[Slide #1]
Sunday, March 3, 2013
Message Title: The Sign Of The Cross
Message Goal: To help us become fully alive in God’s unconditional love
➢ The Cross was a window into the Father’s unfathomable love for us. It is a peek into how He Himself, His world, His plan and His children.
➢God pursues us through the Sign of the Cross.
[Slide #2]
Romans 8:15-17 (CEV)
15 God’s Spirit doesn’t make us slaves who are afraid of him. Instead, we become his children and call him our Father.16 God’s Spirit makes us sure that we are his children. 17 His Spirit lets us know that together with Christ we will be given what God has promised. We will also share in the glory of Christ, because we have suffered with him.
➢ We are children of promise!
[Slide #3]
Ephesians 1:3-6 The God of Glory
3-6 How blessed is God! And what a blessing he is! He’s the Father of our Master, Jesus Christ, and takes us to the high places of blessing in him. Long before he laid down earth’s foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love. Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!) He wanted us to enter into the celebration of his lavish gift-giving by the hand of his beloved Son.
➢ Predestined
➢ Foreknew
[Slide #4]
Romans 4:16 (Contemporary English Version)
16 Everything depends on having faith in God, so that God’s promise is assured by his great kindness. This promise isn’t only for Abraham’s descendants who have the Law. It is for all who are Abraham’s descendants because they have faith, just as he did. Abraham is the ancestor of us all.
[Slide # 5]
Ephesians 1:11
11-12 It’s in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for. Long before we first heard of Christ and got our hopes up, he had his eye on us, had designs on us for glorious living, part of the overall purpose he is working out in everything and everyone.
[Slide #6]
Galatians 4:5
4-7 But when the time arrived that was set by God the Father, God sent his Son, born among us of a woman, born under the conditions of the law so that he might redeem those of us who have been kidnapped by the law. Thus we have been set free to experience our rightful heritage. You can tell for sure that you are now fully adopted as his own children because God sent the Spirit of his Son into our lives crying out, “Papa! Father!” Doesn’t that privilege of intimate conversation with God make it plain that you are not a slave, but a child? And if you are a child, you’re also an heir, with complete access to the inheritance.
➢ Jesus pursues the Father’s goal and gives us credit for it.
➢ Jesus was the God in bodily form
➢ The Cross was love of the Bodily God on display for all eternity or observe
➢ Jesus absorbed death’s sting...and stain for us
➢Redemption!!
****
[Slide #7]
Galatians 3:24-26 (CEV)
24 In fact, the Law was our teacher. It was supposed to teach us until we had faith and were acceptable to God. 25 But once a person has learned to have faith, there is no more need to have the Law as a teacher. 26 All of you are God’s children because of your faith in Christ Jesus.
➢ Justification: May completely right with God. Alignment is offered our souls.
John 1:12-13 (CEV)
12 Yet some people accepted him and put their faith in him. So he gave them the right to be the children of God.13 They were not God’s children by nature or because of any human desires. God himself was the one who made them his children.
➢ We are His children in a literary or metaphorical way. We have rights and access...a destiny...a name!
[Slide #8]
Challenges/Next Steps
➢ Step 1 is believing that the message of God’s love is true and ask for forgiveness from God and for the presence of Jesus Christ to enter your life and make you brand new. (This is an act of faith...we cannot earn God’s love.)
➢Ask God for power to turn from everything that blinds you to the truth of the story.
➢Live like Children
➢Learn to tell the story
➢Tell this story to others.
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