Choose to... write the message?

Recapping the 10 (choose wisely.) Series
Over the last several weeks at New Cov, we've been going through the 10 most important choices you can make in life. This week we'll be hitting #9, and for those not keeping track, we've covered the following:

1. Choose God
2. Choose God's Forgiveness
3. Choose Jesus as Lord
4. Choose the Bible as God's Word
5. Choose to Forgive
6. Choose to Trust
7. Choose to Love My Family First
8. Choose Authenticity
9. Choose to Serve (coming this weekend)

In the two Sundays to follow (October 18 and October 25) we will be reviewing these 9 choices, and talking about how they have impacted us. So we want to know: what do you want to hear on these topics? Obviously, we won't be just reviewing them (what fun would that be?). Instead, we're planning bring some new thoughts on the choices, and we hope to answer questions you have on them!

What We Need From You
Here's where you can help! YOU can help us WRITE THE MESSAGE! (Sorta.) We do want to hear from you, so respond to any of the following:

- Which choice has impacted you the most? How?
- What question has been burning in your mind since hearing one of the messages?
- How has one of these choices changed your thinking?
- Which choice challenged you the most? Why?

Or just write your thoughts on any of the 9 choices we've covered so far. Our hope is that for the next two weeks we can reflect on what we've covered before revealing the final of our 10 choices. Because if you're not choosing any one of the first 9 choices, choice #10 doesn't matter.

So share your thoughts! Post a comment! Or, if you'd rather do it as part of a discussion, you can head to the New Cov page on Facebook (there's a badge link on the right side of this blog).

The First 9
And if you need some more details to jog your memory on the first 8 choices, here are the "Bret's Notes" versions of the messages:

--Choose God--
Jeremiah 29 also calls us to seek Him, and that's the key here: choose to seek Him. The first 4 words of the Bible were a call for reflection for the week: "In the beginning, God..." God can be found in the improbabilities of the Earth, in the moral fiber of humankind. We should choose Him.

--Choose God's Forgiveness--
The story of Jesus healing the paralytic was the text. Tim used boxes stacked up to show that we can't be 100% good on our own. We listened to Sinatra's "I Did It My Way" as painters showed us that we can't paint over our mistakes by ourselves. We took communion and heard the words of Isaiah 53 in the song "By His Wounds."

--Choose Jesus as Lord--
Curt Liesveld talked about a created order of the world. God made us higher than creation, but not at the top. He mentioned a Dallas Willard concept: "vampire Christians." We accept Jesus and his blood, but we don't make Him Lord.

--Choose the Bible as God's Word--
Tim reflected on Psalm 1. In the first verse are 3 postures that show our progression to our bottom-line authority: walk, stand, sit. Who or what is the authority, the compass, the final authority in our lives? James 1:22 then says to not only read the Bible, but to do what it says.

--Choose to Forgive--
We heard quotes read from blog comments on why forgiving is so hard. Tim reminded us through Matthew 18 that God has forgiven us, so we should forgive others. Justin and Erica Klemsz shared a story of forgiveness from their marriage. We had communion, remembering that Christ has forgiven us: how could we withhold forgiveness from others?

--Choose to Trust--
The service started with movie clips, where the topic was worrying about the future. Tim took us to Matthew 6:25, and challenged us with this idea: when we worry, we are saying there isn't a God big enough for our problems. We can choose to trust, or we can choose atheism.

--Choose to Love My Family First--
Troy Heller spoke on the importance of making our family a priority. Using tennis balls to illustrate, Troy showed us that we've got 168 hours in the week, and around 72 aren't spent sleeping or working. How do we make the most of those 72 hours? And how do we work spiritual growth into our family communication?

--Choose Authenticity--
Tim spoke, and illustrated that the only way we can lessen the gap between who we say we are, and who we really are, is to draw nearer to Christ. We saw a drama called "Mask" that showed a woman putting on an act to go to church, so no one would see how she was hurting. "Honesty" by Sara Groves concluded the drama. We had communion while singing verses from "O For A Thousand Tongues To Sing."

--Choose to Serve-- (coming this weekend)

Forgiving is hard. Why is that?

We all know that forgiving people can be hard sometimes. Sometimes it's like throwing a switch, but sometimes we withhold forgiveness for weeks, or months, or years.

Why is it so hard to forgive?

We want to hear from you on this one. Tim is currently working on a message about forgiving others, scheduled for Sunday, September 13. He wants to speak to what people need to hear, so we're giving you an opportunity to help shape the message. So here's what we need from you:

Post a comment below, and answer at least one of these questions:

• Why is it so hard to forgive?
• What are the barriers that keep me from forgiving the person who wronged me?

Keep things anonymous (don't point any fingers here), and post anonymously if you'd like.

Romans 9 Summary

Somehow in his providence God is able to orchestrate everything so that people choosing freely somehow contribute to God’s plan exactly as he planned it.

Questions/ Comments Calvininsm

According to Calvinism:
Salvation is accomplished by the almighty power of the Triune God. The Father chose a people, the Son died for them, the Holy Spirit makes Christ's death effective by bringing the elect to faith and repentance, thereby causing them to willingly obey the gospel. The entire process (election, redemption, regeneration) is the work of God and is by grace alone. Thus God, not man, determines who will be the recipients of the gift of salvation.

What in this statement is true according to your understanding of the Bible?

What seems "off" from your understanding of the Bible?

Questions / Comments Arminiansim

According to Arminianism:
Salvation is accomplished through the combined efforts of God (who takes the initiative) and man (who must respond) - man's response being the determining factor. God has provided salvation for everyone, but His provision becomes effective only for those who, of their own free will, "choose" to cooperate with Him and accept His offer of grace. At the crucial point, man's will plays a decisive role; thus man, not God, determines who will be recipients of the gift of salvation.

What in this statement is true according to your understanding of the Bible?

What seems "off" from your understanding of the Bible?

Face to Face----Betrayal

From Text Questions Feb. 15

1. How do you ever heal from being betrayed? How long is it going to hurt? It's been years.
It is going to be a long journey. For sure, it will be when Jesus appears! My experience is that a betrayal today opens the wound of yesterday’s betrayal. I have to go back and work on forgiving and letting go of something that happened long ago—again. Memory is both a wonderful and terrible thing. Healing, however, is different from remembering. Healing has happened when I can honestly say “God has used the terrible wrong for something really good in my life.” In other words, when I can bring God into the situation and truly believe and see the good He has delivered, then I am healed. (Gen. 50:20) A tip I have would be to talk to a trusted friend in detail about the betrayal. Having someone listen and ask questions really helps the healing process. James 5:16 says confession and prayer bring about healing. Likely things will not return to "normal." We are in process and are changing. A decision to look forward instead of backward will help the process of growing into Christlikeness.

2. Is being conscious of what we're doing wrong in sin and feeling the conviction in our heart wanting to draw closer to God ...Is that enough punishment?
I hear two things in this question as it is stated: (1) is what I used to say to my mother when she was spanking me, ‘That’s enough. I won’t do it again!” In reading Hosea, it is hard for us to erase the picture of God doing punishing. If I read the book properly, God is allowing the consequences of sin to do the punishing. “Egypt” and “Assyria” are mentioned repeatedly as punishers. Those are the very nations that Israel looked to for life rather than looking to God. Israel made treaties with those countries and tried to buy their way into alliances. Those are the nations that tore Israel apart. (2) “wanting to draw closer to God” is not enough. Hosea 5:4 says, “Their deeds do not permit them to return to their God.” In addition to wanting to draw closer, there has to be the ceasing or stopping of the actions and attitudes that caused one to leave God. It is both heart and action.

3. Do we have to restore a relationship with someone who betrayed us?
No. Forgiveness is different from reconciliation and restoration. I can forgive someone who has been toxic to me or even abusive without letting them back into my life. I need to wait until I know they have fully repented and they have rebuilt trust to invite them back in my life. Forgiveness does not mean that the hurt is gone. When the hurt returns, I must go to God and to other trusted friends to share my hurt. I may need to revisit and reaffirm my choice to forgive which is not unusual. Forgiveness is vital to our spiritual health. Bitterness is a cancer that will eat away our spiritual life. In Christ, we can come to a point of forgiving and then enter into a process of healing which involves forgiving again and again. Rom. 12:19 says that the goal is not reconciliation but peace. “If possible, as far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men.” I can be at peace that I have done all I can do in Christ. I can pray for the one who wounded me. But if the other person is unwilling come to Jesus honestly for what they have done, then I can have peace but not restored.

Face to Face...Living a Life of Obedience

Below are two text questions from Feb. 8th services dealing with God's call on Hosea to pursue a relationship with Gomer who was a prostitute. Also, there are two text comments from New Cov. attenders.

1. All the earth’s population started from Adam and Eve. The only way people could multiply was through incest. In Hosea’s life, God tells him to take a prostitute and later to take his wife back who had been unfaithful to him. How can a God order people to do things He told them never to do in the Law.

Incest in the Bible: Given that we are all descended from Adam and Eve, either Cain or one of his brothers must have married a sister. This would seem to violate the commands recorded in the book of Leviticus forbidding marriage between brothers and sisters. The Levitical laws, however, must be considered in their proper historical context.

Though the book of Genesis condemns sexual relations between children and their parents, it nowhere prohibits a man from marrying his sister or niece. Abraham, for example, married his half-sister without compunction. Not until the time of Moses were laws established forbidding a man from marrying a sister or niece. The timing of this command makes perfect sense biologically, for genetic defects as a result of intra-family marriage would not begin to crop up until after the first few dozen generations….This is from Dr. Hugh Ross, Reasons to Believe: http://www.reasons.org/resources/apologetics/cainswife.shtml

Was Hosea told by God to sin? Even though it is very disconcerting to hear that Hosea was told by God to find Gomer (a prostitute) and marry her, there was no sin committed in him doing that. He was not sinning by marrying her, nor sinning by pursuing her even though she had been unfaithful to him. She was the one who was sinning by her actions, but no sin on Hosea’s part.

2. What are sacred raisin cakes?

This food was eaten in the feasts that honored false gods. Dried grapes were used in the worship of fertility gods, who were believed to give abundant harvests to their worshipers.

3. Hosea has been my favorite for many years. I find it helpful to read it aloud as if reading a play. It brings out all the Passion of the story…comment from a New Cov. attender.
4. Chapter 4 seems like the most contemporary of Old Testament books. It is fun and sad to think of modern examples of the charges against Israel…comment from a New Cov. attender.