Living Stones Christian Church East Bay (formerly Great Exchange)

Practical steps to make room for Jesus in Advent

In trials, we can choose hope because of God

God calls us to a politics of love rather than fear.

What is Jesus' definition of leadership vs. the World's definition?

Christians sadly, embody the same partisan and political divisions of the world. But we have something the world doesn’t: God. What if God is in our political disagreements? What if there is something he is trying to teach us, form us, sanctify us in our conflicts? What if he is can make something new if we discern his presence in our radically opposing passions and beliefs?  This draws heavily on Tim Otto’s “Oriented to Faith” and David Fitch’s “Church of Us v Them”

Money, Family, Education, Comfort, Security, Health, etc - life in the burbs can be oriented around so many things. But what if God has an even bigger purpose for us? What if God is bringing his kingdom – and inviting us to join him? What would it look like to join him in his work of compassion, justice, and sharing about his good news? What would sharing the good news look like here in our pluralistic, post-Christian circles? C.f. Redemptive Presence

Where we live tends to be about proximity to schools, safety, home values, or consumer preferences. But what if it is true that “the Word became flesh and moved into the neighborhood”? What if God has you where you are for a reason, to join him in his mission? This message delves into a Theology of place and the call to the practice of “neighboring”. C.f. Value of Redemptive Presence

We live in a world so oriented around the worship of Mammon that it’s hard to see Money soberly. But our worship belongs to God, and so we are called to a radically new relationship with money. How are we to use, spend, seek, and give money as people? E.g. Divine philanthropy (Malcolm Foley).

We often separate work and school from our spiritual lives, which allows the worldly logics and values of work and school rule how we live in those spaces. But what if God is deeply present at work and school? What if he has a purpose? How might this impact how we approach work and school as people who realize Jesus is bringing his good Kingdom everywhere? (Testimonies, TEDTalks, Panel of student and workers?). C.f. Value of Repurpose

Fall Launch Panel: Worship, Hospitality, & Small Groups

Today, what we seek more than timeless principles is an experience of the Ultimate. God is the ultimate reality, but he is not just a philosophy we “believe in; '' he is a person whose presence, love, and power we experience through his initiation and our response of obedience. How do we actually experience this God? C.f. Our value of soul

Life is more than about “being happy”; it’s about finding self/fulfillment in our deepest purpose: loving God and others (c.f. How EEAAO deals with Nihilism). David Brooks calls our generation to consider living for our moral bucket list, rather than a eulogy that boasts little more than that we were happy. Cf. Our value of worship/allegiance

Training in righteousness is training in relationship with God. It involves the whole person being in a relationship with God: physical, mental (thinking), and emotional (feeling), but it's worth the cost.

To be disabled oftentimes means the loss of not only dignity, but community. An extreme example of this is Alzhiemer’s where, in modern society, we prize an able, conscious mind as the hallmark of what it means to be human. How does the gospel speak to the dignity and community of the disabled? How does this challenge the able-bodied believer?

Gender roles and even gender itself is being deconstructed. How do we respond? How do we live as gendered people?

Race is when “your skin is that friend who meets everyone before you do.” Race is first and foremost, not how you identify, but how society identifies you - e.g. it is a social construct. But in Christ, we discover who we really are. How do we live out our true identity in Christ in while in the racialized gaze of the world?

What is God’s vision of our life as sexual beings? Why does he place limits? How is sexuality spiritual? How do we honor God with our sexuality?

Health is important to God! Yet if we cannot worship health – God’s vision of health is not a life lived out of Whole Foods; God is still deeply present and perhaps even more greatly known in suffering and sickness

Sabbatical reflection: Our Creator/Lord of the Sabbath created us in grace and gave us the gift of Sabbath rest; we are finite mortals not the eternal God – even Jesus rested! Yet, is “work-life balance” the pinnacle of spirituality? We are still called to labor/toil – but for what end? In our world, we sacrifice our health for the gods of wealth, body image, etc; but in Christ, there is a greater thing we can give our bodies to: Loving God and Others/His Kingdom

Our priorities and commitments are reorganized in light of the Lordship of Christ