Freedom 3.0

God has set us free from "man made religion." Religion often keeps us away from God. It makes it all about what we do instead of what God has done. I can do nothing to make God love me more or less. The easiest way to think of this is by thinking of our own children. We love them no matter what they do or say. God loves us and offers himself to us no strings attached. Man has come along and tied up all the strings. These strings keep us from God.

I grew up in a Church setting that taught us to doubt our self worth in Christ, causing fear and doubt. Always doubting if God would save me. Leaving many of us with a warped sense of self, beat down, and thinking we could never do enough. A "step child" mentality thinking I can never really get God's love.

It is true that we can never do enough, but we can know that we are going to be saved. We can have confidence before the throne of God. We are not step children, we are heirs! Kings Heirs!

New!!! Home Gatherings

Just arrived this week!
We started home gatherings this past Wednesday.
We have the following Groups:

1. Carr's Teens


2. Cook's Young Kids


3. The Shop Adults-in depth bible study

4. Mike and Alta's home-Video Study

Feel free to join one of these or start your own in your backyard.

What is a Home Gathering?

They all may look and feel very different. They will each be different to meet the needs of their community. They are geographically located to help us reach our neighbors and get to know the people around us and create new friendships. Right now most of them are laid back and fun, lots of food and conversation. This is an organic movement and will unfold at God's timing if we continue to bath it in prayer.

We need to bath this in prayer and see where God takes it. Last Wednesday we had more people in homes than we did on Sunday AM worship!

Freedom 1.0

As a parent, do we want our children to quake in deathly fear by our mere presence? Do we want children that don’t act until they are yelled and screamed at?

Of course not! We want children that chose our ways on their own, Children that decide on their own to follow our directives without being forced into submission.

So it is with God, He did not come down and force a lot of stuff on us. He doesn't come down here and yell and scream in our face to get us to do His will. He doesn't beat us into submission either. Instead he gives us freedom. He wants us to freely choose Him on our own.

When children chose to follow parents on their own, it shows the parents that they have their child’s heart. When a child does this on their own it makes the parents heart leap for joy at the thought of their children’s heart being so turned to their parents.

How much more does God’s heart leap when we chose His way?

Noise 2.0

"It’s so loud, Can’t you hear how loud that movie is!” This is a phrase often repeated in the Cook household. We most often have this conversation with our oldest son about the noise level of the TV. We are a family of technology freaks. We love it! The problem is it is on 24/7. We seem to always have some media going from Music, DVD’s TV, VHS Tapes (yes I must be old, I even know about Beta, 8 tracks, record players, 45’s), CD’s, Computers, WII. . . you name it, if make sounds the Cook’s listen to it loud and proud baby, loud and proud. Can you hear me now?

Where did my son learn this behavior from? I wish I could say “he’s a little deaf and has to turn it up a bit” or “Matt is a little hard of hearing and has to have everything loud.”

Isn’t it ironic so many times what we drives us crazy with our kids behavior is so often a flaw in us. Should I be angry @ my son or should I be angry @ myself? Should I desire a change from my son, or should I desire a change in me?

What about you? Too much noise in your life too?

What's in your wallet?

We have all seen the commercial; the answer for most of us is very easy; NOTHING! Our world is full of concerns about what is in or not in our wallets. We become consumed with this in our everyday life. It’s hard to live here in the states and not think about “What’s in your wallet?”

I have been thinking about “What’s in your Spirit?” This is the question we should be asking our selves on a daily basis. We live in a world full of “lightning fast download speeds.” This made me think, What is God trying to “download” into me by His Spirit. (The Spirit "Downloads" into us, we "Upload" through prayer)

What have we been downloading into our spirits? Have we been using what God is downloading, or have we forgotten where we put that file? Maybe we need to “refresh” the download and start again.

So what’s in your spirit?