Omc: Family Chapel

For Easter Sunday, we'll be seeing how Jesus is the Good Shepherd who provides his people new life by giving up His life. We're so often searching for life in all the wrong places. In Christ, we receive abundant life through his life, death, and resurrection! Hallelujah!

In our passage this week, Paul continues to address Timothy concerning the false teachers in the church, and we see a glimpse of the nature at what these false teachers were teaching: that right standing before God could be attained through the keeping of the law. Paul writes to affirm the message of the gospel, that the law is not to be used that way. According to Paul, the law does two things: 1) reveals our sin (1:8-13a), but 2) highlights the depths of God's grace and mercy in Christ Jesus (1:13a-16). This is the teaching that the church is to be built upon, and that we are to guard. This is the gospel, that it is not by the keeping of the law that we are saved, but by the grace, mercy, and perfect patience of Christ Jesus. The ultimate purpose of the Law is to reveal the need for our Savior.

The book of 1 Timothy hones in on what the church is supposed to be like. We want to build the family and in the next few years, we'll be undergoing some pretty big structural changes. So we're hoping to lay a solid foundation and a common understanding for our congregation as we move forward together! With our first sermon, we'll see that the church needs to be aware of the danger of false teachers. The church needs to know the marks of false teachers (teaching devoid of truth; life devoid of love) and rightly respond to them (recognize responsibility, hold on to integrity, and exercise church discipline).

We are wrapping up our short series on Suffering this Sunday. We'll be looking at how we are to walk with others in their suffering. We'll see that the way we walk with others is by showing up (Galatians 6:2), listening (Job 13:5), praying (Philippians 4:6-7), providing practical support (1 John 3:16-18), giving the gift of hope (Hebrews 6:19-20), and waiting (Isaiah 40:30-31). As a family, God calls upon us to walk well with one another in seasons of suffering.

As we continue our series on Suffering, we'll be looking at how we should respond when we are in times of suffering. Though we may understand the biblical framework for suffering and God's purposes in suffering, we often find ourselves not knowing how to respond when suffering hits. Naturally, we tend to deal with suffering by denying it, oversimplifying it, or despairing in it, which ultimately do not work. Rather, we'll see that the Bible gives us a healthier, more robust way to respond to suffering, rooted in the hope we have in Christ.

While suffering is not a good thing, certain good things can only come through suffering. The goal of this sermon is not necessarily so that you can look at the suffering you are going through right now or at suffering that you have gone through in the past and try to pinpoint exactly why God did what He did. (That’s a fool’s errand!) Rather, the goal of this sermon is to give us some general guidelines so that we can trust that God is working for our good and for His glory in the midst of our suffering.

Creation: Suffering was not a part of God's original design Fall: Suffering is a result of sin Redemption: Suffering is ultimately experienced and overcome by God at the cross Restoration: Suffering will be no more one day

We will be wrapping up our short series in Jonah this upcoming Sunday. We'll see the surprising reason why Jonah ran away when God first called him, and that's because He did not want the Ninevites to receive God's mercy! (Jonah was a nationalistic racist!!) While he rejoiced in receiving God's mercy, he could not bear to see others receive God's mercy. From our passage, we'll see that we ought to have God's heart of compassion towards those we see as "others". As we have received mercy, we ought to show others mercy.

As we continue in the book of Jonah, in chapter 3, we'll see God graciously call upon Nineveh to repent. And then we'll see how God graciously responds to Nineveh's repentance with mercy. Repentance, from beginning to end, is an act of grace - the call to repentance, the act of repentance, and the response to repentance are all truly God's gracious gifts to us!

We'll be kicking off a new series (4 weeks) through the book of Jonah. For this Sunday, we'll focus on the call of God. God calls us to obey Him. Oftentimes, it is difficult to obey, but we should obey the call of God placed on our lives because God is the sovereign Lord who is worthy of our obedience and His call will come to pass. Instead of running away, we should obey the call of God by living in the presence of God.