Water City Church - Oshkosh

Too often, we read the words of Jeremiah 29:11 out of the context of the exile. There is promise in these words, but not away from the work of exile. Followers of Jesus must be careful to avoid edits even when they are "small and carefully considered.” Promise without difficulty leads to entitlement.

Jeremiah 24 & Jeremiah 18

Today, we circle back to John 18 and take a second look at the story of Jesus' resurrection. https://watercitychurch.org/garden https://watercitychurch.org/cross

The story of the resurrection of Jesus is amazing and difficult. It is that way for us today, and it was that way for John and Peter then. Yet even though they didn't understand what they saw, they still believed. How do our lived experiences reflect theirs?

We tend to focus on Jesus' "Triumphal Entrance" into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, but that is not the only scene that day. Jesus clearing the temple is an essential moment for reasons so much deeper than just "he flipped some tables". A deep reading of Isaiah 56 touches on the elephant in the room.

John 11 “What we have at the moment isn't as the old liturgies used to say, 'the sure and certain hope of the resurrection of the dead,' but a vague and fuzzy optimism that somehow things may work out in the end.” N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope

Jeremiah 18:1 - 10 The Potter is responding to the clay. God tells Jeremiah (us) that He responds to the people. Our free will - choices, actions, heart matters in how God deals with us. link to art

A message on discernment

Context matters. Let's dig in before we go forward.

“If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.”  C.S. Lewis