Category: Sermon Reflections

To Bless ~ To Give Life

This past Sunday we talked about how we are called to bless people.

The main idea was that blessing in Genesis 12 in the Old Testament was tied to giving life. I think this is a much better way to understand it for our lives today. The word bless seems to be one we only use when someone sneezes. “Blessing” can be hard to picture, and even harder to practice.

But “giving life” isn’t hard to picture or practice. Whatever makes someone else’s life full, deeper, meets a need, relieves a concern, frees a worry, or generates love is giving life.

This can be simply listening, fixing a roof, baking cookies, having neighbors in to your house. The possibilities of how to “give life” are endless. This as a church needs to be our calling. God in Genesis 12 has promised to bless us – or give us life and we are then called to bless others or give them life.

  • Imagine what would happen, and how disciples would be made, if giving life to others becomes a major part of our identity and action?
  • What if your house and home was known as a place of life in and for the community?
  • What if in your workplace you were recognized as the person who gives joy, love, and meaning to others?
  • What if your church was known as a place where those in need could find life in practical and real ways?

Doesn’t that sound like God’s Kingdom? It does to me.

So this week go out and start to bless people. To literally give them life. Be generous, be spontaneous, and give life in the context of relationship and share with me here how its going and what’s happened. Because when you share stories of blessing, you are also spreading blessing…

Discussion Questions from this Week Sermon

  • Adult Questions
  • Who in your life can you bless or “give life” too?
  • What needs do your neighbors have, or co-workers?
  • Who has blessed you in the past few weeks? Why not thank them.
  • Questions for Young Families
  • Talk to your children about how you are called to be a blessing to others and to serve. Ask them if they have any ideas who or how they could bless people. Maybe make cookies with them for your neighbors, or a card. Involve them in a giving life to others.
by Andrew Mills

Go and Make Disciples…being #missional

This past Sunday I left the challenge to go and make disciples, as a way of life. You can hear the sermon here.

In Matthew 28:18-20, Jesus gathers his disciples together for one last time. What he doesn’t leave them with is a reminder to pray. He doesn’t remind them to be holy. He doesn’t really remind them about what he’s taught them. Instead what he leaves with them is an invitation. An invitation to adventure, mission, and to go out into the world and make disciples. And he leaves behind one promise: “I will be with you”. He doesn’t tell the disciples how to make more disciples. He doesn’t leave behind a 7-step process. What he gives to them is an invitation and a promise.

And isn’t that all we need? An invitation to partner with God in his mission, and promise that he will partner with us. We’re given an invitation and promise that Jesus will be with guiding us, shaping us, and leading us as we follow God on mission.

The question is: are you going to accept his invitation and promise?

For me and my family we’ve made the deiscion to accept both the promise and invitaiton this year to make disicples. We are going to make 2012 a year of making disciples, living out Jesus command and believing in his promise. What about you?

I’m excited to see how this year unfolds and what God does. So this year I’ll be sharing stories of how it’s going for me. And I’d love to hear yours as well!

Discussion Questions: Here are the discussion questions that came from Sunday in case you missed them:

  • Adult Questions
  • Are you ready and willing to follow Jesus in making disciples?
  • How might you start to make disciples?
  • What excites you about making disciples? What maybe makes you a bit nervous about making disciples?
  • Who might help you stay accountable in your decision?
  • Questions for Young Families
  • Talk with your kids and share about how God invites us to join him in helping people find and follow God. Ask them if they are willing to help people find and follow God. Ask them what friends you, as a family, can pray that they might become a disciple of Jesus? Spend some time praying as a family.
by Andrew Mills

My Top 10 Lessons I’ve Learned… Part 3

Here are the last 2 lessons I’ve learned this year.

Lesson #2: God Leads One Step at a Time

We often love to know the destination. But the life of faith isn’t a destination, it’s a journey. And what I’ve learned is that God reveals the next step but often not the destination. He asks me to trust him, in that as I walk with him, He always shows me the next step and asks me to trust him with that. And I’m learning to do just that.

Lesson #1: God is Certain

So much in our lives feels uncertain. As we look forward into the next year I don’t know what it holds. Maybe you too have some uncertainty in your life. You might not know what’s going to happen with your job, family, personal life or health. But what I’ve learned is that while I’m often uncertain about what the future holds: God isn’t. He is certain. He is steady and true. And he promises us that the future in front of us is good. This doesn’t mean easy and perfect. It means good. It means that he will cause everything good, bad, and boring to come together for good (Romans 8:28). God’s future for you and for me is full of hope, promise and more than we could ever hope, dream or imagine (Ephesians 3:20). So I’m learning to trust in that.

So I guess the only last question is to ask – what’s the next step God is leading you to take to reach your certain future? What is he asking you to do? Maybe today is the day to take that step.

by Andrew Mills

My Top 10 Lessons I’ve Learned… Part 2

Here are the next three lessons I’ve learned this year.

Lesson #5: God’s Love is Unconditional

This is something I’ve known, but this year experinced in a deeper way than before. With a son, whom I love so deeply for no reason other than he’s worth loving, I’m starting to get a glimpse into what God feels for us. This in reality is really changing me this year.

Lesson #4: God sees Us as Holy

This has been an amazing learning, that once you come to know Christ God sees you as holy. You are not a sinner, but saint in God’s eyes. Go and check it out yourself. Read the Bible and discover that what defines us isn’t sin but Jesus Christ within us. So this year I’m focusing on reminding people who they are in Christ, not what they need to do. My theological hunch is that the more we focus on who we actually are, the easier it will be to actually live that out.

Lesson #3: Grace is Costly

Grace is freely given, but that grace costs. I’ve learned this year that grace is hard to give, it isn’t cheap. We love to give grace to people who deserve it, but God gives it to us, those of us who don’t deserve it. And we should do the same. To give grace to those who hurt us, who know better, who won’t accept any responsibility for their actions. We don’t do this because it’s easy, but because it’s godly. This doesn’t mean excusing the hurt that was caused, but recognizing the depth of the hurt and still choosing to show grace. This is the high road, and high roads are hard. But that’s also where you’ll find God and Jesus walking with you.

For me these were three amazing lessons to learn. The first two were great to learn, the last one no one wants to have to learn. But each made me a better person I believe.

What have you learned over the past year that’s made you a better person?

Would you share it with us?

by Andrew Mills

My Top 10 Lessons I’ve Learned…Part 1

Here are my top ten lessons I’ve learned this year. To hear the expanded explanation download my sermon from Sunday here.

Here are a few of the first fun ones, and the list gets more serious as it goes.

Lesson #10: God Loves Top 10 Lists

This is pretty self-explanatory. Just go check out the original top ten list…the 10 Commandments. Looks like God invented it, not David Letterman.

Lesson #9: Laughter is Good For the Soul

Proverbs talks about how laughter feeds the soul. This is true, so go and watch something funny. Get together with friends and laugh. You’ll feel better. And now you know that laughter is a spiritual thing, and a Godly thing.

Lesson #8: God Loves Coffee

Now this is hard to prove biblically because the Bible really never mentions coffee. But I think if you’ll notice how many great God conversations happen over coffee you’ll need to agree that God must love it then. I’m pretty sure the logic is infallible, much like God.

Lesson #7: We can Find God in Creation

This year I learned how close you can feel to God when you recognize him in creation. Whether that’s being in awe of mountains, feeling the tranquility of a quiet lake, or the beauty of a sunset we can see God revealed in creation. This year more than most I’ve found myself feeling close to him simply in awe of his handiwork.

Lesson #6: We can Find God in Others

Since we’re all made in the image of God we have the potential to reveal God. This is really what my posts entitled “Where I Saw Jesus This Week…” are about. They’re about finding God in the everyday, and that’s become clear to me this year. God is not distant but waiting to be discovered in our midst.

Tomorrow I’ll post the next 3. But for now – which lessons resonate with you?

Which ones has God taught you as well this year?

by Andrew Mills

Messy Spirituality

After an amazing children’s program on Sunday I thought I’d share something I’ve learned from my child.

My personal style or aesthetic is clean, simple, and modern. This is just me. I love working with clean lines and in clean spaces. My son has not inherited this trait. This is him after being home in a spotless house for under five minutes.

How is it that something that was so clean becomes so messy so quick? But this is my life…messy. So I do what any good parent does. I wade into the mess, into the toys, and sit and play with my son.

And God isn’t any different with any of us.

He enters into our mess, plays with us, and helps us clean it up.

So today if your life is feeling a bit messy and you’re stressed about Christmas or any number of other things; if your life is simply not feeling put together – just know this: God is with you, present in our messy lives.

He’s there. Just like how I sat and was with Hudson, God’s wherever you are today. He is with you.

My style may be to prefer clean spaces but that’s not God’s style.

God’s style is to simply be wherever you are…and isn’t that what we need anyway?

by Andrew Mills

Hide and Seek with Jesus

On Sunday we talked about joy, and you can listen to it here. We talked about how joy is connected to finding Jesus. Because when you find Jesus, you find someone special. You find a person who is God, and yet just like us. You find a person who knows what it is to struggle, yet overcomes. You find a person who knows everything, yet just wants to get to know you…

This is a person worth finding.

And when you find him and connect with him you get connected to joy, hope, peace, and love. Because Jesus is each of those things. He doesn’t give us joy, we find our joy in him as Paul says. And so key to finding and holding on to joy in our lives is finding and holding onto Jesus. He is our source. Finding Jesus means finding joy, peace, hope, and love that lasts. It lasts because he lasts, he is steady, he is true, and the story of Christmas is that he is here. The invitation to the shephereds in Luke 2 is that Jesus is findable, “meetable”, and here.

So how do you find him in your life? Simple. Just do what the shepherds do…they start looking.

Each week I write a post called “Where I saw Jesus this Week…”. And maybe this week you should comment or write your own post titled “Where you found Jesus this week…”

Because he is ready and willing to be found…and with him comes joy, peace, love, and hope…

The question is are you looking?

And if you find him, I’d love to hear how and where…

by Andrew Mills

Peace I give to you; Peace I leave with you…

Last Sunday our focus was on peace. To hear the sermon click here. We talked about how in Isaiah 9 it says that a a child has been born to us, a son is given who will be called the Prince of Peace. We focused on how Jesus is that Son and promises us his peace in John 14:27. At the end of the service we invited everyone to accept Jesus and his peace.

Today’s post is a bit different. I don’t want to add anything to what was shared on Sunday at all. Today I simply want to remind you that if you need peace between yourself and God, others, or even who you are then accept Jesus’ gift of peace.

Peace is found in our connection with Christ. It is Jesus who is peace, and then when we connect to him peace flows in our lives.

How does Jesus create peace in our lives? I’m not sure. But what I do know is that it is his responsibility and promise to us. Our responsibility is simply to accept the gracious gift he gives to us in this Christmas season of his peace.

So today my challenge is to accept Jesus and his gift, and let it shape you.

And if you feel bold, or maybe peaceful, share with me how accepting his gift has given you peace…

by Andrew Mills

The People of Hope

Yesterday we talked about hope. And after last night I realized something. So often our hope is based in things. For example that this thing will change, that we’ll get this thing, or that this thing will come about. Whether that “thing” is a job, a desire, a relationship, or whatever, true hope isn’t based in things.

True hope is based in a person, and in people.

True hope is based in Jesus Christ. Jesus is the reason we can have hope because he enters into our lives, meets with us wherever we are at, and promises no matter what we are going through we’ll never go through it alone.

True hope is also found in people; in a caring community that loves and supports. Last night I was at a Small Group where a few couples gathered to share, pray, and talk. And what I saw was honesty, openness, deep caring, love, a bit of crying, but true friendship. Hope is found there too, because when you care like that you are literally being Jesus Christ. Whenever this happens hope is found…

So whatever you are in the midst of needing or hoping for this season, don’t forget to find hope in Jesus Christ who walks with you. And also don’t forget to lean on those who surround you and who care for, find hope there as well.

And if you don’t have either of those things…well then I think this is the perfect time to find Jesus…and people who live like him too…

by Andrew Mills

Coffee, Connecting, and Slowing Down…

I’m a fairly high energy person. I like to get things done. I have an at home to-do list and work to do list. And in I love to get things off that list. I feel like I’m making progress, that I’m doing a good job, and in general a productive person.

Productivity is a good thing, except when it comes to relationships. Relationships aren’t meant to be productive.

The difficulty is that’s often times that’s how we view them. We feel obligated to connect with people we haven’t seen in a while. We meet with people that circumstances or situations force us to talk to. We talk to only some people when we need them in some way. That’s all productivity influencing relationships. And unfortunetley the same happens with God. We try to catch up, talk with him when we need too, or when we need him.

But relationships aren’t mean to be productive their meant to simply be. To be enjoyed. To be experinced. To be part of. To simply be.

So after reflecting on my sermon on Sunday where I shared that we need to connect with God, I’m going to try to do just that. Today rather than focusing on being productive, I’m going to focus on being with God. I’m going to get a coffee, get some space, and slow down. To give my relationship with him room to breathe. To not focus on bringing all my agenda items to him, or going through my list of needs. Instead I’m going to appreciate our friendship, and simply be with him.

What about you? Is there space in your day to connect with God? Over coffee, lunch, or while driving?

For me I’m going to simply be with God and have a good cup of coffee.

I think that’s a good way to start the day…

by Andrew Mills