By Pastor Rici, on May 8th, 2013
Hey church!
This week’s readings and meditation were overwhelming…I’ll share some of my readings and reflection in hope that you get overwhelmed and ready for Sunday…
You are my day, You are my night
You are my love and all of my life
You are the love I need
You are the air I breathe
You are my love my life always forever [1]
“In the Christian practice of living through the year, recurring patterns of longing and fulfillment, of repentance and grace, encircle us again and again as we encounter different dimensions of the mystery of God at each point in time, all year long. Over time, the round years accumulate into a thick line, and we find that we have been caught up in the story of God.”[2]
[1] Phil Wickham “Always Forever”
[2] Dorthy C. Bass, Receiving The Day. p. 82, Kindle version.
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Exposed by His blood,
Rici
By Pastor Rici, on May 2nd, 2013
Hey church!
Have you ever experienced great difficulty or failure in trying to do anything else than obeying Sabbath rest on Sunday? Maybe you tried to study, catch up on work, go out shopping, catch up on house chores, etc…by doing such kind of work on Sunday we self-sabotage our Sabbath rest. This is against our best intentions. After all who goes about their week thinking to themselves: “I’m planning to murder this week”, “I’m planning to commit adultery, ” etc? Yet we plan our Sundays according to what we should/will do as if we were planning to break Sabbath? This sucks out the life and goodness of sabbath.
This Sunday we continue our series on Sabbath. We will explore Sabbath in light of creation and ushering a good future.
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Exposed by His blood,
Rici
By Pastor Rici, on April 24th, 2013
Hey church!
Are you ready to worship God with everything you have? I hope you are.
I’ve started reading a new book for our new series on Sabbath. Most of us suck badly at Sabbath keeping…we badly need God to teach us the basics about Sabbath. Here’s something I read that is a perfect intro to our sermon this Sunday…I hope it stimulates and stirs your heart as much as it did for me.
(from Dorothy C. Bass’ Receiving the Day: Christian Practices for Opening the Gift of Time. P.1, Kindle version)
“We live not outside and above time but within it. Nature and culture craft its units – days, weeks, and years- and how many of these we will finally have is not up to us. Time is a given, and time is a gift. We receive it in increments that flow from the future into the past, a certain number of hours each day, a certain number of days each year, a certain span of life whose duration we do not know in advance. Making good use of the time we are given is important, to be sure, and datebooks and other aids help us to do this. But when our emphasis on using time displaces our awareness of time as gift, we find that we are not so much using time as permitting time to use us.”
BOOM!
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Exposed by His blood,
Rici
By Pastor Rici, on April 18th, 2013
Hey mountaintop seekers and dwellers,
This week we continue our study of Matthew 17:1-5. We will focus on the tension between experiencing an awesome mountaintop experience and the need to descend from such awesome experiences. Through the life of Peter and the other disciples we will study the implications of mountaintop experiences and hopefully learn how to integrate them better in our own “personal and individual” discipleship.
Hopefully we will discover and be convicted of the extend of what “personal and individual” discipleship means…
PS. Thanks to our brother Ny here’s the video from our last Gospel Sunday sermon. Feel free to share it with relatives and friends who could not make it last Sunday.
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Exposed by His blood,
Rici
By Pastor Rici, on April 10th, 2013
Hey church!
This coming Sunday is Gospel Sunday. It is a good time to invite your relative, friends, co-workers, neighbors who might have questions about Jesus and Christianity. If you know anybody in whose heart God is working then pray for them and invite them to this coming service. It will be at our regular start time (9:30am) in the sanctuary.
We will be looking at the transfiguration…
Matthew 17:1-5
1 After six days Jesus took with him Peter, James and John the brother of James, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. 2 There he was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light. 3 Just then there appeared before them Moses and Elijah, talking with Jesus.
4 Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you wish, I will put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.”
5 While he was still speaking, a bright cloud covered them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!”
Who was Jesus?
What is His transfiguration? And what was the meaning of it?
Why should we listen to Him?
What does he have to tell us?
These are all legitimate questions that arise after reading Matthew 17:1-5. Maybe some of these questions are on your relatives, friends, co-worker, neighbors’ mind? As we try to make sense of this supernatural event this morning hopefully God will reveal to us how this event speaks into their lives and ours.
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Exposed by His blood,
Rici
By Pastor Rici, on April 4th, 2013
Hey church!
Who likes to save $ here? Give me a “Yea! Yea!!” I LOVE to save money and get the most bang for my buck!!! I’ll be honest and say that for me the most bang is always measured in terms of food…”with this saved money I can buy this or that to eat, I can buy X pound of this or Y number of that.” Saving is great for my tummy.
It’s been a while since we had a sermon on offering. We will, hopefully, learn more about it but most importantly, hopefully, be challenged to start giving or give more faithfully or give more consistently or give more cheerfully.
PS. Also note that this Sunday we will have 2 offerings/pass the offering bags twice: the regular Sunday offering first and then the caring offering second. The caring offering is collected to help families in need in out church family. Feel free to give to this special offering if the Spirit leads you.
By Pastor Rici, on March 21st, 2013
Hey church!How many expectations, small and big, did you have this past week? Did all of them come through? If I could get 1$ for each thing that does not live up or happen according to expectation I would be rich! 
I think most of you will agree with me that we worship and serve a God who has a killer sense for surprise. He has a knack for knowing how to throw us off guard. Off guard enough to make us reflect and/or fall back in his arms to be assured of things he has for us but yet not fully visible. Does this sound familiar to you?
I hope that this coming Sunday will be a great time to expect the unexpected and reflect on our proper response.
PS. I hope the worship team does not mind me sharing but they have a sweet set of songs for singspiration this coming Sunday…here are the songs in case you want to prepare yourself to greet and praise your God and Maker… Prepare the Way + Forever Reign + Cornerstone + Waiting Here for You
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Exposed by His blood,
Rici
By Pastor Rici, on March 15th, 2013
Hey church!
Spiritual warfare is a daily reality. Matt 4:1-11 relates an intense episode Jesus victoriously went through. I this speaks a lot to those of us who are lenting or simply struggling through things now.
Whether you like it or not there is lots of activity in the spiritual realm. Although we already have victory in Christ (1 John 3:8) and Satan’s destruction is inevitable (Romans 16:20) we still need to respond to Satan’s attacks (Eph 6:10-18) because he will try to draw as many away from God as he can.
Maybe this message is not for you this morning or maybe it really is…
PS. some of you shared with me that God really spoke to you 2 weeks ago through our sermon on wilderness. Here it is if you wanted to listen to it and meditate on it again.
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Exposed by His blood,
Rici
By Pastor Rici, on March 5th, 2013
Hey church!
This Sunday we have a returning guest speaker: our brother Luciano Chiazzese. He will preach on Isaiah 40:31 and lead us to wrap our minds around waiting upon the LORD.
PS. Remember DAYLIGHT SAVING TIME this coming Saturday night: move your clocks 1 hour ahead. So see you at 9:30am, the real 9:30am!!!
PPS. pray for your own CNE participation for 2013. Registration deadline coming soon!!
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Exposed by His blood,
Rici
By Pastor Rici, on February 22nd, 2013
Hey sojourners!!
Have you ever been lost? I mean real lost: on your own without a gps, google maps or a wife to tell you to stop and ask for directions? We usually do not like this sense of “lostness” and we usually rely on different things to gain control over any situations and potential situations where we might feel helpless or worst directionless.
What does this mean to us during this Lenting season? Let us come together this Sunday to learn and reflect on this together.
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Exposed by His blood,
Rici
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