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Sleeping Sickness and Staying Wide Awake

On Sunday we looked at the letter to the church in Sardis. Sardis was a well known city for being wealthy and powerful. In fact, Sunrise on Fieldsthey were thought to be unconquerable. They were thought to be almost invincible. And some of us have felt that way about some of the relationships around us. But Sardis fell asleep…literally. Twice in their history they were conquered by invading armies because of stupid mistakes, falling asleep, and becoming complacent. Once a soldier went down a secret path to gather a dropped helmet…leading an army in to conquer an unprepared city. And then unthinkably it happened again. A city that was wealthy, powerful, and had all the potential to excel was conquered and devastated.
Maybe you’ve seen the same thing around you. Maybe you’ve seen relationships that we’re so full of potential, and promise but they fell apart. How do these things happen? Slowly and subtly. People fall asleep, they stop making an effort, they forget that all relationships require effort and faithfulness. So Jesus tells the church in Sardis wake up and be faithful. Wake up and be faithful. Don’t fall asleep, don’t become complacent, don’t think you have it all going on and forget to follow. This is the temptation in any church, marriage, or relationship…we become complacent. We start to take our calling, our spouse, or our friends for granted. And whenever this happens…soon things fall apart.
Jesus gives us this advice though. He says wake up and start again. Go back to the beginning and start to try to love again. Love afresh, put effort in, don’t let what was is good slip away because of forgetfulness. And yes it is hard. That is why in the letter to Sardis Jesus reminds them that some have been faithful. Some are doing it. Yes it is hard but it can be done, and if you wake up and are faithful you will win life.
So the main point is this: faithfulness and effort are needed for relationships to last. So are there any relationships where you need to wake up? Where you haven’t been faithful, where you have been forgetful, where you haven’t put forth effort? This is the perfect time during Lent to be reminded and to reflect on our relationships. But more than that it is the perfect time to act and even repent. Repenting means turning around and starting again. So in your marriage start again, give love like you used to. In your friendship start again, listen like you did in the start. In your church start again, remember your calling to care and act on it. Because whenever we fall asleep in our relationships death isn’t far away, but whenever we are faithful in them life is there to stay…

Sermon Notes

Big Idea: Wake up!

Take Aways…

  • Have we fallen asleep in our Christian walk?
  • What do our actions show we believe?
  • If you stay true, you will be victorious
  • Relationships fall apart slowly and subtly
  • Practical Points:
    • Realize if you are sleeping
    • Wake up and Take Action
    • Stay Awake by being Faithful

Adult / Group Discussion Questions: What surprised you? What made you think? What did you take away? When have you asked the question – “How did this happen?” How have you seen things fall a part slowly and subtly? Where in your life do you need to “wake up”? Are there any relationships in danger? How can you stay faithful and walk forward with Jesus? Where is he asking you to remain faithful?

Discussion Questions for Young Families: Spend some time talking with your kids that important things mean putting effort into them. Tell them how family is important so you will be putting effort into it so that it won’t fall a part. Ask them how they’d like you put in effort – what they’d like you to do. Maybe it will be to play with them more, or to go to their hockey games, or other ideas. Listen and then put it into practice.

Challenge for this Week:

Recognize where your sleeping, wake up and take action, stay awake by being faithful…

 

 

by Andrew Mills

Lenten Reflections: Stations of the Cross, Station 9

Station #9: Jesus falls for the third time…


Written Reflection:

Jesus falls for a third time. This last fall he can barely move. His body shudders at each moment. Agony shoots throughout his limbs. The soldiers know he cannot carry the cross any more, and they drag him forward. This man who gave life everywhere – who healed the blind, cured the sick, and set free the oppressed…slowly his life is being drained by the cross…slowly he is dying. This depth of brokenness reveals the completeness of the love of Jesus Christ. He is this broken, this bruised, this devastated so that we might be made whole and healed. His love compels his actions, but the weights of our sin drag him down. As you reflect on this image offer thanks to Jesus for his love, and confess your own sin and brokenness that brought Jesus there…

by Andrew Mills

How Did This Happen?

1236829_46998155There is a question that everyone asks at some point in life. It’s this: “How did this happen?”

You might ask this question when you see a marriage that was strong…shatter. You might ask this question when you see a family fall a part, or when you see a church split. Often in the aftermath of deep loss and tragic fractures we ask “How did this happen?” Things looked to be going well and all of a sudden there was a divorce, a break, a fracture, or a split.

This is the question we’ll be looking at on Sunday. How do these things happen? How do relationships fall a part? Why do churches falter and fail? Why do some marriages that seem healthy end in so much hurt?

And most importantly, while we’ll be talking about how these things happen, we want to ask a second question. We want to ask an even more important question, “How do we keep these things from happening”. So on Sunday we’ll discover what Jesus has to say about this.

But before we get there what do you think? How do you keep a relationship whole? How do you keep a relationship fresh? How do you ensure that difficulties don’t turn into fractures and breaks? What is it that you do with in your marriage and friendships to prevent decay and difficulty?

Because I think the reality is that making relationships work is harder than we often think. It’s easy for things to slip and break. But on Sunday we’ll discover how keeping things together has a lot to do with staying awake…

by Andrew Mills

Lenten Reflections: Stations of the Cross, Station 8

Station #8: Jesus Meets the Women of Jerusalem

Written Reflection:

As Jesus continues on the road to his death he sees the people of Jerusalem. He sees the men and the woman. He sees hate, condescending glares, confused stares, and with some of the woman he sees sorrow. He see the hurt, and the women remember his words of hope and compassion.

Jesus looks out and sees their needs, fears, hopes, and desires. In the midst of his own sorrow Jesus sees others. Help me Jesus to remember others. Help me Jesus to pick up my own cross and care for others. Spend time reflecting on this: when have you been too busy or preoccupied to help respond to others? Who can you help today?

by Andrew Mills

The Seriousness of Sin and Confession

On Sunday we talked about the seriousness of sin. Not a fun topic, but a revealing one. What I realized is that Jesus takes sin far more seriously than I do. I’m much more likely to ignore it, to cover it up, to forget it, or to compromise with it. Jesus calls it sin and deals with it.

At first I struggled with why. Why is there just not “grace” to all problems? Why do we have to name the sin, confess the sin, and repent from the sin? Why does it have to be so…personal.

Well, the answer should be clear. Because sin is personal, and it’s personal to Jesus. Sin brought him to death on the cross because that is where all sin leads to death. That is why Jesus is so insistent on dealing with it, because he doesn’t want us to go through the death he went through. He doesn’t want us to feel the force of death, sin, and darkness. So he comes to us and challenges us to name our sin, repent, and live in life. The goal of Jesus isn’t to be harsh, the goal is to bring healing.

sin

So on Sunday we ended with challenging ourselves to ask Jesus if there are any areas of sin, compromise, or darkness that we need to confess. I then challenged all of us to confess any areas of sin to a friend. Why make that step? Why not just confess it to God and be done? Well because sometimes our uneasiness of desiring to go to a friend in community reveals something about us. Dietrich Bonheoffer writes this, “Should we not find it easier to go to a brother than to the holy God? But if we do, we must ask ourselves whether we have not often been deceiving ourselves with our confession of sin to God, whether we have not rather been confessing our sins to ourselves and also granting ourselves absolution. And is not the reason perhaps for our countless relapses and the feebleness of our Christian obedience to be found precisely in the fact that we are living on self-forgiveness and not a real forgiveness”. If we want to avoid death we cannot live on self-forgiveness. If we want to live in life we need to do this together with community, and we can’t shy away from naming our sin.

Is it easy? No, naming our failures, regrets, guilt, and shame is rarely easy. The question though isn’t whether it is easy. The question is whether or not it is  freeing…and the answer to that is absolutely…

 

Sermon Notes:

Big Idea: Sin is serious business

Take Aways…

  • “Anyone who is willing to hear should listen to the Spirit”
  • I take sin far less seriously than Jesus.
  • Jesus takes sin seriously because Jesus died because of it.
  • Jesus doesn’t call it compromise, he calls it sin
  • The path to growing with him, involves dying to sin.
  • Whenever you are walking away from Jesus and his truth you are walking into the darkness.
  • Doing leads to becoming.

Adult / Group Discussion Questions: What surprised you? What made you think? What did you take away? What did you feel when you first read the passage? Were you surprised, shocked, or okay with it? When have you been tempted to compromise? What happened? Are there areas in your life now that you need to confess and change? How might you do that? Who are going to confess them too?

Discussion Questions for Young: Families Take a moment and ask them to tell you what they think sin is. Get any of their answers. Then tell them that a good way to think about sin is any action, thought, or desire that doesn’t look like Jesus. Share with them how when we don’t act like Jesus we miss the point, but that if we confess our sins Jesus will forgive us. Ask if there is anything to confess and make sure you confess your sins too. Share together and then walk forward together.

Challenge for this Week:

Confess and Repent of Any Sin to a Trusted Friend

 

by Andrew Mills

Lenten Reflections: Stations of the Cross, Station 7

Jesus falls for the 2nd time…

Written Reflection:

With each step Jesus takes the weight continues to grow. It grows to much, and Jesus falls to the ground. His knees scrap the earth, and his face hits the dust. Maybe he remembers the verse, “from dust you can and to dust you will return” He catches a raspy dust filled breath before he is forced to continue.

Store up this image in your heart and mind. Though he felt alone in the dust we never have to because of his sacrifice. Jesus is on the ground, so that we might be raised up. This is for me and this is for you. Jesus breathes in dust, so that he might breathe out life.

Today take a deep breathe and breathe in life. As you do reflect on this: you have been given a gift from Jesus how might you show him gratitude today.

by Andrew Mills

A Difficult Passage to Preach

Here is a confession. I didn’t want to preach on Sunday.1344258_74138164

I know, weird right, because preaching is kinda my thing. And I don’t have a lot of other “things”. I can’t really build anything, play sports, or have any musical skill. But what I can do is preach, and I love to preach…well except I didn’t want to.

In fact, I thought of skipping Sunday’s passage, of making Dave preach on it, or calling in sick. The reason is because the letter out of Revelation for this Sunday – is just plain difficult. I was tempted to skip it or to just focus on the parts I liked. But that’s not preaching, and that’s not my calling. To get a sense of what I’m talking about take a read of Revelation 2:18-29

“Write this letter to the angel of the church in Thyatira. This is the message from the Son of God, whose eyes are like flames of fire, whose feet are like polished bronze: “I know all the things you do. I have seen your love, your faith, your service, and your patient endurance. And I can see your constant improvement in all these things. “But I have this complaint against you. You are permitting that woman—that Jezebel who calls herself a prophet—to lead my servants astray. She teaches them to commit sexual sin and to eat food offered to idols. I gave her time to repent, but she does not want to turn away from her immorality. “Therefore, I will throw her on a bed of suffering, and those who commit adultery with her will suffer greatly unless they repent and turn away from her evil deeds. I will strike her children dead. Then all the churches will know that I am the one who searches out the thoughts and intentions of every person. And I will give to each of you whatever you deserve. “But I also have a message for the rest of you in Thyatira who have not followed this false teaching (‘deeper truths,’ as they call them—depths of Satan, actually). I will ask nothing more of you except that you hold tightly to what you have until I come. To all who are victorious, who obey me to the very end, To them I will give authority over all the nations They will rule the nations with an iron rod  and smash them like clay pots. They will have the same authority I received from my Father, and I will also give them the morning star! “Anyone with ears to hear must listen to the Spirit and understand what he is saying to the churches.

Do you see the reason why I wasn’t excited to preach? I mean this text is so harsh, so difficult, and…judgey.

But here is what I realized…that the portions of the Bible that I react strongly against…often have the most to teach me. That my reactions reveal more about me, and what I need to learn.

So while I wasn’t initially excited (more like dreading) preaching this passage I now know better. That in the difficult passages we have the most to learn, and sometimes the learning can be tough. But often the tough things in life pay off most at the end…

So read the passage, take notes of your feelings, think about how you would preach it and come Sunday we’ll see what God has to speak through it.

by Andrew Mills

Lenten Reflections: Stations of the Cross, Station 6

Station #6: Veronica Wipes the Face of Jesus

Written Reflection

Blood, sweat, tears, and pain drip from the face of Jesus. He has been whipped, beaten, spit at and betrayed. A woman from the crowd is said to have come and wiped his face. Her name in tradition is Vernoica.

We are reminded that moments of beauty and grace sometimes break the darkness if only for an instant. Like a shooting star on a black night, grace and light can break through in moments of deep pain. Spend a moment and reflect on when you were in darkness and difficulty and God gave you a glimpse of grace. Spend time reflecting on the glimpses of grace around you…

by Andrew Mills

Struggling with Speaking of Sin

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Through the past few weeks I’ve started to notice something about myself. There are certain Sundays where I come away from speaking and don’t feel that I’ve done my best. I feel like I’ve missed the mark and messed up. And then I started to notice a pattern. The Sundays where I felt like I struggled, and where I lost confidence were all sermons related to conviction and challenge. The sermons where I lost confidence and left feeling a bit shaken were all related to sin, sacrifice, and conviction. Through some reflection I realized that I find it easy to preach a sermon on grace and gift, and difficult to preach a sermon on sin and challenge.

The struggle I face is maybe one you face in your own relationships. I know it is important to talk about sin. I know it is important to challenge people and let the Spirit do his work of convicting. I know this is important because I need it personally. I need to be challenged to give up greed, hate, unforgiveness, lust, and all sorts of sinful things. The struggle I have is in how to do it. How to share in a way that is convicting but not condemning, that is challenging but not judging.

What is even more disturbing to me is a growing realization that I may not feel confident in this type of sharing because of a lack of practice. What I mean by that is perhaps I struggle because I am unaccustomed to sharing about sin. This is concerning to me because Jesus talks about sin, the Bible talks about sin, and sin, we are told, leads to death. Therefore, sin isn’t something I should avoid or struggle speaking about. I should share honestly with the dangers of consumerism, violence, greed, and lust. I should share openly with the temptations and struggles I face. And I shouldn’t ever shy away reminding people that sin leads to death while following Jesus leads to life. And this is something we know deep down. We know that hate kills relationships. We know that lust destroys marriages. We know that unforgiveness wrecks families. So we need to learn to speak about sin in such a way that it leads to life not death.

So I’ve made a personal decision. I will grow and learn in how to share about sin in such as way that conviction without condemnation happens. To share about it in such a way that challenges someone, but doesn’t lead to damnation. To share in such a way that, like Jesus, people who are broken and struggling feel freed; and people who are haughty, prideful, and oppressive to others sees their need.

In essence, I’m going to work on struggling to speak of sin a little less…

by Andrew Mills

The gods of Greed, Hate, and Sex

On Sunday we looked at a difficult passage in the Bible. Some passages are difficult because they are hard to understand, confusing, or out of our context.

This passage was hard for none of those reasons.

This passage was hard because it called us to repent. It called us to follow Jesus. It reminded us that we live in an age with gods all around us that vie for our attention, worship, and loyalty. We live in a world where greed, sex, hate, violence, power, and self-image seek to hgodsave us follow them.

But our calling as Christians is to follow Jesus because following the path of greed, sex, hate, or power simply ends in darkness.

So on Sunday we listened to the call of Jesus to leave those things behind. That just as how 2000 years ago people were called to leave behind Athena the goddess of war, Dionysius the god of sex and wine, or the emperor the god of power and image; we are called to leave behind all the gods of our age if our witness is to have any power.

Jesus is clear in Revelation that if we compromise our character, it compromises our message. That while each god has its own temple in the world; he has no temple but us.

So this Lent we ask a deep question: “What does it mean to live faithful to you in this world”

This is a question worth spending time and reflecting on today, this week, this month, or for the rest of our lives…

Sermon Notes

Big Idea: Stay true…Live Differently

Take Aways…

  • The Spirit is whispering…are we listening?
  • The gods of Pergamum
    • Asclepius ~ known as the savior who healed
    • Athena ~ goddess of war and wisdom
    • Demeter ~ bathed in bull’s blood goddess of grain
    • Dynoisus ~ son of a god and human mother, drank to connect with him
    • Zeus ~ known as creator, life-giver, and had a huge alter
    • Emperor ~ had the right “to give or take life”, known as “lord”, declared “son of god”
  • In a pluralistic world compromise dilutes and confuses the message
  • Deep witness is shown through difference
  • You are Jesus’ temple in the city, you are his representation
  • Jesus says don’t tolerate compromise, because it is killing your light, witness, and life.
  • Our world is dominated by subtle gods of Greed, Sex, War, Self-Image, and Selfishness
  • Stay true, and turn to follow Jesus

Adult / Group Discussion Questions: What surprised you? What made you think? What made you laugh? What did you take away? How has the Spirit been speaking to you over the past few weeks? What “gods of our culture” are the most difficult for you to resist? What are some reasons for that? How is Jesus asking you to follow him, and him alone? How does compromise kill our message? What message are your actions sharing about you?

Discussion Questions for Young Families: Spend some time with your kids watching TV. Yes watching TV. Look at the ads that are there. Ask them what they are showing, what they are teaching. Is it that if you have this “thing” you’ll be happy? Is it that if you look “this way” you’ll be accepted? Talk through the messages they receive, and share with them the message of the Bible. That God loves them as they are and that greed, lust, and hate lead to darkness.

Challenge for this Week

Repent from any of the gods of our culture that have captured you

 

by Andrew Mills