Month: January 2011
Experiential Discipleship
I stood ourside in the forest-setting at our ladies rereat last year. We had just concluded 3 days of women meeting together expressed in laughter, singing, teaching, walking, eating, praying and all that goes into shared community. It was time to go home and as I stepped outside, the warmth of the sun, the beauty of the blue sky and ...
Intentional Community
This Sunday we continue our series on Intentional…our Intentional Journey in discipleship. What we’ve come to realize is this journey into becoming more like Jesus is the invitation to be with Jesus himself…to walk with him, work with him, learn how he does things…. What we are discovering together is…we can’t bring about this transformation ...
Sacredness of the Ordinary
“When the crucifixion of Jesus is dramatized in the Gospels, we have this very interesting image of the tearing of the temple veil from top to bottom. Now the word for temple is fanum. Everything outside the temple was pro fanum. (Hence we get our word “profane.”) There was “the holy” and it was distinguished ...
In the Mess of Our Unfixedness
“Spirituality is not about competency; it is about intimacy. Spirituality is not about perfection; it is about connection. The way of the spiritual life begins where we are now in the mess of our lives. Accepting the reality of our broken, flawed lives is the beginning of spirituality, not because the spiritual life will remove ...
Leading With Our Ears
"Incline your ear, and come to me," says God in Isaiah 55:3. "Listen, so that you may live." At one time part of my job required me to sit through a four hour presentation on verbal S.W.A.T. The focus centered on active listening techniques. Active listening was presented as the solution to diffuse potentially dangerous ...
God’s Role and Our Role
So last time we looked at the good work that is already going on in our lives by the Holy Spirit…that our inner being (heart) might take on more and more the image of Jesus that we might live like and love others like Jesus. “…until Christ is formed in you” (Gal. 4:9). So exactly ...
The Good Work of God
Receiving the abundant life Jesus wants to give us rarely looks like we think it should. Often it means abandoning the life into which we have settled. One of my favorite quotes, in speaking about Mary the mother of Jesus, Craig Barnes writes, “God has interrupted our ordinary expectations, as cherished as they were, to ...
Receiving a Life vs. Making a Life
In continuing my thoughts on keeping in step with the Spirit (Gal. 5:25) one of the first things, I believe, we need to get our arms around is that the Holy Spirit is always active in our lives to birth in us the life of Christ we cannot produce ourselves. We cannot by direct effort ...
Keeping in Step with the Spirit
“Those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.” Romans 8:14 My interpretation of that verse: Those who follow the Spirit’s leading…they are the real deal. This verse also makes me think of a dance. In a dance some leads and it the job of the other to follow. It doesn’t ...
Daily Discipleship
“Come, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Mark 1:17 It’s the most concise definition of discipleship. In eleven words, Jesus summed up the essence of the Great Commandment to “Go…and make disciples…” The call to discipleship is the call to become an apprentice of Jesus – becoming like Jesus by entering ...
Gail Johnsen 