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Whatever We Focus On Is Where Our Hearts Will Follow

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Jesus said a focus on money will blind us and keep our hearts in the dark. We rob money of its hold over us when we; acknowledge its power, admit our weakness over it, and become generous with it. By contrast, focusing on the treasures of Jesus’ kingdom, will instead fill our whole beings with light.

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What Are We Doing With What We’ve Got?

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The world and everything in it belongs to God. He’s looking for us to look after and use well the bountiful gifts He gives us. The key to a joyful fullness of life, and the only true antidote to anxiety, greed and consumption is to hold lightly to what we have and be giving it back to Him over and again.

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Easter Sunday

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We had a blast celebrating Bread’s second birthday along with an estimated 2.2 billion christians around the world declaring the risen Lord this Easter Sunday. But what is it that stops us from living fully in the light of the resurrection? We took a look at the historical/intellectual, cultural/societal and experiential/personal reasons that might be stopping us from celebrating this world-upending, life-changing thing everyday.

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Ephesians 6: Life Is Tough

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To end his letter to the Ephesians, Paul pulls no punches - we’re in a battle. But we are all called to make a stand. We do it in God’s strength not ours. Empowered by him we can make a difference for God’s kingdom by bringing his gospel of good news, comfort and transformation to a world in need.

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Ephesians 5: Men & Mutual Submission

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Paul continues to expound on what our new humanity looks like. It looks like mutual submission- everyone putting everyone else first. In particular he concentrates on those who in his day wielded more power - those for whom being Jesus-like would have been particularly counter-intuitive and counter-cultural. Everyone thrives when no one is threatened and each looks to promote the other. This is the beauty of Christian community.

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Ephesians 4: Unity & Maturity

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Throughout chapters one to three, Paul purposefully reminds us of all that God has already done. Now - he catapults the church into action. Paul urges the church in Ephesus (and us) to live a life worthy of our calling, and in true Paul fashion - he is unapologetically direct. Be who you now are. Identify and use your gifts for the Kingdom. Take off your old self. Unify with one another. Paul invites us into the freedom and maturity to be who we really are.

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Ephesians 2: Message of grace

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In Jesus, God has done everything to not only solve the problem of our alienation from Him, but also our alienation from one another. He destroys all barriers to peace. He’s done it for us so we can live free - in peace, joy, love and fullness with Him and with one another. This is the extraordinary message of grace.

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Ephesians 1: Spiritually Blessed

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The opening to the book of Ephesians was written to inspire its readers to worship. It’s a veritable kaleidoscope of the dazzling colors of the amazingness of this thing we believe in and belong to. Yet, how many of us - who were brought up with this stuff - can feel like these words have lost their meaning? Worse still - how badly have these upbringings caused us to misunderstand things? If you love a bit of demystifying and clarifying - all in massive puddle of grace, love and ‘it’s already done’ - then this talk is for you.

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How can I be filled with the Holy Spirit?

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What does the Holy Spirit do? The early Christians first experience of the Holy Spirit was powerful. In the book of Acts, there is an explosion of the Spirit's activity - violent winds shake rooms; tongues of fire appear; the disciples stumble out into the street like drunk people; Paul is blinded and knocked from his horse; the Holy Spirit falls in power on everyone - even the Gentiles.

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Parables: Sower - Growing the Kingdom.

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The parable of the sower is not really about four types of soil, but two; Those who welcome Jesus and experience the joy and abundance of His kingdom, and those who don’t. He wants everyone to experience the fullness of life that He brings and He won’t stop going after a broken world, liberally and recklessly giving Himself away to it.

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Parables: Samaritan - Culture of the Kingdom

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The parables have been reduced and misinterpreted when understood outside of their original context, so first we kicked off this new mini-series with a bit of a ‘what IS the deal with the parables anyway?’ before taking a closer look at The Good Samaritan - a classic in all ways, because we discover that Jesus’ listeners would NEVER have seen the point of this as ‘a story about the kindness of a stranger’.

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Baptism Service: Made in the image of God

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You, are infinitely significant because you’ve been made in the image of an infinite God. We all share something of his DNA, but we don’t always feel that special. The God DNA has been, and continues to be marred in us, but Jesus is on a mission to restore it all. If only we let Him. He uniquely has the power to make us new so that we can experience the infinite significance, infinite love and infinite purpose for which we were all created. Jesus is the one we need. The more of Him, the more we become fully ourselves.

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2019: Be made new

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You, are infinitely significant because you’ve been made in the image of an infinite God. We all share something of his DNA, but we don’t always feel that special. The God DNA has been, and continues to be marred in us, but Jesus is on a mission to restore it all. If only we let Him. He uniquely has the power to make us new so that we can experience the infinite significance, infinite love and infinite purpose for which we were all created. Jesus is the one we need. The more of Him, the more we become fully ourselves.

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Thank God for Christmas

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In a world where it seems increasingly difficult to know what to believe, and where life at times can feel stark raving bonkers, what we’re all yearning for is something real, true and dependable. We don’t need more words or speeches right now, we need universe-altering action. Christmas says God became a human. One of us. He showed us he knows exactly what it is like to be human and he showed us exactly what it is to be God. That’s action. He it is who makes sense of our world, even when the world seems to be losing its marbles. He is what we’re made for and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in him. Thank God for Christmas