One More Thing

Hi Five Oakers, The weekend's coming and I have a few things I want to share with you:

The Weekend

It's THE weekend--the celebration of Christ's resurrection. We're going to be looking at the resurrection as told in Matthew 28.

Interestingly, there's only one person clearly identified besides Jesus. It's not Peter or John or any of the other disciples. The disciples are only referred to as a group.

This one person shows us that after the resurrection Jesus continued to be concerned about "the least of these." And it is to the humbled--people who are on the outside and excluded and failed--that Jesus first gives not only the good news of the gospel, but also the task of announcing its life-changing, world-altering message.

I'm excited to share the message of Easter that takes the dead ends in our story and weaves them into his glorious story of love and grace and acceptance.

FYI

Jeni Carlson on "Game Cafe Highlights"

One KidsHOPE USA child from Woodbury Elementary School and his family attended! This Local Impact connection from the school to our church is amazing! Repeating comment, "let's do this every quarter, or at least once a month, or how about weekly?" Multi-generations of Five Oaks community gathered to build puzzles, challenge Pastor Henry with Settler's of Catan, and play board games

Jeni Carlson on "Easter Experience"

We are thrilled to announced an all ages experience for Five Oakers during the weekend of Easter on April 4 and 5.

One More Thing

German theologian Wolfhart Pannenberg:

 The evidence for Jesus' resurrection is so strong that nobody would question it except for two things: First, it is a very unusual event. And second, if you believe it happened, you have to change the way you live.

10 Tweets

Here's last weekend's sermon in 10 Tweets, Rule of Life: God in My Everything, “Taking it to Work”

1/ There is no hierarchy for God when it comes to our work. There is not "perfect work" (clergy) vs. "permissible work" (everybody else)

2/ Work is sacred activity. God works. God is described as a worker of many professions.

3/ Jesus was a student during his childhood years. I doubt Mary gave him a pass to miss school saying, "You're God. You already know everything."

4/ “Your work is a very sacred matter, God delights in it, and through it he wants to bestow his blessings on you.” (Martin Luther)

5/ God matters at work. Inscribe the sacredness of work on your tools. Set prayer reminders (e.g., laptop password).

6/ Love people at work. God values them supremely. Get to know their needs. Pray for them. Tell them you pray for them.

7/ Pray your to-do list and calendar. Have a "personal strategy session" with God each day. See "Why I STOPPED Doing Quiet Times"

8/ Offer your work as a prayer. St. Benedict: "to work is to pray"

9/ Dorothy Sayer: We tell a drunk carpenter to stop getting drunk...we miss the point if we don't tell him he should be making good tables.

10/ When trust God enough to rest we seek our worth and identity not in our work but in the One we worship.