We are spiritual beings first therefore real meaning of life is going to found in the spiritual.

The best way to develop and deepen these spiritual relationships is in the context of a smaller group.

The purpose of a Life Group is to connect with God and others for the purpose of life change – to look more like Jesus.

2 Incomplete Small Group Experiences that get confused for a Life Group.

#1 – Ministry Teams – groups that are organized and function around a task.

#2 – Bible Studies – groups that are focused on knowledge.

It’s possible to be active in both of these of groups and never connect with God or experience life change.

The key to it all is authenticity. When we take off our mask and reveal who we really are – our hurts, fears, failures.

The mask we wear is a double-edged sword. We wear it because it does offer some form of protection. One of the greatest fears we have as people is if they knew who I really was, they wouldn’t want anything to do with me.

The same mask that offers a little protection is also the exact thing that prevents true healing. Jesus will always demand that the mask come off first.

Mark 5 is a tragic tale of an entire community that didn’t want to be authentic.

Authenticity will cost you something. It’s expensive. It’s worth it – but it does cost something.

Addiction comes in all sorts of sizes and packages. Some more acceptable than others, some easier to recognize than others. But all addictions have one end in mind – total dominance and control over a person. Whether it’s drugs, alcohol, porn, eating, greed, pride — the inevitable end of every addiction is to consume.

Addictions consume, control, and rob people. It becomes their god.

Paul’s journey in Romans 6,7, and 8 has great insight for addicts. I don’t do what I want to do but the evil I don’t want to do I do. The solution is to feed the “Good Wolf.” (Confused? Listen to the sermon! ha ha)

Romans 8:1 is the most scandalous verse in scripture. How ridiculous is it to say there is NO, none, nada — zip — condemnation for those IN Christ Jesus? Our bodies and emotions don’t believe this truth of scripture most of the time. Yet, this truth stands in the middle of our messes as God’s declaration of what He wants to do, WILL do and IS doing for those who place their life IN Christ. It’s nothing sort of scandalous.

It doesn’t remove our need for God AND our need for a place to share the LAST 10%. It does provide the basis for such a context – since there is no condemnation, I can BE accountable.

Next week: Anger

I was also totally surprised by how few people knew who Bear Grylls was. He is the patron saint of worrying about things that will probably never happen. I love his shows, his accent, his charitable works, and I think I’d like to hang with him — as long as I didn’t have to eat like him. I’m glad I showed the two clips of his shows because if I hadn’t – the joke/illustration would have completely been lost. Plus now our congregation knows the awesomeness that is Bear Grylls. Thank God for technology, huh?

Worry is sneaky because many of us don’t see it as a sin AND because it tricks us into thinking we have control over more than what we really do.

Worry is saying to God “I don’t think You are big enough to handle my problem.” Worry is the loss of perspective of big God is.

The weapon against worry – Matthew 6:33-34 — Seek first the Kingdom of God. Let God consume us and that will put in proper perspective our problems. God has given us a spirit of power, love, and a sound mind.

A sound mind is one that does what God asks me to do, gives to God what I cannot do, and trusts God no matter what happens.

I do think the ‘sound mind’ piece can often be missed. I have this conversation over and over and over again in all my years as a pastor — if you’ll do what you KNOW God wants you to do (His Word, serve, worship, give) it will be easier to recognize His voice when He speaks. If you NEVER do what is CLEAR that God wants us to do, you’ll NEVER recognize His voice in the more subtle ways.

Next week in Hostage is ANGER.

Yesterday we dealt with bitterness and I’m already hearing God-stories. The highlights for me:

The only solution to bitterness is forgiveness. Only those who’ve been forgiven can really give forgiveness.

And forgiveness is NOT about justifying the hurt. It’s about moving us to a place to be healed. Without this healing, we’ll end up poisoning ourselves as well as those around us.

Had the opportunity to pray with people for forgiveness and a new start.

Going to be a great series….going to see a lot of healing over the next few weeks.

Abraham’s life is a study in 2 steps forward, 1 step back (sometimes more than 1 step) kind of faith. And God is both ruthless and patient with him. He’s patient in that He doesn’t choose to take away the promise. He’s ruthless in that He allows Abraham to deal with the full measure of his choices, Lot as well.

I think more of us can relate better to Abraham than any other character in the Bible for this reason. Most of our walks look exactly like this – trust, trust, not trust. Hear the voice of God then run ahead of Him to ‘help him out’ and end up messing the whole thing up worse than it was in the beginning. Having pockets in our life where we feel this huge sense of entitlement – I deserve this – only to later realize how immature and foolish that line of thinking is.

The thing about Abraham is that he finished well. The last few years of his life — from the birth of Isaac forward, we see a man who for the most part walks by faith with God. It may have took him over 100 years to get to that point – but he did.

We (Creative Team) picked up on the theme of Broken Dreams because the more we looked at Abraham’s life, we saw all these fragments of decisions in his life – Lot, his dad, his relationship with Sarah, Ishmael. These fragments were once whole pieces of a dream of a life that he and perhaps Sarah had envisioned for themselves. And like all of us – life happens and these dreams began to break.

Yet we noticed that when God was seen as a resource – the Source – something different happened. Redemption. Healing. Refocus. When they tried to fix the brokenness on their own with their own schemes, it always ended worse than when they started.

Until Isaac. By the time God asked Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, all of that had changed. Abraham now trusted God no matter what the outcome or directive. He knew better. He had the scars to prove God’s character. So now what normal people would call broken dreams, Abraham would call opportunity for the holy.

It was a good series and one that I hope gave our congregation some insight in how to deal with the broken dreams in the own life.