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Father in Heaven! You have loved us first, help us never to forget that You are love so that this sure conviction might triumph in our hearts over the seduction of the world, over the inquietude of the soul, over the anxiety for the future, over the fright of the past, over the distress of …
Continue reading "You have loved us first: a prayer by Søren Kierkegaard"
1 Corinthians 13 is one of the most powerful and profound passages of Scripture describing love. In particular, with verses 4-7 the Apostle Paul writes one of the most succinct statements about the nature and activity of love. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It …
This past weekend at Eastbrook, we continued our preaching series entitled "God's Grace for an Imperfect Church: 1 Corinthians." This week we arrived at one of the most well-known passages in the entire letter of 1 Corinthians, chapter 13. Hopefully you already know that these words were not written by Paul specifically about marriage, even …
Continue reading "“The Way of Love” – a message from 1 Corinthians 13"
When Adam and Eve turn from God and His will by choosing for themselves and their own will, they were in essence choosing to love themselves over God. Sin can be both the decision for and experience of disordered love. Saint Augustine, the 4th century Bishop of Hippo in present-day Algeria, described this reality when …
Continue reading "Sin’s Disruption and Disordered Love: Insights from St. Augustine"
I continued our series, "Love-Sex-Body: Toward a Biblical Theology of Embodied Sexuality," this past weekend at at Eastbrook Church by turning to the third chapter of God's Good Story: Redemption in Jesus Christ. This message builds off of previous messages on Creation and the Fall, looking at Christ's redeeming work as outlined in Romans 5. …
Matthew Erickson 