The Big Dream Podcast by Meadow Heights Church

Because Jesus was fully human, he fully experienced the same temptations we do. We can learn from Jesus how to resist those temptations when we reject their lies by surrendering to the good news that we are God’s much-loved children.

In his divinity, Jesus reveals what God is like; but in his humanity, he reveals what humans can be like. We flourish as humans when we continually choose to follow Jesus as a fully growing human.

Our default imagination for loving like and living as Jesus is to power up and try harder. But our fully human God shows us how to depend on the same power he did to live a fully human life, the presence of God’s Spirit with us.

When we imagine Jesus as superhuman, we may assume it’s unfair or unrealistic to follow him. But when we embrace Jesus as fully human, we are compelled to learn from him how to love like him and live as him.

The fast pace of our lives cuts off our connection to God, each other, and our own souls. Because we are programmed, prompted and pressured to do more and desire more and produce more, Jesus invites us to move away from hurry and into sabbath.

Hurry sickness clutters our schedules, our homes, and our hearts. But when we trust our good and generous God to richly provide for our needs, we stop hustling to accumulate more in our own power. Jesus invites us to move away from hurry and into simplicity.

Jesus invites us to move away from hurry and into solitude where we can be more present with God and ourselves. Solitude is a unique place to remember who we are in Jesus and open ourselves to the transformational work he is doing in us.

Hurry sickness is always striving but never arriving. The fast pace of our lives cuts off our connection to God, each other, and our own souls. Jesus invites us to move away from hurry and into stillness.

We can be deceived and distracted by the evil at work in our world. But when I remember that evil is ultimately defeated, I reclaim the confidence I need to win my battles today. I am strong when I allow God’s power to fight for me and through me.

I am gifted for you and you are gifted for me. Apart, our gifts lie dormant and useless. Together, our gifts make God’s Big Dream for the world come true!

Because of Jesus we are forever new and continually becoming new. Becoming new isn’t about trying harder or sinning less, it’s about being with Jesus and allowing him to do the transformational work in us. We are all a work in progress.

The cross destroyed the barriers that separate us from God and one another so we can take our place in God’s family. As God’s children, we are empowered to leverage our personal identities for the good of the world.

God gives us our identity. We do not earn it. It is a gift that no one can take away from us. We are God’s masterpiece!

On the first Easter, nobody expected no body. But that discovery was the unexpected beginning of everything! Unexpected endings are often unexpected beginnings in disguise.

Experiencing God’s love FOR me inspires me to invite others to experience it WITH me. There are no good excuses for not sharing good news.

I want to pray so God will change things, but God wants me to pray so he can change me. Things change when I change.

We anticipate the return of Jesus by helping him reclaim his original dream, not by waiting for him to rescue us in a heavenly escape plan. We long for a new beginning for the world, not the end of the world.

The gospel isn’t a carrot on a stick, a promise of a future heaven designed to manipulate us into behaving better. The gospel isn’t good advice to apply to your life. It’s GOOD NEWS about the freedom and flourishing that Jesus is enacting, and it’s happening NOW, in your hearing. Will you trust Jesus today? Will you say yes to the good news?

Revelation unveils a vision of our future where we will live and reign with God in loving communion forever. We are invited to live TODAY in excited preparation for that TOMORROW.

In the battle between truth and deception, we embrace a final victory of love on a cross, not cosmic bloodshed by a violent God. Willing to appear weak and foolish, we overcome the way he overcomes.

Revelation reveals a message of encouragement and freedom to first-century churches not one of disapproval and fear to future churches. Because we are the church, like them we get to live in freedom and not fear.

Since God looks exactly like Jesus, his character is revealed by a slain lamb and not by a roaring lion. Rather than put our trust in the power of this world, we follow the Lamb in self-sacrificial love.

Jesus compels us to trust and follow him now, not to predict or fear the future.

To have emotionally healthy relationships, eliminate “dirty fighting” tactics and fight cleanly for the sake of the relationship.

To have emotionally healthy relationships, understand and own your thoughts and feelings so you can bring your true self.