JR. Forasteros - August 30, 2015
Infinite Jolly Ranchers
We're taught only to be friends with those who can benefit us in some way. Even the Ancient Romans valued this kind of friendship. But Jesus shows us a different way: to engage in friendships for what you can GIVE, not what you can get. When we love God, we have more than enough to go around. We can love and give without worry that we won't have enough.
From Series: "Summer Break '15"
Each Summer, we give our KidMin volunteers a break, which means our kids worship with us. These sermons are designed to be more accessible to kids, and could be about just about anything!
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Today’s about Ghost stories. Though they appear in many forms, the quintessential ghost story involves the spirit of a dead person who’s stayed around (usually a haunted house) because they have unfinished business. Maybe they have to deliver a message or ensure proper burial or get revenge. Whatever the case, once their business is complete, they leave into the afterlife.
Unlike our previous two monsters, today we’re not ghosts. Rather, to quote Peter Rollins,
We are the haunted houses. — Peter Rollins
We move through life collecting hurts, wounds and scars, evidence of pain inflicted on us by other people. Some may be slight, exaggerated in our heads – maybe someone who cuts us off or says something cruel or who causes us harm by accident. Others could be huge, life-altering. A spouse who left. An abuser. And there’s a whole range of hurts between.
Whatever their source, however legitimate or not, these people, these hurts don’t just exit our lives.
We carry them around with us, in our heads and in our souls. They haunt us, returning again and again out of the ether to drag us through the past, to relive history, to reopen old wounds.
The problem is we don’t know what these ghosts want. We don’t know how to resolve their business and get them to leave us. We can’t escape their haunting – especially if the person who hurt you is still a part of your life.
