JR. Forasteros - November 19, 2017

The Shadow Self

Good Grief

We build our lives around all kinds of things that make us feel secure, in control or valuable. But these things cannot give us the meaning and purpose we crave. In Lamentations 4, we see God strip these things away from the people of Jerusalem that they might return to worshipping God alone. How can we return to God before our own idolatry ruins us?

From Series: "Good Grief"

We avoid pain and grief as much as possible. When faced with someone else's grief, we avoid or offer platitudes. But the book of Lamentations invites us to sit with grief, to enter into the prophetic process of Lament. In this series, we'll explore how to grieve and how to be a friend to the grieving. Ultimately, we'll see how the process of lament invites us to be agents of healing in the larger world.

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In a world increasingly divided and hopeless, even something as simple as respectful disagreement seems impossible. But the prophets who taught Israel how to long for the birth of the Messiah made bold promises: weapons formed into gardening tools; wolves and sheep living in harmony; deserts blooming. Such promises seem impossible – like pure imaginative fiction. But God’s promises aren’t fiction. They’re a future God is bringing into existence. Jesus birth proves God is with us, that God is working. We can have purified imaginations, see the world as it will be, and begin to work for that world now. What does it mean to be a people of Advent?

Advent means the impossible has been made possible!

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