Water City Church

Closing message in our series recentering on the Beatitudes. This week, we sit with the question: What is persecution in our actual context?The Kingdom of Heaven is not fragile.The kingdom of God will not be defeated.The kingdom is still open to all.“There’s trouble ahead when you live only for the approval of others, saying what flatters them, doing what indulges them. Popularity contests are not truth contests—look how many scoundrel preachers were approved by your ancestors! Your task is to be true, not popular." Luke 6:26 (the Message)

Luke 24"I have never had clarity; what I have always had is trust.  So I will pray that you trust God.” Mother Teresa

John 20 - Faith comes before understanding..."Almost nothing that makes any real difference can be proved.  I can prove the law of gravity by dropping a shoe out the window.  I can prove that the world is round if I’m clever at that sort of thing – that the radio works, that light travels faster than sound.  I cannot prove the greatness of the great or the beauty of the beautiful.  I cannot even prove my own free will; maybe my most heroic act, my truest love, my deepest thought, are all just subtler versions of what happens when the doctor taps my knee with his little rubber hammer and my foot jumps.” Frederick Buechner, Wishful ThinkingLink for Art Study - Two Disciples at the Tomb by Henry Ossawa Tanner

“And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume...”Mary took the most precious thing she possessed and spent it all on Jesus. Love is not love if it nicely calculates the cost.  It gives its all, and its only regret is that it has not still more to give.

Guest Speaker: Rachel Yokers

It’s the most demanding of all the Beatitudes, because there is no hiding.“Rules for Self-Discovery:1. What we want most;2. What we think about most;3. How we use our money;4. What we do with our leisure time;5. The company we enjoy;6. Who and what we admire;7. What we laugh at.A. W. Tozer

Matthew 5:7 "Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy."“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view... Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.” Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

"No one is just one thing, even the worst of us.  That doesn’t excuse anyone’s behavior, but it does complicate a narrative we might otherwise want to make very simple.”                                                                        MikeCosper, Land of my Sojourn

Jesus' words, "Blessed are the meek," are a counter voice to the growing number of angry alpha pseudo-religious. They are an invitation... They are a challenge... They are healing...“We may say as a general rule for life that it is never right to be angry for any insult or injury done to ourselves – that is something that no Christian must ever resent – but that it is often right to be angry at injuries done to other people.  Selfish anger is always a sin; selfless anger can be one of the great moral dynamics of the world.” William Barclay

"Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted." Matthew 5:4"Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break,"  Shakespeare, Macbeth

As a follower of Christ, what is our place in this moment? The way of the Kingdom of God is a different path.“Blessed are the poor. Blessed are you who are conscious of your lack of merit and readily open yourselves to the divine mercy.”
 Brennan Manning, The Importance of Being Foolish

Before Jesus ever began his sermon, the disciples first came to him. Are we willing to come to Jesus... even when that means God is going to disrupt our lives?

Matthew 2The Joy of the Magi is on display, contrasted against Herod's rage. “Son,'he said,' ye cannot in your present state understand eternity...That is what mortals misunderstand. They say of some temporal suffering, "No future bliss can make up for it," not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory. And of some sinful pleasure they say "Let me have but this and I'll take the consequences": little dreaming how damnation will spread back and back into their past and contaminate the pleasure of the sin. Both processes begin even before death. The good man's past begins to change so that his forgiven sins and remembered sorrows take on the quality of Heaven: the bad man's past already conforms to his badness and is filled only with dreariness. And that is why...the Blessed will say "We have never lived anywhere except in Heaven, : and the Lost, "We were always in Hell." And both will speak truly.” C.S. Lewis, The Great DivorceArt Study: “The Adoration of the Magi” by Peter Paul Rubens1st - LINK2nd - LINK

Herod the Great is yet another example of the anti-peace of this world.Matthew 2:1 - 18"It is clear how such a man would feel when news reached him that a child was born who was destined to be king.  Herod was troubled, and Jerusalem was troubled, too, for Jerusalem knew well the steps that Herod would take to pin down this story and to eliminate this child.  Jerusalem knew Herod, and Jerusalem shivered as it waited for his inevitable reaction." William Barclay

Luke 1:5–25“Blessed are the ears which hear God’s whisper and listen not to the murmurs of the world.” Thomas A’ Kempis

Matthew 18:26 - 35There are times when the most loving and Christlike thing you can do is say:  “I forgive you…but this relationship has to change.”

Jesus is teaching us to pray in all directions:  The Now:       Give us today our daily bread. The Past:      And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. The Future:    And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’

“One of the most curious facts of the Gospels is that there is no definition of the Kingdom.  The Kingdom is described in pictures and in analogies and in its demands and effects, but it is never in so many words defined.” William Barclay

In prayer, as in life, knowing God shapes all that follows.“To hallow God’s name means to treat His name as ultimate, as weighty – to center our entire being around who He is, not to reduce Him to a category of convenience.” Tim Mackie

“We live, as Jesus lived, in a world all too full of injustice, hunger, malice and evil.  This prayer (The Lord's Prayer) cries out for justice, bread, forgiveness and deliverance.  If anyone thinks those are irrelevant in today’s world, let them read the newspaper and think again.” N.T. Wright 

Guest Teacher: Rachel Yokers

In Ecclesiastes, the Teacher declares that limitations point to the meaninglessness of life. Yet, rightly understood, these limitations actually draw us into a life of true meaning.

Ecclesiastes teaches us that joy is God’s gift, even in the midst of life’s contradictions.“Estella, to the last hour of my life, you cannot choose but remain part of my character, part of the little good in me, part of the evil. But, in this separation I associate you only with the good, and I will faithfully hold you to that always, for you must have done me far more good than harm, let me feel now what sharp distress I may. O God bless you, God forgive you!”Charles Dickens, Great Expectations

How are we to navigate this present moment? What are our fixed points? The ancient paths - Love God, Love others AND Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Jesus says all the Law and the Prophets are fulfilled in these.“Those who lead disorderly lives tell those who are normal that it is they who deviate from nature, and think they are following nature themselves; just as those who are on board a ship think that the people on shore are moving away.  Language is the same everywhere: we need a fixed point to judge it.  The harbor is the judge of those aboard the ship, but where are we going to find a harbor in morals?” - Blaise Pascal, Pensees 697

“Happiness can be found neither in ourselves nor in external things, but in God and in ourselves as united to him.”
 - Blaise PascalEcclesiastes 1“I would rather have questions that can't be answered than answers that can't be questioned.” - Richard Feynman

Introductions. Who is this Teacher? Is there "wisdom" in Ecclesiastes?“Knowing God without knowing our wretchedness leads to pride. Knowing our wretchedness without knowing God leads to despair. Knowing Jesus Christ is the middle course, because in him we find both God and our wretchedness.” Blaise Pascal, Pensées

The opening chapter of the book of Ruth is complicated for a variety of reasons.  One reason is that the message we choose to hear shapes our hearts more than we realize.So the question is: What are you listening for?Are you listening for offense? For criticism? For failure?Or are you listening for grace, truth, and the whisper of God’s voice?

Ruth 1 - God wants to work in our uncomfortable in-between.

"Our unimpressive, very ordinary lives make us feel like outsiders to such a star studded cast. We disqualify ourselves. Guilt or willfulness or accident makes a loophole and we assume that what is true for everyone else is not true for us. We conclude that we are, somehow, just not religious and thus unfit to participate in the big story.And then we turn a page and come on this small story of two widows and a farmer in their out-of-the-way village." Eugene Peterson, Introduction to Ruth

We tend to see what it is we are looking for.Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports our prior beliefs or values.

We believe we understand Peter's story from that night. However, there is a crucial aspect we often overlook. "Inconsistency seems to be a lifelong battle for Peter."John 18:15–1615 Simon Peter and another disciple were following Jesus. Because this disciple was known to the high priest, he went with Jesus into the high priest’s courtyard, 16 but Peter had to wait outside at the door. The other disciple, who was known to the high priest, came back, spoke to the servant girl on duty there and brought Peter in. 

Guest Speaker: Rachel Yokers

The Resurrection story is incredible on many levels, one of which is what does not happen after Jesus returns from the grave. Unlike modern power narratives, this is not a story of revenge.

Art Study Link - "Christ's Entry into Brussels" by James Ensorhttps://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/103QSA

“Love cannot exist in isolation: away from others, love bloats into pride.  Grace cannot be received privately: cut off from others it is perverted into greed.  Hope cannot develop in solitude:  separated from the community, it goes to seed in the form of fantasies.  No gift, no virtue can develop and remain healthy apart from the community of faith.” Eugene Peterson, “Reversed Thunder”

"WE BELIEVE that one day, Jesus will return to judge the living and the dead, and each will go to their eternal reward – forever life in union with God or the final death, forever separated from God.  In the age to come, the new heavens and the new earth will be revealed."

John 3“God has infinite attention, infinite leisure to spare for each one of us.  He doesn't have to take us in the line.  You're as much alone with Him as if you were the only thing He'd ever created.”C.S. Lewis, Beyond Personality

Psalm 8 & the last chapters of Job “People do not seem to realize that their opinion of the world is also a confession of their character.”Ralph Waldo Emerson

"When we gather together as followers of Jesus reading these texts, something happens." Five ways we are meant to read the Bible. We are meant to read the Bible in community.Full Video: Rethinking our relationship with the Biblehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wK0WGniMPCU&ab_channel=PracticingtheWay

Mark 4 and the Parable of the Soils. Maybe we've heard this story so many times that we only catch part of the warning. What if the point isn't just about being a plant but about being fruitful? And what if the weeds that choke don't kill us, but simply make us unfruitful... which misses a massive point of life in the kingdom of God.

“To know oneself is, above all, to know what one lacks. It is to measure oneself against Truth, and not the other way around.  The first product of self-knowledge is humility . . ." Flannery O'Connor, Mystery and MannersThe story of Jephthah in Judges 10 and 11 is not easy. Yet it is so important to soak in this text, which pulls no punches and challenges us to examine which God we believe in. "Just because I'm talking about God doesn't mean I 'm talking about God."

Jesus began with "Come and follow me". These are words of invitation that are repeated to us. And Paul writes to the church, "Live a life worthy of the calling..." All are called just where you are. All who respond are challenged to live a life worthy of that calling. This is the beautiful mess of the Christian life.

The story of Herod Antipas is such a tragic example of the excuse of almost believing.

guest speaker: Rachel Yokers

Be in the Psalms.  They say things that stories and even didactic teachings don’t say in the same way.  And they penetrate our deep places in ways that other things don’t. We are in the Psalms because we are REMEMBERING who God is.

“Be careful that you do not forget the LORD yourGod…”

Message for the start to the year.

It’s hard to follow in faith when you can’t see the big picture. Yet, the life of faith says, "I will have enough for today.  I will trust God with tomorrow."

guest speaker: Rachel Yokers

Isaiah 12:1 – 6 "In that day you will say..." The good news is good news because it is first hard, honest news. This is an invitation to move beyond the trap of "fake it until you make it" Christianity. The good news is that you are not the source of meaning and purpose. That can only truly be found in Christ Jesus.