Fountain City KC

Fear is on the rise in our time. Report after report shows that people in the United States are far more afraid than they used to be. One of Fountain City's core values is courageous faith; choosing to trust and follow God even when it's risky. Why would we value that? How can we actually pursue it? We'll see from the Apostle Paul's life it has everything to do with resting in God's will. 

Words are powerful things. They shape nations, companies, and lives. We consume an unending stream of slogans and campaigns that want to influence and shape us. Last week we celebrated Easter, the good news that Jesus is alive, and we talked about how because He’s risen, our lives have real hope and purpose. This week, we’re going to look at what we do with the gospel of Jesus while we live in a culture flooded with competing claims of good news.

Every year, Easter Sunday serves as a hallmark of our Christian faith; a day when billions of people around the world will gather to hear afresh the centerpiece our faith: that Jesus Christ is risen, that he's alive! Our brief passage from Acts will lead us to consider this question: what difference does Jesus's resurrection really make in your life? The answer will be loud and clear: because Jesus is alive, your life can have real hope and real purpose with no illusions.

In one of his greatest books, The Great Divorce, C.S. Lewis helps show us a struggle we all have in recognizing the true source of our security and significance. What is it in life that assures me that I'll be secure? And what assures me that I'm significant?  These are two of our most essential needs as human beings. Our passage this week will call us to find joy and peace in putting our trust in the only true source that will satisfy our need: Jesus Christ. 

A good but difficult question we are often asked is, why? Why do we do certain things, believe certain things, or go to certain places? It's a good question because "why" forces us to think and answer truthfully. This week, one of the questions that arises is why do Christians share the gospel and why do they persist in sharing the gospel even in hard, challenging places? The answer we'll see is because He wants us to, and because it will be believed.
 

If you could ask Jesus to do one thing in your life, your community, someone close to you, what would you ask him? Our answers give us a picture that grounds our church's vision: gospel renewal. Jesus is moving all things from the failure of the garden to the glory of new creation and he's working through us, his church, to do it. What kind of expectations does Jesus want us to have for what he's doing in us and through us? The answer we'll see is probably more than we think.

In this generation and the next.  Why would our church have those words in our vision? This short phrase helps define the timeline and the scope of our mission and calling. Weeks ago, we began our current series by looking at the grand story of the gospel; that God is moving all things from the failure of the garden to the glory of New Creation. Now, as we position ourselves within the story, we see that God wants His grace of new creation to go out to both this generation and the next.