Friday – Reflect – Groups in Community

Friday – Reflect – Groups in Community

We reflect and pray about the importance of community in following Jesus. Reminder: Last week we saw the importance of reading the Bible together in sync, so our new daily bible readings start today in our mobile app and web site.

Thursday – Act On It – Groups – in Community

Thursday – Act On It – Groups – in Community

Yesterday, we explored how a church community is meant to be a gathering, sometimes even just for fun and fellowship. You might think church has always meant a religious gathering of Christians on Sunday morning.  But in the Bible’s Greek language, church had another meaning before that.  The Greek word for church is ekklesia which […]

Wednesday – Change It – Groups – in Community

Wednesday – Change It – Groups – in Community

This week we’re exploring the importance of meeting regularly with other Christians, as part of a church community. The Bible passage we’re exploring this week suggests two purposes to gathering:  Encouragement and Worship.  We’ll focus on worship next week, and for this week we’ll focus on the encouragement part. Encouragement to what?  Hebrews says community […]

Tuesday – Study It – Groups – in Community

Tuesday – Study It – Groups – in Community

We are beginning a new series on “Becoming Like Family” as our online community members begin to share the daily challenges with friends, and we begin to gather our larger community together.  We want to have five main characteristics, and the one we’re focusing on this week is to be spending time in community groups. […]

Monday – A New Idea – Groups – in Community

Monday – A New Idea – Groups – in Community

We are beginning a new series on “Becoming Like Family” as our online community begin to share the daily challenges with friends, and we begin to gather our larger community together. Why would we bother?  One survey found that 59% of 18-29 year old Americans with a Christian background dropped out of church.  Four-in-ten American […]

Thursday – Act On It – Growth – in Discipleship

Thursday – Act On It – Growth – in Discipleship

This week we’re exploring how to become a church community united by common learning goals, even when we are busy! We’ve seen that the church is made up of many different complementary gifts and passions, but all put to use pursuing the same goal.  The Bible described this as “maturity, the full stature of Christ”.  […]

Wednesday – Change It – Growth – in Discipleship

Wednesday – Change It – Growth – in Discipleship

We are working toward becoming one church community united by common learning goals, even as we are scattered commuting people. This week we’re studying a passage from Ephesians that includes this line: “until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to […]

Tuesday – Study It – Growth – in Discipleship

Tuesday – Study It – Growth – in Discipleship

This is our new series on becoming like family.  There are five main characteristics of the kind of community we’re forming.  The first one: Discipleship – what we’re learning together as a community.  Here’s our guidance from the Bible on this characteristic.  Comes from Paul, one of the first to start new church communities in […]

Monday – A New Idea – Growth – in Discipleship

Monday – A New Idea – Growth – in Discipleship

We are beginning a new series on “Becoming Like Family” as our online community begin to share the daily challenges with friends, and we begin to gather our larger community together. We want to have five main characteristics, and the first is to be bound together by some common learning experiences. In October I attended […]

Thursday – Act On It – Becoming Like Family

Thursday – Act On It – Becoming Like Family

So what does it mean to do the will of our father in heaven, as a family of followers of Jesus?  How do our values impact our routines and traditions as we develop into a church family? One example that will guide us for the rest of this series comes from this description in the […]

Wednesday – Change It – Becoming Like Family

Wednesday – Change It – Becoming Like Family

Every family has routines and values, and these are closely connected.  Take suburban family life as an example.  On the surface, we can see routines:  wake, eat, drop-off at daycare/school, commute to work, work, commute home, pickup kids, make and eat dinner, get everyone to bed, and repeat. But we have to ask what values […]

Tuesday – Study It – Becoming Like Family

Tuesday – Study It – Becoming Like Family

We asked yesterday if you could list of what comes to mind when you hear the word “church”.  Our lists probably included buildings, events and services.  It may have included organ and choir music, stained glass windows, dusty books, bake sales and more.  It may evoke good experiences, or bad ones. But not how the […]

Monday – A New Idea – Becoming Like Family

Monday – A New Idea – Becoming Like Family

In our last series, we talked about loving our neighbours, and stepped through six shifts.  From stranger to neighbour to acquaintance to partner to friend to becoming “like family”. It’s possible to become like family with a focused group of people, where you practice loving your neighbours within that small group, and see that spill […]