My Epic Journey

Here is the teaching outline for our final week in the series, Attached.

Bottom Line: Attaching ourselves to Christ requires “unattaching” ourselves from everything else, a choice that requires risk on our behalf.

INTRO:

It feels like God isn’t always there.

Sometimes it feels like He lets us down because He doesn’t do what we expect or want Him to do.

Becoming the beloved is going to take risk.

TRUTH:

There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish ruling council (John 3:1 NIV).

He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs you are doing if God were not with him” (John 3:2 NIV).

In reply Jesus declared, “I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.” “How can a man
be born when he is old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely he cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb to be born!”
(John 3:3-4 NIV).

Jesus answered, “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit” (John 3:5-8 NIV).

“How can this be?” Nicodemus asked. “You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things?”
(John 3:9-10 NIV).

TENSION:

To truly follow Christ, there is a level of risk.

This feels risky to some of us, but this is true relationship. This is what is required of being the beloved.

APPLICATION:

The problem is that we don’t want to unattach ourselves from everything else.

To attach yourself to Jesus means that you must begin what might be a painful process of unattaching yourself from other things.

CONCLUSION:

Take the risk.

It’s worth whatever you have to unattach yourself from.

The game this week at EPIC was very interesting and if you ask me, unsanitary. But hey, who really cares anyway? Not these students…

GOAL: Get the most gummy bears on your partners face as possible by licking the bear and sticking it on

WHAT YOU NEED:

• Packages of gummy bears
• 8 student volunteers

Here are some pictures of Middle School at the 11:00 am service:

High School:

Came across this great article from the guys at www.xxxchurch.com.  I will be mentioning this at our P.A.T.H. meeting this Sunday (3:00–4:45 @ Grace Point Community Church).

Did you get your kids Porn for Christmas?

By Kevin Outland

I bet you never thought to ask yourself, “Did I get my kids porn for Christmas?”. I’m pretty sure you didn’t wrap up a stack of Playboy magazines and put them under the tree or put porn DVD’s in your kids stockings. Or did you?
Sometimes we don’t think or don’t know about the unintended consequences of the gifts we give our kids. For instance, did you get any of your kids a new cell phone for Christmas? Does the cell phone have Internet access? If so, you gave your kids porn for Christmas. Did you get any of your kids the iPod Touch for Christmas? If so, you gave them porn for Christmas. Did you get your kids a new computer for Christmas? If you didn’t buy a filter to go along with it, you gave them porn for Christmas. Why did I pick Cell Phones, the iPod Touch and Computers? They’re popular gifts and can crack the door open to the world of porn.
Cell Phones: Most cell phones have Internet access and filtering porn on cell phones is a real challenge. Some cell phone carrier’s, like AT&T or Verizon, have parental controls available but you may have to pay extra (AT&T charges $4.99/m per line) for the service and each cell phone may have a different way to implement the filtering. So grab your kids Christmas cell phone, call your carrier and find out how to block porn and other inappropriate websites on their phone.

iPod Touch: The iPod Touch has parental controls but it’s pretty much having Internet access turned on or turned off. So grab your kids’ iPod Touch, access the Parental Controls and turn off the Internet. There is a company, SafeEyes, that’s coming out with Internet filtering for the iPod Touch and the iPhone. So when that comes out get it so your kids can safely surf the web on those devices. For more information about this mobile Internet filtering software from SafeEyes follow this link: www.safeeyes.com/iphonedemo.

Computers: Without Internet filtering software on your kids PC they can access a ton of porn and other inappropriate content. And if you got them a laptop they can access that type of content just about anywhere. So grab you kids PC and load up an Internet filter from SafeEyes by clicking here. Then go download X3 Watch from XXXChurch for extra protection. It’s not a filter but will tell you, via email, if your kids are going to inappropriate websites (click here).
Now that you have a little more information ask yourself, “Did I get my kids porn for Christmas?” If so, now you know what to do to make your Christmas gifts porn free.