Hey everyone…it’s been a few weeks! Hope everyone is cool with the Big Room makeover. If you have any suggestions about it, lemme’ know (albeit, a suggestion that we put a drop ceiling in will be ignored 😛 )
I want to remind everyone that we are going back to two services starting this Sunday (August 1st), at 9 and 11am.
We’re going to continue our study in Luke this Sunday, reading Luke 8:26-39 .
Evil is a real force in our world. What characterizes evil as you read the description of this man…what effect does evil have on him?
We have a lot of different views about how to tackle the problem of evil in our world, but I would say that this passage shows us the ultimate answer. The answer is obvious as we read this, but is it the answer you go to when struggling with a particular temptation or habit in your own life? Jesus has the power to restore us to God’s original intent for our lives, but way too often we settle for chains, don’t we?
Why do you suppose Jesus grants the request of demons and pagan hostiles, but NOT the request of someone who sincerely seems to appreciate Him (v38-39)? What lesson can we learn about our OWN lives from that?
This should be an interesting exploration…hope to see you Sunday (at 9 or 11am).
WONDERWHAT 
Being Jewish, why were they keeping herds of pigs anyway?
This passage (like all the others don’t) answers a question for me. “Where do you go, when you have gone too far?” “Far too” often I’ve accepted that “too far” as a definition of who I truly am. Jesus saw that man for who is was, just as he saw the demons inside of him for what they were. He has done the same for me. I spent “far too” many years assuming that the bad things I did was just who I was, and that gave me a freedom (or chains) to just do them again. Pauls says the same thing in when he says the things he should do he’s not that great at, and the things he shouldn’t do, he’s real good at. But who does he say will change that? Not himself. So he goes to the only place available, the house that will allow him in-Jesus.
I think Jesus allows the request of the pagans and not the man because He realizes there are only two choices. One without Him and one with Him. And the choice belongs to us, even if we have already “gone too far”.
Here piggy, piggy, piggy….. but seriously folks – I can understand why a guy that was not longer full of demons would want to hang out with Jesus. But ( I think) Jesus is showing that one of the principal components of his message is the idea of multiplication. First, Luke tells us that Jesus told him to go home and that the guy preached to everyone about what Jesus had done. It’s sort of like that old shampoo commercial, “he told his friends and they told their friends etc, etc.” But the coolest thing (to me) is the “go home” part. Something tells me that this guys life was in shambles. So Jesus told him to return to the life that you had before all of this happened, go back to your mom and dad, the wife that you lost, the kids that are shunned because of their crazy dad– let them know that because of what I’ve done for you that they have been set free too. It’s like ripples on a pond when a rock is dropped in, the effects continue out (are multiplied) past the one that is actually touched. A son returns, a husband and wife are reunited, a man is able to be a father to his children once more. Kinda cool —
Music Sunday was most coooool! Oh, message was on the spot also. It just goes to show “a little Kentucky will do any HOOSIER a little good!” God does speak in Kentucky ya know! Thanks for what you do for Elsie and me and I am sure for the rest of us. In his love Moose