not just about a party for their friends. It's about a milestone or a marker in the turning point of this people's relationship forever that now God is kind of joined with them, right? So with that in mind, as you kind of talk to us, you know, about how to really take care of our life group in this kind of regard, what are some other pitfalls perhaps that we may need to avoid, things that we have to just be aware of as we enter into this discussion? So one of the key things we're gonna do both in the sermon and in this small group discussion is making this connection between holiness and being a holy nation.
Again, there's that kind of plural identity, being a holy nation and being the bride of Christ and what that, how those two relate to one another. And I want it to be clear for all of our groups that again, that this holiness that we receive from Christ is a gift. Again, you think back to kind of when you take a new name in marriage or the different gifts you receive at a wedding or whatever, I still have things I use every day from our wedding almost 20 years ago that were gifts. And so that this holiness that we receive is not something that we do to earn this relationship.
It's not something that, you know, we have to act a certain way in order to stay in relationship with God, but it's this gift that he's given us so generously out of his love for us. And we commit in our own lives in relationship to him that we walk this out and we're not gonna do so perfectly. And I think it's healthy to talk about that, like we do fall just like in marriage. There's those times where there is conflict, but because we love each other, because we're committed to one another, we recognize that and we repent and we talk and we work through those things.
And the same is gonna be true in our relationship with Christ that he is going to be perfect and faithful in every way towards us, but we are still gonna stumble. We're still gonna fail. And that does not mean that our relationship with him is not real, that it's not true, that it's not life changing, but it means that we're still in this process of sanctification. And so recognizing those times that we fail doesn't mean, I really hope people can see that when we struggle, maybe even have doubts or people use language of backsliding or whatever else, but that doesn't negate our relationship with Christ.
That doesn't mean that we're no longer in this covenant relationship with him, but he gives us his holiness and constantly invites us back into right relationship with him. Jeremy, can you take a minute and just define for us holy nation as we see it in the book of 1 Peter. My concern is that we can accidentally drift into a conversation about isn't America supposed to be a holy nation when that was not the intent of the writing. So I just, can you take a minute and just let us know, what does he mean by this?
Yeah, that's really good. I'm really glad you brought that up because what Peter is talking about here is that language from the Old Testament, a people set apart for God. It's not a geopolitical state. This was not talking about Israel as a country, as we would know it today, in that sense, but nation meaning ethnos, a people group.
Again, throughout the Old Testament, you saw this picture of God setting apart a people. And sometimes they had political power and sometimes they did not, but they were always his people. And he was using all of these different situations to form them and shape them in a relationship with him so that they could represent him in the world. And really, this points all the way back to Adam, Nev, in the garden, both the picture of marriage, that covenant relationship for doing the work of God in this world, that you saw Adam and Nev, both kind of given that co-laborers and the work that God had given them.
But then also as people set apart to fill the earth with his image, to kind of like the Great Commission of go and make disciples of all nations, that's what we're doing. We're filling the world with his image. And so, yeah, the language of holy nation is that biblical imagery of a people group being set apart, different from the world around them. But it's not talking about a geopolitical, state entity, structure, government, things like that.
Yeah, thank you for that, Jeremy. I appreciate it taking the time just to be sure that our groups don't accidentally enter into a conversation that can turn political and then potentially divisive. And what's intended here is that we actually are more unified around our mission within our city, our country, our world as being a set apart nation spiritually. I mean, that's what we're talking about, identity in Jesus, which is not gonna be defined by just simply national borders and political structures.
So, thank you. So before we turn our attention into the next week, and we talk about volunteer expo and kind of what to expect during the next week's content, any final things you wanna say about being his bride? Yeah, I would encourage leaders, as always, we've provided questions to kind of help guide the conversation and to choose the ones that work best for your group. But to be sure this time that you really look at that look out section about identifying the relevance of God's word in the world, where kind of without getting into any kind of like judgmental posture to really reflect honestly on do you think the world sees the church as being holy and set apart, or are there often things that get in the way of representing Christ in the world?
It is a lot of time, even as a church, can our identities get tied up in other things other than this loving relationship we have by the grace of God through faith in Christ. So, there's some questions to kind of guide some final reflection on as a church, not to point fingers, but to self-reflect, like am I reflecting this loving relationship and all that I do, both personally and corporately, collectively as part of Mariners, as part of the broader Christian church, are we reflecting Christ in this world? Amazing. Well, thank you Jeremy.
So, just a quick note, as we wrap up this episode, we want to let you know that next weekend, as we approach the topic of being his servant, this is going to be a weekend that Eric not only encourages, but actually preaches the value of serving the church. And we are going to host a volunteer expo after every one of our services on the patio, at all of our congregations, there will be things available for people to go and get more information about serving some volunteer teams in various ministries within the church. And so, Life Group Leader, the reason I'm bringing it up now is I want you to even begin planting the seeds for the people of your group to come to church this weekend to not just see that this isn't just about volunteering your time. This is about when we are in pursuit of becoming more like Jesus, and we recognize that at the core of our identity as a Jesus follower is being a servant, these are some easy entry point opportunities for us to be involved in the life of the church.
I actually started at this church as a junior high Life Group Leader when I was in college. I showed up out of nowhere and just said, I started attending church, and I felt really quickly that if I was going to attend here, I wanted to be involved here. And I saw a thing on a volunteer Expo weekend that said, come be a junior high Life Group Leader. And so, I did, and I have seventh grade boys that are now 30 years old.
Wow, that's awesome. It's been a little while. Yeah, they're amazing kids, and I still know the vast majority of them, which is really, really fun. And I want that for you, Life Group leaders and everyone in your group.
And so, come on out next weekend, make sure that you can be here for that. And we'll provide again another episode with some content about having a great discussion about that. So, Jeremy, any final words? No, I'm excited for everyone to discuss this week and to find out how they can also get more plug into serving one another as the church.
All right, Life Groups have a good week. We will see you next time.