Hi! Welcome to Redeem the Commute. I’m Ryan, you host for the daily challenges. These daily challenges are meant to help people explore what it means to follow Jesus even during our busy commuting lifestyle. If you’ve never looked into what that means in the first place, I’d really encourage you, check out our Christianity 101 course first. You can take it live in-person or through our mobile app; great introduction to the basic concepts of what it means to follow Jesus that we try to build on in the Daily Challenges.
Every day and week, we follow a rhythm to help us, as one community, learn what it means to follow Jesus even when we’re not physically together. Every Monday,we introduce the idea for the week. Every Tuesday, we see what the Bible has to say. Every Wednesday, we allow ourselves to be challenged in our thoughts. Every Thursday, we try to apply it and live it out in our lives. Every Friday, we take time to pray and reflect on the topic. Saturday is a day for rest and then Sunday is a day for community. We’re going to start gathering together as one community soon. We just recently had a great baptism service and celebration where a number of our members came together in one place to worship God. We’re going to do that more and more often over this year. So, stay tuned for some of our upcoming gatherings.
We’re in a series right now called, “Reset.” We’re looking at how deciding to follow Jesus resets everything in our lives. We’ve looked at a number of areas that it impacts. This week we’re going to look at how following Jesus impacts our view of sexuality and marriage.

Last week, we saw how following Jesus means we see the body and food differently, and how they are good things God created, but can be abused when used in the ways God didn’t create them to be used.

We also saw how following Jesus means his Holy Spirit lives in us, which is why our bodies can be called a temple. This means we can’t pretend to own our bodies, as followers of Jesus, but instead need to show reverence to God’s presence in us by caring for these bodies, using them as their creator intended.

This is going to be a helpful way to see our sexuality, as well. The passage from the Bible’s first letter to the Corinthians that we explored talked about food and the body as a temple, but Paul, the author, was not really making a point about food. He was using food as an example to show how the Corinthian Christians were abusing their gift of sexuality.

He challenges them not to be distracted, and think that sex is the most important thing in their lives, nor their source of identity, comfort or security. He wants them to stay focused on God, and see all other things in life through that lens. He wants them to think of themselves as people on a journey with a purpose, which necessarily means they will be different than those around them who are not on the same journey.

That’s hard in our world – particularly with sexuality, because we are a culture obsessed with sex, and it’s easy to forget there is more to us than biology! Some Christians or churches have responded by never talking about it, making it seem like sexuality and our bodies have nothing to do with God. But Paul takes neither approach; he says our bodies matter to God, because we matter to God.

See attached video:

Sex Is… from David Tate on Vimeo.

Sex is clearly on people’s minds. One survey asked Canadians how often they’d like to have sex, more than half of Canadians polled said they’d like at least twice a week. 20% of men said they’d like sex every day, but only 3% actually experience it.

There are some limits in people’s minds: In a Today’s Parent magazine survey, 82% of parents say sleep is more important than sex. The magazine readily admitted their sample was skewed heavily toward parents of young children, and primarily women.

On that note, fifty-seven percent of U.S. women would choose their mobile device over sex, according to another survey.

These represent some curious limits on how much sex people want, but God puts some serious limits on sex, that we’ll explore later this week.

In the meantime, here’s a question to consider:

Question: In what ways is our culture obsessed with sex? Think of commercials, businesses, events, etc. Does our culture place any limits on sex?

Well, have a great discussion. Don’t forget, we’re reading the Bible in sync as a community. So, check our website or app to see what today’s Bible reading is. Have a great one.

Read the Bible in Sync Today

Ryan Sim - January 14, 2014

Tuesday - Study It - Reset

Reset

When we imagine a reset in life, we can come up with lots of excuses. Here’s the story of an interaction between one man and Jesus: Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?” Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” (John 3:1-8 ESV) Nicodemus is a Pharisee, a religious law expert. He lives by the book, is religious authority and example to others. So why does he come speak to Jesus like this? One opinion is that he has sinister motives: he’s sucking up to someone famous by saying nice things. Or worse, he is trying to draw Jesus into saying something wrong or illegal. But another, more likely opinion notes that he comes to visit Jesus by night. He’s truly intrigued, and is scared of the consequence if anyone realizes. It seems like that’s how Jesus treats him, like anyone else who comes to him asking questions. Jesus makes it clear that following his teachings won’t just be adding a new religious layer on top of Nicodemus already impressive religious portfolio. It means a complete reset of his life, which is costly considering all he’s already invested. Jesus uses the imagery of the ultimate reset – being reborn, when he says, “unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” This is where we get the terminology of being “born again”. Maybe you react to this word, or don’t like it, because it conjures up images of pushy evangelists. But it’s great image, and Jesus’ image, so we shouldn’t be too quick to dismiss it. He’s saying that following him means a new life, 100%. Nicodemus, though, misses the point. For one reason or another, he takes it quite literally. He’s probably not that naïve to think Jesus means he needs to climb back in the womb – he’s probably just shocked and confused so he argues with it, and tries to argue with the imagery rather than the concept. Question: What does “born again” evoke for you? Do you embrace it, or challenge it?

From Series: "Reset"

When our computers get bogged down and unmanageable, we know to hit a reset button to simply start over. Wouldn't a reset button be great in life? We know it would be complicated, with all our responsibilities and routines to consider, but imagine the freedom and refreshment of a new start in life! What would you do differently? What would you pay more attention to, and what would you ignore? How would you avoid getting bogged down and broken again? The great news is, in coming to earth as Jesus Christ, God has begun to "reset" our universe, our world, and even us. We're invited to start over with him, in what he calls his kingdom. We're invited to start a new life with a clean slate. What gets wiped clean, and lived differently, when God resets our lives? We'll explore how God resets these key areas of our lives: Reset: Goals Reset: Time Reset: Money Reset: Work Reset: Body & Food Reset: Sex & Marriage Reset: Family Reset: Compassion Reset: Nature Reset: Society Reset: Death Join us for the next several weeks, and invite God to reset your life.

Discuss

More From "Reset"

Powered by Series Engine