by Elizabeth | Jun 16, 2011 | Learning Story
Chart from Learning God's Story of Grace
Women struggle. We forget our God-designed and designated meaning and mission; we are blind to our manipulative ways; we hunker down in shame rather than being buoyed by the hope of the freedom for which Christ set us free; we lose hope when our sights don’t remain on the full redemption to come.
In the workshop on bearing Christ to the world’s women, we considered the implications of redemptive history for the world’s women. The above chart is lifted right out of Learning God’s Story of Grace — to explore more fully what redemptive history tells us about who God is, what He has done, and why that matters so emphatically to us, check it out. For more on why knowing this story of grace matters for women, check out the recorded workshop at Barker Productions.
by Elizabeth | Jun 15, 2011 | Learning Story
We must learn and love these core stories to bear Christ into the world.
Some of you asked me about an earlier post regarding the gospel and Lady Gaga. As promised, over the next few days, I’ll share a slice of the workshop on Bearing Christ to the World’s Women, which leads us ultimately to the question of what do we as Christ-followers have in common with Lady Gaga, and what essential differences do we have?
If we’re going to share Christ and bear Christ to the world’s women, we need to start at the beginning — with four core stories, contemplating…
1. What does God’s Story of Grace have to offer the world’s women?
2. Who are the women of the Bible and what hope do their stories tell?
3. What is your story of grace? Awe and gratitude for what God has done for us and in us is the best story we have to share.
4. What is the story of the world’s women? We must listen carefully to the stories they are telling us.
Stay tuned for a few more thoughts on this topic and for thoughts on the gospel and Lady Gaga. If you want to hear the recording of that seminar, you can order it from Barker Productions.
by Elizabeth | Jun 14, 2011 | Learning Story
Yesterday I wrote about the new Bible study arriving, and today I am working on its sequel (which is really the wrong word for a study on what is all woven together in life — living in faith and hope (and love –which will be the third in the series…), but nonetheless, I am immersed in faith and hope. This morning this gem played in my heart…beautiful lyrics by Michael Card…Do you know this song?
They called him laughter
“A barren land and a barren wife
Made Abraham laugh at his wandering life
A cruel joke it seemed then to call him the father of nations
A heavenly prank, a celestial joke
Cause grey hair and babies leave no room for hope
But hoping is something this hopeless old man learned to do
Chorus:
They called him laughter
For he came after
The father had made an impossible promise come true
The birth of a baby to a hopeless old lady
So they called him laughter
Cause no other name would do
A cry in the darkness and laughter at night
An elderly couple sat holding him tight
An imporbable infant, a punchline, a promise come true
They laughed til they wept then laughed at their tears
This miracle baby they’ve wanted for years
Would make a messiah who’d give us impossible joy…
What about you? What stories in the Bible or in your life make you laugh at the hilarious beauty of God?
by Elizabeth | Jun 13, 2011 | Learning Story
Learning God's Story of Grace Bible Study
Weighing in at approximately 12 ounces, with a definite pastel skin tone, sturdy and sensible binding, and perfectly lovely writing paper,
Learning God’s Story of Grace, the first in the Living Story Bible study series, has arrived!
To give you an idea of its nature, I’ll share with you a few questions people have asked, and my answers. Please add to the questions (or answers, if you have already taken part in the study!):
1. “Would this be helpful for me to discover more of my own story of grace? I’ve done a lot of Bible study but I haven’t ever really thought that I had a story of grace.” Scotty Smith, who wrote the foreword, says: “Elizabeth helps us find our place in God’s story – God’s Living Story of redemption and restoration. Each of us is called to be a character in and a carrier of this amazing story. Indeed, the gospel runs to us and through us, to the glory of God.”
2. “Do you study the Bible?” Learning God’s Story is about just that – understanding the whole of the love and life story Scripture tells in a way that makes us passionate to study it and learn it.
3. “Is it only for women? I have some co-ed groups in my church that I would like to use it with.” Take a look at Chapter 4 to find a great story of a men’s church board using the concept of Story Feasting. I surveyed church planters as I was designing the study, and they asked me to leave it open for study by men and women.
4. “Can anyone in any denomination use it?” Anyone who has an interest in growing in grace, living the story of the true gospel of Jesus Christ will not only love this study, but begin to see new realities about God, Scripture, and themselves in it.
5. Where can I buy it? It is available online through P&R Publishing, Christian Books, Barnes and Noble, Amazon, Family Christian, and others. You should be able to walk into your local Family Christian and Barnes and Noble and ask for it. If they don’t have it, please tell them to order it for you and stock a few extras:!
Got questions? Ask them here or on Facebook page, Living Story.
by Elizabeth | Jun 11, 2011 | Learning Story
Ah, I am happily home, surrounded by mounds of laundry and readying myself for a two-basket trip to the grocery store, but before I go, I want to share the good news of fond memories of the gathering of the PCA this past week in Virginia Beach, Va.
- Real conversation about matters that matter. Beyond the politics and posturing that so often happens at such gatherings to true heart struggle of women and men laboring to bring hope to those desperately needing to hear that Jesus Christ saves from irreligion and religion.
- The call for unity: The pastor of an intentionally integrated church in Jackson, Mississippi talking about racial reconciliation happening in the deeply entrenched South: “We don’t wait for heaven for unity. It must be in some way visibly expressed now.” Luke 17:20-23
- The call to worship. A bold and humble pastor speaking about “oppression,” not in the context of other cultures but in the context of his home, and how his wife felt oppressed by – him. Confessing his idolatry and self-righteousness and pointing to the gospel as the healing force and community as the strengthening body. This is worship in spirit and truth. John 4.
- The call to mission. Luke 10: 1-42…We must be bold messengers, loving neighbors, and good listeners, coupling the ‘repulsive’ message of the gospel with the irresistible winsomeness of a life of faith, hope, and love.
- Real women wanting to share God’s story of grace with real women. Learning to look for what we have in common as women created in the image of God, struggling in our own sin nature — and to leverage the difference: our hope in Jesus Christ. (More on that with a summary of “A Woman’s Story” seminar coming next week.) Luke 7:36-50.
by Elizabeth | Jun 8, 2011 | Learning Story
The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed.
For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation. itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. Romans 8:19- 21
I wrote this blog yesterday, then had two discussions with people about Christianity and our call to steward creation, then woke up to the sound of a bulldozer moving sand on the beach, so I figured, yeah, it’s relevant:
Does living the Christian story have anything to do with environmentalism, and if so, what? Just read a very helpful article on the topic in Christianity Today with two folks who are thinking hard about the matter, Peter Harris and Eugene Peterson. Listen to Harris’ encouragement:
If you believe you’re going to be able, by technology, by political force, by whatever means, to save the planet, you may well get disillusioned and exhausted and depressed. these are genuine problems within the environmental movement.
If, on the other hand, you do what you do because you believe it pleases the living God, who is the Creator and whose handiwork this is, your perspective is very different…i do think it gives God tremendous pleasure when his people do what they were created to do, which is care for what He has made.
My heart’s desire for the new Bible study, which, yes, really exists, as confirmed yesterday in the bookstore at General Assembly:), is to get people “Living the Story.” As a community working through this study together and as individuals. , people will be called and given opportunity to think of creative ways to live out what we were created to do.
You can read excerpts from Learning God’s Story of Grace here.
