JR. Forasteros - August 17, 2014
Haggai
When we experience crushing tragedy, recovering seems impossible. Often, we build walls inside ourselves, keeping our hearts and souls safe - or so we think. Haggai shows us that in the wake of the Exile, God's people were doing the same. They were neglecting their relationship with God because it was too painful. But Haggai's challenge to them is the same as to us: if we stay behind our walls, we'll slowly die. We must embrace God once again, and when we do, we'll find not a God who is cold, uncaring and distant, but a God who suffers with us, who is working even now to redeem the world.
More Messages From JR. Forasteros...
 |
Get Rich QuickSeptember 5, 2010 |
|
|
Camel for Sale!September 12, 2010 |
|
|
Best Church Ever!September 19, 2010 |
|
Powered by Series Engine
A lot of you know I’m a huge astronomy nerd (and nerd in general). When I was in second grade, I had read all the books in my little elementary school’s k-3 half of the library. It took some wheeling and a good bit of dealing, but I convinced the school librarian to let me check out books from the 4-6 section of the library. The first one I got was a book on the moon.
Do you know how the moon was formed? The most popular theory is called the Impact theory. Essentially, something like 3-4 billion years ago, when our solar system was still coalescing, a planet the size of Mars collided with Earth. As you can imagine, such a collision was cataclysmic for both planets. The other planetoid shattered, and its fragments became the moon.
And poor Earth – the collision set Earth on a trajectory to develop oceans, and oxygen. And life.
That’s right – without our moon, life would look very different here. We wouldn’t have tides (or werewolves!).
This cataclysmic collision actually created the conditions under which life could emerge on earth.
I want to talk about what happens when people collide today. We’ve all probably had some people come into our lives, relationships that felt cataclysmic. And, especially if you’ve had one or two of those encounters, it’s easy to become inward focused. Protective.
We’re going to talk today about the risk of remaining open. Even in the face of difficult, challenging relationships. Because the truth is: cataclysm isn’t the end of the world. It might just be the beginning of something new and beautiful.
God created us to need each other. God created us to need relationships with each other to open us up.
