Life Church

Growth (3:18)

God is Life

Many people have thought that “growth” is all about what is supposed to happen on Sunday mornings. “I go to church to get my dose of God.” Or, “I attend on Sundays to get my weekly feeding.”

Although gathering together on Sunday mornings is important to us, we see growth happening through many types of connections and is something that happens through more of a way of life… and Sunday morning is just part of that way of life.

Fundamentally, Life Church is about Life. And for us, we don’t see life as a thing… we see Life as a person (the person of God) who wants to live in connection with us. In fact, we were created by God for this purpose.

So to experience real life, (which could be synonymous with real love or real freedom) we need to understand that these aren’t things we create. These are what we experience when we lean into our creator and live in communion with Him – who is our freedom, our love, and our life.

It’s kind of like this… It has been said that there is a God shaped vacuum in the heart of every person, that can only be filled by God, the creator, made known through Jesus Christ.

You see, central to who each of us are… is a heart—(our center). And everyone of us tries to fill the vacuum of our hearts – in attempts to feel worthy. So we are motivated to fill our hearts with what we believe will help us feel significant or secure, and we think that this is what will define life, and our worth as a person.

So we see that “life” can easily be misunderstood to be a lot of things. For example: “life” is – money, success, busyness, pleasure, family, work, power… We think -“These are what makes me a worthy person.”

The problem is that when we look places other than God to fill our hearts (to give us “life”) —we can only find a temporary and shallow sense of satisfaction.

For us, we see through a different lens. Life growth is a process of submitting and aligning these things that are easily perceived as being “life”… to the one who is Life.

So growth isn’t about a bad person becoming a better person. Or, something we measure on the outside – by saying, “I’m becoming richer, smarter, nicer, or more religious.” Growth is a process of progressively leaning into one who is Life, and walking with Him on His path of relationship.

So growth is all about- relationship. And with any relationship there are certain things we need to know, and certain things we need to do- to have real connection. But out of 1. ignorance (“I didn’t know.”), or 2. arrogance (“I know what I believe, don’t bother me with the facts.”) or 3. misinformation (“Someone told me the wrong thing.”)… most of us have tended to miss the incredible wonders of real relationship with God, and have leaned toward the fallback mode of being religious instead.

Well, the opportunities that we offer each other, as a group of friends, are intended to help us in the process of walking Gods path of relationship. – What is outlined next, is our the plan for connections to help us grow in the process of relating with God and each other.