Five Questions to Help Drive Home the Biblical Purposes

This weekend I am finishing up a series about the five biblical purposes. I’m going to end the message with the following questions:

HONOR: what matters most?
CONNECT: who knows you?
GROW: who will you become?
SERVE: what moves you?
REACH: who’s hearing your story?

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discipleship in action: a student commits to tithing

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What I loved about my old home

We moved today. We have left behind the house that was our home for seven years. Here is what I loved:

It was comfortable, safe, familiar. A sanctuary.

It holds memories, lessons wise and foolishness; learnings both painful and joyful. For me, a treasure beyond measure.

It was a place where relationships grew and flourished. A Starbucks without the overpriced coffees.

It was an open and welcoming place. It was like a hostel for who ever needed room.

I loved the laughter and fun. A bright place in a dull and difficult world.

It was a hard place, were hard truths were spoken; sometimes in love, sometimes in arrogance.

It was the place where three sons were added to our family.

These are the things I loved about or old house, things I want to build into this new place.

What is your home to you? What is your ideal, and how can you work to make it happen?

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these barriers to spiritual growth have been around 600 years

Read this earlier this week in my devotions. Amazing how human nature stays the same through the ages. From The Imitation of Christ:

Lament and grieve because you are still so carnal and worldly, so undisciplined in your passions, so full of sexual desires;

So unwatchful over your outward senses, so often entangled with many useless imaginations;

So much inclined to outward things, so negligent in inward things;

So quickly moved to laughter and immodesty, so little moved to tears and contrition;

So swift to ease and pleasures of the flesh, so dull to strictness of life and zeal;

So curious to hear new things and see what is attractive, so slow to embrace what is humble and low;

So covetous of abundance, so sparing in giving, so tenacious in keeping;

So inconsiderate in speech, so reluctant to keep silent;

So unruly in manners, so troublesome in conduct;

So immoderate about food, so deaf to the Word of God;

So quick to rest, so slow to labor;

So wakeful to hear gossiping tales, so drowsy at the sacred services;

So eager for the services to end, so inclined to be [mentally] wandering and inattentive;

So negligent in prayers, so lukewarm in celebrating holy communion, so dry and heartless in receiving it.

So quickly distracted, so seldom entirely composed;

So quickly moved to anger, so apt to be displeased with another;

So ready to judge, so severe to reprove;

So joyful at prosperity, so weak in adversity;

So often making many good resolutions, and yet bringing them ultimately to such poor results.

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