Crossings Knoxville

Our final week of “My Most Important Question” focuses in on Jesus’s commission to be the light of the world, or the salt of the earth. What does it mean to make a difference? What is our work to do?

How do we see faith as a puzzle-solving exercise done in community? Ryan Foran asks whether the early Christians would recognize his (our) version of the faith. Bethany Long asks what it means to witness when our beliefs about the afterlife and gospel are changing.

Every year Crossings attempts to live into its name, derived from Genesis 32 and Jacob’s wrestling with God. We invite folks to share for 10 minutes about their biggest questions of faith right now, how they arrived at these questions, and ways they’re wrestling through these questions. This week we remembered that the process of solving puzzles is often more important than actually solving the pu...

Unforming our Western-influenced, independent, hyper-individualized, understanding of community will take work. Even in our attempts to provide hospitality and create community it’s easy to become so focused on ourselves. What might the story of Elijah teach us about Elijah’s loneliness? What might the plants and creatures of the earth and Indigenous wisdoms teach us about our interconnectedness?

What do we do when our ideas and expectations of God and faith die? Where do we go if we Westernize ourselves out of received forms of Christianity? How can we encounter an unexpected “thin silence” through our intellects, ethics, and brothers and sisters from other religions? What does Christianity look like for now?

What if your body was more than something you  have —what if it’s who you  are ? In this week’s teaching, we explore the ancient story of Elijah through a different lens: embodiment. Together we consider how faith becomes real not just in what we believe, but in what we feel, touch, remember, and experience in our bodies. Because, what if showing up in your body was one of the most sacred things y...

What if your faith journey isn’t a linear path of constant growth—but a circle of unlearning, undoing, and rediscovery? This week, we reflect on Elijah’s encounter with God in the silence, explore the harm of hustle-culture spirituality, and consider how non-Western and Indigenous traditions can help us reimagine spiritual formation. Inspired by  Our Unforming  by Cindy S. Lee, we ask the unsettli...

How can we become better listeners? What if the church's primary role is to translate shalom - peace, wholeness, well-being - into the home languages of all people? How can we avoid using our words to dominate and instead use them to heal?

What if the Gospel is primarily about solidarity? About realizing our interdependence and connectedness? About expanding the category of "us" and shrinking the category of "them?"

The healing of the man by the pool in John 5 isn’t as easy and straight forward as it seems. It does, however, force us to ask questions about what happens when things change in our lives. What does it mean to get up, take our mats, walk, and look back on the way things used to be?

How can we better live into the narrative arc of Scripture? How can we recapture the goodness of creation? How can we seek the expansiveness of a progressive love? What would it look like to make Earth look a little bit more like heaven?

What does it look like to view God as Shepherd and King in our lives? In what ways should we follow the voice of the Shepherd in our lives, politically and spiritually? How can we live more as citizens of an heavenly alternative here and now? What would it look like if we actually followed the teachings of Jesus, regardless of the cost?

This Easter season, what would it look like for our faith to be completely new, not just a dressed up version of what we received? What if we are exactly where we are supposed to be, and God is still with us? What would it look like for us to embrace a new calling and not return to business as usual?

The season of Easter continues on, and so do peoples varied experiences of faith, Jesus, and resurrection. Was Jesus trying to prove something to Thomas or was he trying to make a statement about belief and belonging?

On Easter morning we tend to focus on the way showing up early for Jesus will lead us to a new and resurrected life. But that’s not actually what happened for Mary Magdalene on the first Easter morning. She didn’t ultimately find what she went looking for, something found her.

What do we long for? What are our expectations of God? And what would it mean to have those expectations frustrated? How can we allow our bad versions of religion and faith—even those that have served us well in the past—die, so that something new can emerge?

All the stories that led to the table at Bethany in John 12 contribute to emotional potency of a beautiful aroma that filled a house in the face of death. Even when told it's all a waste, may we recognize the ways our lives add to beautiful and healing moments such as these.

How do we extend grace in these parched times? How do we seek justice and forgiveness? How can we make God’s dream for humanity a reality in our world?

What do we need to change, starting with ourselves? How can we live more aware of how little time we might have left? What can we start doing today?

Molly’s second annual “bird teaching” explored Luke 13:31-15 where Jesus identifies as a mother hen. While this is intended to be a warm and comforting metaphor, the implications of what a mother hen can’t do in the face of dangerous foxes is important to consider.

Lent is a season to contemplate our mortality and the fragility of our ideals and faith. It is a time to be in the Wilderness. Do we have a faith equipped for the disorientation of Lent and Wilderness times? How can we move from scarcity to trust in abundance? How can we be moved to worship a weak, powerless God who denies dominating power and instead allows divine power to be put to death on a Cr...

This teaching is for the mystic. For those who are drawn to a more mysterious and enchanted faith and spirituality. It’s also for those who find themselves wondering, “Will I ever have a meaningful spiritual experience again?

What would it look like if we took Jesus' teaching to love our enemies seriously? Is this practical or ethical in every situation? How can we create more spaces to share a table with those we disagree with? What common ground can we find to see the image of God in all people? Here is a link to the Heineken ad that was shown during the teaching: Worlds Apart

How do we answer the question “Who am I?” Are we what we do, what other people think, or what we have? How can we find a level identity when the world around us is so up and down?

On our 18th birthday as a faith community, we wondered together how God might be inviting us to push out into the deep end. To go places only gods were known to go. And to learn to find our place in the family of things with however many weeks we have left together.