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Unhealed: Origins

To paraphrase M. Scott Peck, life is difficult, and once we accept that, we can transcend it. Much of this difficulty stems from the dysfunction we all have in our family of origin. There are generational messages transmitted, both purposefully and otherwise, that impact our lives.

So no family is perfect – and when we look to scripture we see this emphasized. The families in Genesis paint a clear picture of dysfunction and generational trauma. From Cain & Abel to the Jacob/Rachel/Leah love triangle, we get many, many stories of people chosen by God but still hurting within themselves and hurting others. But out of that chaos comes the legendary 12 Tribes of Israel, the People of the Covenant the line of Christ and the mechanism by which God saved the world.

We can take some comfort in this, that we are not alone – there is nothing we have ensured or are enduring that God has not seen before, that God has not used for the good of His people and the glory of His name.

The dynamics in our families of origin still impact us. They help determine how we interact with people we love, what we value, and how we respond to both hurt and success.

Scripture tells us that the sin of parents impact their children and their children’s children (Exodus 34:7). But it also tells us that His grace is even more pervasive.

We get a picture of this grace and healing in a family, also in Genesis. Joseph came out of this same dysfunctional brood, with favoritism, pride and jealousy all coming together to leave him considered dead by his family and enslaved in a foreign land. But Joseph turns his focus to following God even in his circumstance, so that when he is brought face to face with the brothers who wronged him, he (eventually) finds a way to forgive and find healing. First, though, he is overcome and finds a private room in which to weep. What are your private rooms, where you go to when triggered by a reminder of past hurt?

When Joseph finally confronts his brothers, he does so with mercy and forgiveness that is nearly unfathomable. The story of Joseph is the story of the Gospel, turning trauma and tragedy into salvation.

In the same way, our misery becomes our ministry. When God takes us through healing, He gives us the words and the ability to reach others with that same message of healing. Sometimes that trauma itself will even push us to God and to that healing.

Joseph’s brothers deserved to be cursed and to have revenge taken on them. Instead, God made their sin the mechanism of material salvation for their family, and even of healing for the relational trauma of the family.

What are the traumatic events of your past that have wounded you? God is big enough. There is nothing too bad or too overwhelming such that He cannot bring healing and redemption.

— Sermon Notes, Dave Sim, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, June 2, 2024

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Resurrection Life – Why are You Looking at Heaven? – Acts 1:4-11

It is not for you to know

We get a sense of impatience among the disciples in this passage, and like much impatience it may have stemmed from fear. The disciples had been looking forward to Jesus as Messiah overthrowing Rome’s rule over Israel – Jesus’ death derailed that plan briefly but now things seem like they should be back on track, but over the 40 days from His resurrections He hasn’t made any kind of move in that direction. So naturally, they are getting impatient. What’s the plan?

Here, they ask about this directly, and Jesus’ answer is critical to understand: “It is not for you to know.” We all want answers and a clear understanding of our place in God’s overall plan. But Jesus’instruction is to wait. We hate that!

But there is a promise coming – the Holy Spirit will come, and the disciples will be witnesses. That is ultimately the story of Acts, which is an active, mission oriented book, but that starts with the leader of this new movement disappearing and telling his followers to sit tight.

And so they stand there looking at the sky feeling confused and maybe frustrated. Then along come two angels, much like the scene at the tomb that Luke also described. They promise that, even if the details are hidden, Jesus would return. Their task was first to wait and then to be His witnesses.

We are called to the same – we are not just biding our time until heaven. God has set a plan in front of us and a purpose on this earth. We aren’t meant to simply stand and gaze at heaven, huddled together with like minded people and waiting for the second coming. We are called to be witnesses. There is work to be done!

The church is supposed to be the collective witness of the Good News to the world. We are not here to calculate the times and seasons, to seek and predict the next big change. We are called into the streets and homes and lives of those around us, the nitty-gritty of life. Gaining and losing, loving and mourning, succeeding and failing – we are to be witnesses amongst all of it.

But when we do find ourselves standing around looking at the sky, when we do feel lost or impatient, we have instruction here too: wait. Rather than jumping to whatever seems right in our own mind, Jesus instructs us to wait.

Waiting on God’s spirit can be challenging but it is a fundamental part of building a relationship with God. God’s timing is perfect, even when it differs from our own expectations or desires.

Let us be a people who can wait on God’s timing, and be His witnesses.

— Sermon Notes, Dave Sim, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, May 12, 2024

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Resurrection Life – Listening to the Spirit – Acts 10:44-48

What does it mean to be led by the Spirit? Jesus promised the Holy Spirit would come and instruct the disciples after He ascended into heaven. The Holy Spirit is the real time presence of God working and and through us to do His work in the world. This passage gives us an example of this.

Christianity began as a sect of Judaism. At the time, Jewish religion, ethnicity, culture and language were all very tightly tied together, so the early movement of gentiles into the sect of The Way, it created tension. Many of the Jewish Christians considered these converts to still be outsiders.

This tension is addressed head-on in Acts 9 and 10. In Acts 9:8, Saul, who had been persecuting the church, is blinded after ‘seeing’ Jesus. Meanwhile, the Christian man Ananias has a vision telling him to go to Saul. In 9:18 after ministering from Ananias, scales fall from Saul’s eyes and he is baptized. Then in 9:40 we get the story of Peter raising a little girl from the dead. He says “Tabitha, get up.” She opens her eyes, and seeing Peter she sits up. Then in Acts 10 wet get Peter’s vision that leads him to understand that the gentiles are loved by God and that “God does not show favoritism” even to His chosen people. This is a key pivot point for the Church that ultimately transformed it from a sect of Judaism into the global body of believers it is today.

We have those same transformational moments in our own lives, where the paradigm we have operated by is disrupted and overturned by the Holy Spirit. Consider Peter, looking at this collection of unclean animals, age being told to eat, against a thousand years of culture and religion. Consider him entering the house of gentile, uncircumcised Cornelius, and sharing a meal.

What would be similarly kind blowing today? What could the Holy Spirit do today that would be a similar paradigm shift? On the one hand we must be alert to people claiming the leading of the Spirit, and use the boundaries of scripture, tradition and the discernment of the community. At the same time, we must be open to be challenged in church – church is not only able feeling safe.

So we must find ways to listen to the Spirit and listen to those around us but who may be moved by the Spirit. This takes trust and patience, but the more that we grow in that practice is spiritual formation and discernment, the more we can accomplish for God. The Spirit is moving and speaking all the time, if we are open to listen.

— Sermon Notes, Dave Sim, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, May 5, 2024

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Resurrection Life – Philip and the Eunuch – Acts 8:26-40

This is a story of God pulling Philip out of his standard routine. Philip has been preaching in Samaria and has just had his ministry blessed by Peter and John. But now God calls him away to a completely different place, the road from Jerusalem out to Gaza, where he meets an Ethiopian official.

The official had been castrated as many were in order to keep their full attention. He also must have been either a convert to Judaism or someone curious about it because he was reading Isaiah, specifically chapter 53, the “suffering servant” passage that is one of the clearest prophecies of Christ.

The passage may have had special resonance for him, especially the line “In his humiliation he was deprived of justice. Who can speak of his descendants?” As someone bodily humiliated, someone who would have no descendants, he wants to know more about who is being discussed here.

Given this perfect setup, Philip spikes the ball and walks the Ethiopian through the story of Christ, and he immediately jumps to wanting to be baptized in a pool they just happen to be passing.

For some additional context, this comes shortly after some trouble in Jerusalem where the Greek-speaking widows were being overlooked by the Aramaic-speaking church leadership who then put in place Greek-speaking deacons, of whom Philip was one. The apostles were “oo busy teaching and preaching to” wait tables” so they put in place these deacons to work out the logistics. But then the next two chapters are all about two of these deacons teaching and preaching! Stephen becomes the first martyr and Philip gets teleports all over.

This is a story of the Holy Spirit pushing on our human boundaries. God wants us to move beyond our central comfort zone, to leave our holy huddle and get out on the road to Gaza.

We are called to live a Spirit-Led Life. The Holy Spirit continues to work powerfully today, but at do need to work the muscles that He wants us to use.

But beware, the spirit filled life can take you off track, disrupting your plans and putting you in an entirely different place and directions.

This may happen through timely and crucial interactions. Philip never saw the Ethiopian again, but tradition holds he went on to found the Ethiopian church, among the oldest in the world.

This happens because God has been working ahead of time, moving eunuchs to investigate the Jewish religion and page through Isaiah.

The Holy Spirit will prompt you to push to the margins and boundaries, which means we must practice listening and trying.

God is calling people from the ends of the earth and we all have roles to play in that great work.

— Sermon Notes, Dave Sim, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, April 28, 2024

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God Your Protector – Psalm 121

Why doesn’t God take away our problems and suffering when we ask Him to? Why does God tolerate so much suffering in the world? We heard last month about God as Immanuel, this notion that God through Christ is present with us in that suffering.

But the question remains – if a chef makes terrible soup, does it make it better if he comes out of the kitchen and eats it with you?

But then, the soup isn’t always bad. In fact, often the soup is incredible – but when we are in the midst of those bouts of “bad soup” out makes us question God. Academically we can recognize that we are not in a position to question the nature and decisions of the creator of the universe. But if we are His children, as He tells us, maybe we do have a relationship where that kind of question is ok to ask. Maybe He even welcomes it.

We can all agree that a good parent does more than be present in the pain of their children, but they do what they can to take away that pain. So if God can do that, why doesn’t He always?

Psalm 121 sure makes it seem like there is more of a role for God to play. The word “Protector” or “protect” appears six times in the eight verses. The single word šāmar or “your protector” appears at the exact syllabic middle of the psalm.

The psalm begins with a question and is followed with an unambiguous answer. The psalm includes multiple “merisms” or contrasts between two opposites in order to demonstrate the totality of something. God protects by night and day; from the physical danger of the sun and the emotional danger of the moon (i.e. lunacy); in the going out of the city walls to work to the returning from the fields to our home. And not just now, but from now until eternity.

But what does this protection entail? It doesn’t mean we won’t be hurt. It never has – no ancient worshipper singing this song on the way to the temple thought they would never see any problems. So what does it mean? As a child we definitely see it as a simple protection, but as we mature and faith matures.

Losing that simpler understanding is a real loss, and we do need to work through the “tasks of grief” and reassess our relationship to what has changed for us.

So what does that protection mean? It’s not protection from pain or sadness. It means, for one, that he will not let us get lost. No matter how far we wander, he will not leave us. He knows how he will bring us home, no matter how far we go or how long it takes. This is the heart of the gospel – no matter how lost we are, we are never lost to Him.

When we are in dark seasons of loss, that is probably not what we would pick. We would want the pain gone and the loss restored, right away! But God’s protection means that the doubt and pain will not take us away from Him. We don’t need to be afraid of our feelings – we can feel our feelings and God is still there right beside us.

It also means that there is no journey to God out of grief. God is there with us in the midst of it, and the moment we need Him, He is right there.

— Sermon Notes, Denise Lindberg, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, April 21, 2024

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Road to Emmaus – Luke 24:13-33

This story comes on the same Sunday that the women discovered the empty tomb. The angst and wonder and confusion was still incredibly fresh. This pair of disciples – possibly husband and wife – were trying to sort through their grief and confusion over the course of seven miles. If it was Cleopas and his wife, she had just seen Jesus on the cross alongside his mother and others.

One question, though, was why they didn’t recognize him? He certainly looked differently than he did the last time they saw him, suffering on the cross. It’s always difficult recognizing people out of context. Also, if they had been expecting a resurrection, then they would have been expecting something much grander than just a quiet stranger on the road. But there is a supernatural aspect of this as well, with them being prevented from recognizing him.

One possible reason is to let Jesus directly address the loss of hope that the pair were experiencing. “We had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel.” They are clearly teetering on the edge of despair, while still focused on an expectation of political revolution.

And so Jesus, still unrecognized, begins to teach. He walks them through the whole Old Testament, no doubt familiar to them, but weaving the story of the messiah and the gospel through it all. This new event was not the end of the Old Testament, but the fulfillment.

Something in his teaching led them to invite him to join them for a meal. When he broke the bread at their invitation, their eyes were open and they saw Jesus for who He was. There are many angles to take here, all of them beautiful.

When we sit down at a table together and break bread, we are better able to see Jesus for who He is. When we engage in community, His face becomes clear.

And of course they had very recently seen Jesus break bread at the Last Supper – this was His body, broken for them.

And then, he dissappears! This is making it clear to the disciples that Jesus will not be interacting with his disciples in the same way that he had before, or that they would expect. We run into this as well, with our own expectations of how Jesus will show up and how God will demonstrate His love.

Can we feel the love of God through struggles? See Jesus in the face of someone we dislike? Hear the words of Christ in the mouth of someone we are in conflict with.

This story is also a reminder that the scriptures all by themselves do not do the work of God. In fact, the Bible has often been used to justify oppression and sin. It is when Jesus works through the scriptures that His will is done. It is when we hear the scriptures through the lens and person of Jesus that we get real truth and real power.

And so they leap up from their unfinished meal and immediately head back to Jerusalem, even though it is already night. They have a word of hope to share with those who need it and they do not wait around to share it. Can we do the same?

Is there an area of your life when you were expecting God to show up, where you may need to pray for your eyes to be opened to see his He is working in ways that you may not expect? And when you see it, will you run to tell others?

— Sermon Notes, Alison Robison, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, April 14, 2024

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The Perplexing Resurrection – Luke 24:9-12

We’ve just wrapped up a series going through the book of Mark, ending on Easter with Mark’s rather abrupt finale. We’ll now pick up the story as told in the gospel of Luke.

One thing to note is that the two accounts of the resurrection have some differences. In fact, all four of the gospel accounts of the resurrection have differences – which women went to the tomb, what angels were there, where was the stone, things like that. It’s important to understand that there is one true gospel story and four different accounts of it. Each author noted different things and considered different things important for them to include or highlight. It’s left to us as a puzzle to put together.

That mirrors the confusion that we see in the story itself. The women are perplexed, Peter is wondering or marveling. That wonder, that confusion, that questioning is the first step towards understanding. This is why children ask so many questions – so let us come as little children, wondering and marveling even, maybe especially, when we are confused by events or what God has to say.

Asking these questions puts us in a position of humility, which is one of the reasons it can be hard for us to do as adults. Even Jesus, when taking the ultimate posture of humility on the cross, asked His Father “why?”

Sitting in wonder and questioning together can be a holy thing. When we want to put out simple answers instead of living in the question, it can lead us to race ahead to wrong and even harmful conclusions. Life is not a race to get to the right answer first.

While there is value in answers, in truth, knowledge and understanding, but there is also value in the process in that direction.

Back to the story – the women were perplexed. Paul used the same Greek word in his second letter to the church in Corinth:

But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.

2 Corinthians 4:8-10

The word “perplexed” in both places is aporeō, and the contrasting word “despair” is exaporeō. So while we can live in confusion, questioning and wonder, if we keep ourselves focused on the person of Jesus, we can avoid despair. The women and disciples were confused, but they were looking for Jesus – and Jesus eventually found them.

Are you in a place where you don’t have answers? Are there those around you? Don’t race ahead to find pat answers, and don’t veer off course to despair. Instead, be ready to live in the questions while seeking the ultimate Answer to all our questions.

–Sermon Notes, Alison Robison, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, April 6, 2024

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Immanuel

Many of us grew up with a theology that emphasized performance. Work hard to earn the love of God and the people around you, do what is right in order to get into heaven and avoid hell. Seeking God can feel like a video game, often with a difficult boss that we cannot overcome.

In life, we often feel ugly, invisible, rejected, unworthy, impure, broken, lonely or abandoned.

But in reality, God comes to us in grace, unmerited favor. The painter Scott Erickson describes grace as “presence not withheld. ” And the way Jesus brought that grace and presence to us was through the bloody, painful process of childbirth, entering the world through the womb of a woman.

God’s presence and love are not limited. We have no reason to live in a scarcity mindset, because the love of God is abundant like nothing else. As a church let us be a place that brings this presence and love to our world.

— Sermon Notes, Eunice Cho, Renew Church, Lynnwood, WA, March 17, 2024

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Lavish Love – Mark 14:1-9

This is a story of someone unafraid of demonstrating her love lavishly and publicly. It comes on the heels of strenuous questioning from both the left (Saducees) and the right (Pharisees). That section wraps with a positive discussion of the two greatest commandments – love God and love others, the vertical and the horizontal.

That’s the context of this story. It’s something, that, if it happened today, we would likely respond in similar ways. “That’s too much,” “that’s scandalous,” “that’s a lot of money.”

Both the teachers of the law and the disciples find problems with this, and in some ways it’s hard to blame them. They are, in some ways, trying to love horizontally. We certainly judge how other people spend their time and money, and we often could use our resources more wisely. But what all this misses is that Jesus is a person, and He does not call us into an efficient transaction that maximizes resource allocation – He calls us to a relationship with Him.

The whole chapter previous is about people challenging Jesus around rationality and doctrine. This woman steps into this and unashamedly demonstrates a single-minded purpose to lavish her love for Jesus, publicly and without calculation. The disciples are crunching the numbers, but she is overwhelmed with a desire to actively and abundantly love.

It ties back to the widow who gave all she had at the temple – born women gave all they had, and Jesus lifts up both women as exemplars of what we all should be (both men and women).

What does this look like for us? How do we move from a transactionally-based relationship to a love-based relationship? One way is worship, praising Jesus whether or not you are feeling it at any one moment. While our own personal styles will vary, we should worship in a way that takes its cue from this woman, unashamed and unworried about how others will see us.

Likewise in our private personal prayer and spiritual discipline, we can still be restrained, and the example of this woman calls us to a more open and lavish love for Christ in those moments as well.

And our love here should spring from the same well as this woman’s did – gratitude for all Jesus has done for us.

–Sermon Notes, Dave Sim, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, March 10, 2024

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The Stone Rejected – Mark 12:1-12

Jesus is getting into some heated discussions with the religious leaders – as he gets closer to the cross he begins saying less and less, but at this stage he is being very vocal.

He is, however, still using parables. This less him use simple things to talk about big issues. It lets him be subversive without actually riling his opposition up too early. It also enables selective revelation – those who do not want to engage with the message will not learn from it, but for those who do there are truths to be learned. Likewise, it sets that choice in front of people, whether to receive or reject the message based on the person of Christ more than the specifics of the message.

This parable was directly referencing the people he was telling the story to, but the leaders did not realize this until late, and then when they did realize it they were too afraid of how the people would react to do anything about it.

The cast of characters here is fairly straightforward. The landowner is God the Father, and his son is Jesus. The tenants are the leaders of Israel, those in power over the people. The servants sent are the many prophets, right up to John the Baptist. The vineyard itself is Israel, which is a metaphor used throughout the Old Testament in both positive and negative contexts. The imagery of a place where people have a responsibility to steward creation and mold it in productive ways goes all the way back to Eden.

Then Jesus brings in another metaphor, that of the temple building and the rejected stone that becomes the cornerstone. This comes in the context of Mark’s mentions of the temple building and Jesus promise that it would be destroyed and rebuilt within his person. Ultimately this body of Christ, Paul tells us, is we who are his members, his body parts as part of the church.

This means we are the vineyard, we are the workers who must steward what we have been given, and working to turn it back to the ultimate owner of the vineyard. And how do we do that? Elsewhere, Jesus tells us – the broken, the imprisoned, the needy, the oppressed.

That also means that when we put barriers in front of people and prevent them from coming to partake in the fruits of the vineyard, that is functionally the same as the leaders of ancient Israel who murdered the prophets to stop their testimony.

We see this concept in the Old Testament through concepts like leaning and jubilee.

Another thing to glean from this passage is the patience of God. How many servants did He send to be beaten and killed before His final retribution?

And for us, who are the prophets and voices at have ignored, beaten and even killed? As a nation, as a church, as individuals?

But we are placed right here in this particular place in our own vineyard. Let us welcome people into the vinyard to partake of the fruits that God has been growing, that we have been tending. We are the new temple building, we are the new vinyard – let us live and serve like we know it.

— Sermon Notes, Dave Sim, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, March 3, 2024