Preparing for Sunday, 9/16/12

Tomorrow Jordan will be preaching from 1 Corinthians 6:12-20, on sexual immorality in the Church. This is super relevant, seeing as this is a problem in every culture and every time period. God created sex as a good thing within marriage, and it's one of the biggest good things that Satan and sin pervert for their own ends. But the call of Christ is to enjoy the world and the blessings of God on His terms. Make sure, if you can, to prayerfully read the passage ahead of time.

We'll sing the following songs:
1. Mighty To Save
An anthem that proclaims that our King, Christ, has defeated the grave, has conquered sin, and our fullest joy is found in knowing Him and proclaiming His goodness in the world.

2. Glorious and Mighty
This is a great re-working of Psalm 96, continuing the theme of the glory of God and the joy of knowing Him. The last line of the chorus, that we get to repeat several times through the song, says that God is "greatly to be praised." God is to be praised greatly because He is the fullest joy and goodness that there is. We fool ourselves when we turn to anything else to make us happy. We were created to know and enjoy God, and proclaim His worth with our lives.

3. In Christ Alone
This hymn will help us not miss the point tomorrow, that we can't give God proper glory apart from being saved, redeemed, and born-again through the shed blood and resurrection of Jesus. If we were "bought with a price" like 1 Corinthians 6:20 says, then we have new, regenerate hearts to put faith in Christ, and enjoy the fullness of the triune God. The sacrifice of Christ substituted to us by faith is the non-negotiable part of knowing God. We cannot know God apart from what He has done through Christ. We can't know God apart from being enabled by the power of what Christ has done to pay for our sin.

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I'm also going to shamelessly plug my equipping class, mostly as a reminder to everybody that's been there, that we're starting back up tomorrow for the final 6 weeks. We introduced "worship" back on 8/19, and built a broad definition of what churches and Christians often mean by "worship" and what it actually is biblically. Then 3 weeks ago Marshall filled in and taught on worship in the Old Testament, looking at our severed relationship with God because of the Fall, and at examples of wrong worship in the OT.

Tomorrow we're going to transition into the Gospel, and at how Christ changed everything related to worship. We'll look at some passages from the New Testament, and at how we need to think about what it means to be worshipers of God under the New Covenant. Don't miss it - should be a great time of discussion, and I hope that the class continues to be an encouragement and a spark for us to think deeply about what we do when we gather to worship as a church, and as we worship in our individual lives.