Week 2 Alive

Lewis Cox

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Pastoral Welcome

Welcome this week to worship at Faith Chapel

I’m Pastor Lewis I serve as one of the pastors here at Ankeny First.

If you were hear last week you heard us talk about Christ being risen and how Christ’s ressurection offers us a chance to experience life. Over the next couple of weeks our church will be exploring this theme in worship of what it means to be people that are alive not just physicially, but also spiritually alive

Call to Worship

God so loved the world that he gave his only Son

that whoever believes in him should not perish

but have eternal life.

Let those who know they are redeemed celebrate it!

Those who have been reclaimed from deep trouble!

Though we were as good as dead,

God made us alive with the grace of Christ

through whom we are rescued and healed.

O give thanks to God for such unswerving love,

for such wonderful deeds for the children of earth.

Pastoral Prayer

God so often we forget that your kingdom is not only beyond on understanding, but beyond our imagination. O God We remember that before we even speak you know what’s on our hearts. There is nothing we could say that would surprise you. In this season as we remember your kingdom that is Upside Down, I am reminded of the ways that I sometimes pray as if your kingdom is only for certain people. So Lord God we pray for those that we remember is this time, and also for those that we don’t. We pray for those that are struggling that those that are celebrating. We pray for those that are laughing and those that are crying. Those that are rich and those that are poor.

Lord, in Your mercy, hear our prayer

Loving God,

You are our Creator and Sustainer.

When You open Your hand,

You satisfy the hunger and thirst of every living thing.

And so we look to You whenever we are in need,

trusting in Your love and Your abundant goodness.

As You once fed the hungry crowds with five loaves and two small fish,

we ask that You would again fill those who are empty this day.

Pour out Your Spirit on all who hunger and thirst.

We pray for those who are physically hungry—whose stomachs are empty.

We think especially of the people in Somalia and Eastern Africa

who are facing critical food shortages;

who are suffering the effects of malnutrition and starvation;

and watching helplessly as loved ones die.

Lord, in Your mercy, hear our prayer

We pray for those who are empty emotionally—

who are lonely and long for companionship and love,

who are caught in the grip of depression,

or overwhelmed with grief.

Lord, in Your mercy, hear our prayer

We pray for those who are spiritually empty—

who are troubled, but don’t know where to turn;

who long for purpose and meaning, but don’t know where to look;

who need You, but do not yet know You.

Lord, in Your mercy, hear our prayer

God, we praise You for Your abundant gifts in our lives.

Pour out Your Spirit on us as well.

Fill us with Your compassion and love,

so that we would willingly share some of our abundance

with those who have need.

Lord in your mercy, Hear Our Prayer

We lift up those that are battling illnesses, injuries, and surgeries. We pray for healing, for the renewing of minds, for the freeing of spirits, and for the renewing of minds.

Lord in your mercy, Hear Our Prayer

Forgive, us we pray, for those times we have squandered,

and for those times we have used our creativity

as a force for destruction rather than reparation.

Forgive us we pray and free us for joyful obedience

Lord in your mercy, Hear Our Prayer

With joy and exultation,

we give thanks for the triumph of life over death,

offering special thanks for those joys, sorrows,

challenges and delights named here today,

Silently in our hearts… (pause for thanksgivings) …

God, the world we live in is messy and challenging,

it is the world of King Herod,

a world of pain,

a world of doubt,

a world of fear,

a world of jealousy,

a world of violence,

a world of domination,

a world of injustice,

a world of human failings.

Lord in your mercy, Hear Our Prayer

Yet, God, you are with us always.

So give us grace and give us courage

to live faithfully in this imperfect world.

Remind us always of the promise of your kingdom,

emerging around us and through us.

It is for this kingdom that we now pray,

using the words Jesus taught us.

Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom and the power, and the glory, forever and ever.

Amen.

Scripture

Ephesians 2:1–10 NRSV

1 You were dead through the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once lived, following the course of this world, following the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work among those who are disobedient. 3 All of us once lived among them in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of flesh and senses, and we were by nature children of wrath, like everyone else. 4 But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us 5 even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— 6 and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 so that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— 9 not the result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life.

Gentile and Jewish division

The Sinai covenant separated jews from non-jews

Ephesians is a book to gentile - Pentacost brought together Jew and non-jew

They were physically alive but spiritually dead

HE has brought even those people back to life

Gentiles were formerly ostricized outsiders

they have been shown a new family.

In jesus the barrier is removed the two ethnic groups have become one group that can live together in peace.

The larger story that Paul is building is that all people are spiritually dead

We are separated from God

Dead places exist

Sometimes we slip into them

Sometimes we knowingly and willingly make decisions to go to places of death, and sometimes systems of death and evil are just so pervasive that we feel like we don’t even have a choice about participating in them.

There is a reassurance that even Christians can be dead - even the jews were under the spiritual death

Are we living to die or dying to live?

What are we more afraid of physical death or spiritual death

Do we do everything in anticipation and preparation for death, or can we absolutely not wait to experience God’s grace as people that are ALIVE in Christ

This question really gets at the core of where are our hearts?

We are created from someone who was creative

We are God’s masterpiece

When we start with that it really re-frames how we see ourselves

The larger narrative of verse 10

is that we are created beings

it is a clear reference to Genesis one

God made everything and said that it was “good”

“intended to be” or “functions as”

It means that we are intended by design to ALIVE

We are meant to experience the full breadth of human emotion, and of creativity.

Life is creative death is destructive

To be alive means that we are created and that we are creative

we create in the world which is one way that we know that we are alive

Death is through consuming or destroying

So when we exist simply to consume or to be slaves to any number of things we fall short of the image of God that is within each one of us

There is a sense of redemption or returning to the original creation

We were made to be alive it is just our choice to be dead

We were made to be alive with Christ

We were made as in creation

to be alive with christ as raised with Christ

The word for with Christ

To rise with

We are raised with Christ, as in we find our spiritual life in God’s spiritual resurrection

Christ’s life after death helps us understand that we can find life beyond the dead places that we look to

Grace - this is a gift to us that we have the means to experience life and life abundantly, life to the fullest

Being Alive is a gift

experiencing God’s grace feels like an entire new life

Benediction

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