November 14, 2017 DAILY READING Mark 10:42-45 This week’s sermon text: Romans 15:14-29 FIELD NOTESWe want to be great, right? We seek approval, applause, power, and position. These things are what our culture often values, and so they become the things that we chase after, that we pursue single-mindedly. James and John – a few…

November 13, 2017 DAILY READING Romans 14:13-23 This week’s sermon text: Romans 15:14-29 FIELD NOTESIn this passage of Romans, Paul is encouraging the believers not to cause one another to stumble. Paul reminds us that our actions have an impact on our neighbors. What I do can be a hindrance to faith for someone else.…

November 11, 2017 DAILY READING Hebrews 12:1-3 Hebrews 13:7 Psalm 23 This week’s sermon text: Romans 14:13-23 FIELD NOTESIn the 1984 movie Places in the Heart Sally Fields won an Oscar playing a depression-era widow in Texas, trying to hold on to the family farm; the bank is waiting to foreclose. The movie details her…

November 10, 2017 DAILY READING Proverbs 27:17 Luke 10:1-5 Psalm 36:5-10 This week’s sermon text: Romans 14:13-23 FIELD NOTESDo you remember the song that goes “The church is not a building . . . the church is a people”? Through God’s grace we are a people: “Once we were not a people, now we are…

November 9, 2017 DAILY READING Acts 16:16-40 Psalm 85:4-13 This week’s sermon text: Romans 14:13-23 FIELD NOTESActs 16 reminds us that relationships when one person has power over another are not healthy. Community cannot happen when one person uses another for monetary enrichment. Paul encounters a slave girl being exploited by her owners because she…

November 8, 2017 DAILY READING John 15:12-15 Psalm 82 This week’s sermon text: Romans 14:13-23 FIELD NOTESIn John’s Gospel, Jesus calls us his friends. This is astonishing! We talk about being disciples, but what does it mean to be Jesus’ friend? Many of us grew up singing “What a friend we have in Jesus,” but…

November 7, 2017 DAILY READING Romans 16:1-16 Psalm 27:1-5 Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 This week’s sermon text: Romans 14:13-23 FIELD NOTES Looking back at the list of people Paul greets in Rom 16:1-16, we know very little about them. Paul tells us what is essential: They were “chosen in the Lord” They were willing to “risk their…

November 6, 2017 DAILY READING Romans 16:1-16 Psalm 118:21-29 This week’s sermon text: Romans 14:13-23 FIELD NOTESMy father was a medical missionary in Korea from 1921-1928, some years before I was born, but I grew up knowing that the friends he made in Korea were the best friends anyone could have. We often visited missionaries…