This document provides an overview of today's church service which includes readings and hymns focused on the Holy Trinity, icons of Saint Andre Rublev and the slain lamb, and a sermon titled "The Main Thing". It also includes a multi-week overview of walking through the Bible from Genesis to Revelation highlighting God's relationship with humanity and plan for blessing the nations. The document concludes with financial giving totals and a reading from Mark 12 about loving God and neighbor.
7. A Prayer For The People of God
Your hand is upon your people, O God,
to guide and protect them through the ages.
Keep in your service
those you have called and anointed,
that the powers of this world
may not overwhelm us,
but that, secure in your love,
we may carry out your will
in the face of all adversity.
Amen.
9. The Main Thing...
LAST WEEK
- The same Spirit Who was hovering over
creation, Who landed on Jesus, and Who
fell at Pentecost is the same Spirit
available to us today
THIS WEEK
- The Church is a continuation of the plan
God has had from the beginning: to create
a family to join God on the mission of love
10. A Walk Through The Bible...
GENESIS 1-2
- Reveals Godās plan for human vocation:
living in relationship with God as divine
image-bearing representatives
GENESIS 12
- Reveals Godās covenant promises
to Abraham and Sarah, that through
them all the nations of the world
would be blessed
11. EXODUS 1-14
- Reveals God as the deliverer and liberator
of Godās people from oppression and bondage
EXODUS 19
- Reveals Godās covenant love for Israel, and how God called
them to be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation
LEVITICUS/NUMBERS/DEUTERONOMY
- Reveal the promises and expectations for
Israel as Godās covenant people in ways that
makes sense to them in their cultural context
12. JOSHUA
- Reveals Godās faithfulness to give Israel the land
on which they were to live out their covenant calling,
despite their culturally conditioned ignorance and immaturity
JUDGES
- Reveals the pattern of sin, sorrow, supplication,
and salvation amidst Godās faithfulness and
Israelās continued unfaithfulness
SAMUEL/KINGS
- Reveals Godās willingness to further accommodate
Israelās weakness through the Davidic kingship
13. EZRAH/NEHEMIAH
- Reveal Israelās continued struggle to be faithful to their
covenant responsibilities after their plan for kingship
fails and sees them wrestling with the complexities of exile
RUTH/ESTHER/JOB/ECCLESIASTES
- Reveal Godās sovereign wisdom and power,
as well as Godās loving kindness for Godās people
in the midst of their questions, doubts and struggles
PSALMS/PROVERBS
- Reveal (et. al.) God as one who can handle peopleās
brutal honesty, as well as Godās personified Wisdom
14. MAJOR/MINOR PROPHETS
- Reveal Godās heart for Godās people to live and extend
faithfulness, righteousness and justice wherever they live
MATTHEW/MARK/LUKE/JOHN
- Reveals Jesus as the True Human, the Faithful Israelite,
and the āYES!ā to all Godās covenant promises
THE ACTS of THE APOSTLES
- Reveals the Church as a continuation of
Godās plan to bless the nations through
a covenant family on a mission of love
15. PAULāS WRITINGS & OTHER NEW TESTAMENT LETTERS
- Reveal Godās heart for a single covenant community
crossing all previous societal dividing walls, and describe
how local expressions of that community can/should function
in light of Godās faithfulness expressed in Jesus as Messiah/Lord
THE BOOK of REVELATION
- Reveals Godās future faithfulness to liberate
Godās people and creation as a whole from the
bondage of sin and evil, and to restore all things
to their originally planned goodness and purpose
through the unimpeded Kingship of the Slain Lamb
who rules through self-sacrificial love
16. Our Lamb Has ConqueredOur Lamb Has Conquered Let Us Follow himLet Us Follow him
18. Mark 12
Hear, O Israel:
the Lord our God, the Lord is one;
you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,
and with all your soul, and with all your mind,
and with all your strength.ā
And, āYou shall love your neighbor as yourself.ā
There is no other commandment
greater than these.