The Local Church

12.19.21

Entitlement may be the ugliest thing on planet earth and yet most of us in the West struggle with it. As our world and lives continually speed up we need to learn how to how to keep our joy, peace and love even when we don't get what we want when we want it. Jesus practiced slowness or the discipline of humble patience as an antidote to entitlement and when we choose to practice slowing ourselves...

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localchurchgr.org

We are bombarded with noise, both external and internal so much so that we can rarely remember that last time we were silent. The enemy of your soul knows that the best way to keep you from experiencing God's presence and voice is to keep the actual and figurative noise level our lives constantly humming. Jesus modeled a resistance practice for us often going into the wilderness (eremos) as a plac...

Justin Bieber and the Jonas Brothers, Moby Dick, and Jesus healing a bleeding woman and the dead daughter of Jairus. Love is patient, which makes it incompatible with hurry. Jesus was full of patient love that challenges our hurried lives and invites us into something better (Luke 8:40-56).

We're both made in God's image and made from dirt... bursting with potential, yet absolutely limited. The myth of living life without being yoked together with some type of master is an illusion. The only question is what does your master promise and what do they deliver? Jesus wasn't the first teacher to say that he had a yoke, he was just the first to say that His was light and easy. If our live...

Ever since the sundial allowed us to measure time we've felt the need to fit more into the hours we're given. Nothing has made such a drastic impact on the pace of our lives and our attention like a few inventions that debuted in 2007. If the entire Bible hangs on two commands, love God and love others, then we are doomed if we can't re-learn how to travel at the speed of love. Love is neither dis...

Most people say they want to be generous with their income and yet Americans only donate approximately 2.1%  and Christian American’s are similar at 2.3%. Why does God ask his people to give and why is it in our best interest to do so? Spoiler alert: it’s not so we can feel good about ourselves. God doesn’t want something from you, he wants something for you. This is a tutorial on how to...

Covid has stolen something from us that is central to the human experience, the ability to look forward, dream and plan. We have found ourselves (rightfully) trying to make it through the next day or week, especially as so much changed and the future was hard to imagine. Join us as we begin to look up, look ahead and re-envision a preferred future. We believe God has given us a vision to reach the...

What's the difference between a collector of baking recipes and a baker? It's in the doing. Join us as Dr. Gary Burge gives us a biblical formula for how to hear God's voice in a way that not only transforms our lives but the lives around us.

Have you ever struggled with trying to listen to God and wondering if it's God's voice or your voice that you're hearing? There's a number of ways to go about understanding someone with a radically different accent than you're used to. Find a translator, spend more time with the person, and adding subtitles are just a few options. God has an accent, a unique way of speaking to us today and when we...

"Sometimes I just feel like God's guidance is confusing!" Have you ever felt this way? God does not speak in confusion, but God is mysterious. His ways are higher than our ways, His thoughts, higher than our thoughts. Although God is mysterious, He is also consistent. The ways He has spoken in the past are often the ways He wishes to speak to us today. Join us as we look at six of those ways and h...

Does God still speak to people the way He did in the Bible... and even if he does, would He actually speak to me like that? Join us as we dive into scripture to answer these questions and learn through some personal stories of how God speaks and why it's always in our best interest to listen.

Movie Trailers, Arrival , and how God is retelling our stories and rebuilding our lives--and wants to use us to do the same in others' lives. We wrap up our series by considering a shared identity that we all possess: we are sent ones. John 20:19-23

The Schnitz Deli, Tony Hawk and the bridge between experience and obedience. What John wants to teach about discipleship and how to shock to the world (and why it's easy to miss). We need to move from consumers of Jesus to connoisseurs of Jesus. John 1:35-51

Coronavirus Pandemic dreams, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and vine and fig trees from the visions of Zechariah's. When we invite others into our church community, we participate in God's kingdom and shock the world with the love of Jesus. Zechariah 3:1-10

The middle school lunch room, restaurant racism and why who you eat with says a lot about who you are. Jesus constantly shared a table with people that others would not because to share the table is to share your life. You'll never shock the world if you wont share your table. Luke 19:1-10

Communication theory, hair cuts after one week, and how Christians are meant to live lives that shock the world with the generous love of Jesus. If one of the primary ways that we share about Jesus is by answering questions about Jesus (Colossians 4, 1 Peter 3:15), our lives should be worth questioning. This week we explore how blessing others can help us do that.

Working at Chick-fil-A, the Lion King, and why addition and multiplication are the results of a life transformed by the fullness of Jesus. As we continually transition into post-pandemic life we have an opportunity to lean into one another and rehabit our lives around Jesus and the Church. The same things that God did with the early church in Acts 2, God wants to do with us today.

Where habits come from, why elevators are actually rocket ships, and how familiarity is the enemy of the awe & wonder of God. When we rehabit our lives around the Church, cool things happen. This is the pattern we see in the life of the early church in Acts 2.

Date: 7.18.21 Series: Summer Deep Dive Teacher: Kory Cassell overflowchurch.org

The power of sharing a meal, learning to dive and how we stay devoted to the big rocks of our faith. Join us as we ReHabit our lives around the things that matter most just as followers of Jesus have been doing since the beginning.

We've all lost some habits and gained some habits over the past year, but as we all know, not all habits are created equal. If you are trying to follow Jesus there are no habits more important than the ones we find Acts 2. Join us as we empty out our jars to make sure we get the big rocks in first.

Join as we close our series on Song of Songs with Dr. Erin Clifford as she explains how the poems help us understand what God's love is like. God's love is not like ours, but ours can become like His.