LG #6: You are FORGIVEN!

The Bible is a redemption story.  We’re a character in that story and our name is Beloved.  Though God calls us by that name and we want to receive the name and respond, there are still times when we don’t feel like the Beloved and so we don’t live like the Beloved and then we feel guilty for not being the Beloved.

The fact is, He has forgiven you.  You simply need to claim His forgiveness and believe His promise.  God offers this forgiveness to all who come to Him.  It is yours the moment you believe in Jesus as your Savior and as an act of your will received him by faith into your life as your Lord.

Jesus lived on earth not just to prove he is God but to give you eternal life, to offer you forgiveness and set you free from sin and guilt.  Because Jesus is God, he can provide forgiveness from sin and enable you to live abundantly.  A rich and satisfying life is the heritage of Every Christian.  Jesus intended the Christian life to be an exciting, abundant adventure.  When you walk in a close relationship with our Lord, every day is filled with wonder, meaning and purpose.

However, most Christians don’t experience the abundant life.  The joy and victory modeled and promised by our Lord is strangely foreign to them.  Instead, they consider the Christian life a burden, a chore, a terrible cross to bear.  He called you to a life of joy and victory.  Whatever the circumstance you are in, our Lord promises peace.

Have you ever questioned Christ’s forgiveness?  The good news is that Christ’s death, in your place, is the basis for your forgiveness.  Because of Christ’s substitutionary death on the cross, your forgiveness is not merely a hope.  It is a fact!

To receive God’s forgiveness, simply confess your sin and accept his forgiveness by faith.  The Bible promises that if you confess your sins to Him, He is faithful and just to forgive you and to purify you from all unrighteousness.  To confess your sins means to agree with God about your sins.  Your agreement is threefold:

1. First, you agree that your sins are wrong and grieve God
2. Second, you recognize that God has already forgiven your sins by Christ’s death on the cross
3. Third, you repent (change your attitude towards the sin, which results in a change of action)

Sin obstructs your communication and relationship with God.  When you tolerate sin in your life, you can’t hear God.  You become discouraged and confused.  Soon, you may find yourself operating on your memories of God instead of living in vital interaction with Him.  All you need to do to experience God’s forgiveness is to confess your sins.  That cleansing breath restores your fellowship with Him.  Amen! 

LG #5: You are BELOVED!

Passage: Ephesians 5:1-14

The past couple weeks we have been learning about the importance of getting to know God and developing our relationship with Him.  This time around, we will consider who we are in that relationship.

In this passage, Paul encourages believers to BE IMITATORS OF GOD.  Why?  Because we are dearly beloved children.  Just as God spoke over Jesus: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased”, God says He loves us and He is pleased with us (Mark 1:11). And so He wants us to live a life of love, following the example of Christ.

Paul goes on to outline that as God’s Beloved, THERE MUST NOT BE immorality, impurity, greed, obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking.  WHY?  Because these are improper for God’s holy people.  God fought for His people and paid lavishly for His children to live a life of love, not a life marked with fears, worries, frustrations, angers, devastation, brokenness, etc.  He desires for us to live abundantly.  There is an inheritance set aside for the heirs of His kingdom, us - His Beloved!

LET NO ONE DECEIVE YOU.  The world has a lot to say.  It says we’re not good enough, smart enough, rich enough, strong enough, fast enough, etc.  These are all empty words and it pulls people to stray from the identity of Beloved.  We are already pleasing loved.  But why is it so difficult for us to put the names the world gives us behind us to take on and respond to the name of Beloved?

1. Do you know God? (the One who gives you the name Beloved?
2. Do you know God very well?
3. Do you understand the relationship and know your name?

God calls us to be HOLY: SET APART from the common, ordinary and everyday.  Paul reminds us to LIVE AS CHILDREN OF LIGHT and FIND OUT WHAT PLEASES THE LORD while having nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness.

Wake up, O sleeper,
rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you. 

WAKE UP and receive the name BELOVED.  He’s already given it to us.  He is calling us by that name already.  In order to fully receive that name, we need to view ourselves the way He is viewing us.  It really doesn’t matter how we feel or what we think about ourselves, it is simply receiving the name and growing into it.  We have been set apart specifically to be with Him, the holy God.  We can’t live like we’re unworthy, undeserving people any more.  YOU ARE BELOVED!

LG #4: Developing your relationship with God

Passages: Genesis 12:10-20, Genesis 22:1-18

As we discover the attributes of God by seeking Him and finding Him, we will come to learn and understand how He relates to us and this would change our attitude, perspective and approach to our lives.  As this journey of discovering Him unfolds and as you find more of Him, I trust that you will really fall in love with Him.

Tonight we looked at a person who was considered to be a great man of faith.  His name was Abraham, but his name was originally Abram.  Through the first passage, we see that Abram was messed up!  He clearly valued and loved his own life over his wife’s.  Due to fear, Abram shows a complete lack of trust in God and tries to take control of the situation with his own plans of lying.  But this plan only hurt his leadership of his household and his relationship with his wife Sarai.  If he really knew and understood that God’s promise was truly and simply to bless him, Abram would have had nothing to worry about, not even in the face of the most powerful man of the powerful empire of Egypt.

However, as Abraham, he has grown to become a man of great faith.  When as Abram he feared death for himself, as Abraham he had grown to know and trust God so deeply he immediately obeyed God’s command to sacrifice his son.  Abraham knew God so well he was able to trust that God’s promise of countless descendants was as good as reality, even if it meant surrendering the ONLY son he had (Hebrews 11:17-19).  Abraham knew God would make a way.  We see that Abraham went through a transformation as can be seen in the characteristics he presents so naturally and confidently: surrendering to the Lord’s commands, trusting the Lord’s promises and loving the Lord.

What happened in between?  What journey took place when this man was Abram to this man becoming Abraham?  Abram was a mere man and continued to make mistakes but God knew Abram’s battle for control so He continually reassured and affirmed the promise He had first given Abram in Genesis 12:2-3.  God reminded him of the promise three times (Gen. 13:14-17, 15:5, 17:4-8) and also gave Abram the new name of Abraham to assure him that this promise is binding and unfailing, because God is eternal and constant.

God gives the promise a final time after Abraham’s test in Gen. 22:16-18.  God needed to test Abraham in this way.  Remember how in the beginning of his journey, Abram was unwilling to lay down his life for his family?  Now we see from God’s test, Abraham was ready and willing to lay down more than his life, his whole family line, because his love for God was that great.  And God honors Abraham’s willingness to offer and sacrifice his life by again, firmly promising greatness to come for Abraham and generations following him.

How can we develop our relationship with God?  Get to know Him!
Principles of Spiritual Growth: 1. Read the Word, 2. Pray, 3. Obey
These are not mere actions or a formula but a step of discovering God.  We are not defined by what we DO.  Our actions merely result from who we ARE.  We are a people chosen and loved by God.  These principles of growth are a necessity to discovering all that God is to discover all that we were meant to be.  Amen! 

LG #3: Is God Trustworthy?

Passage: Hebrews 11:1-16, 39-40

Faith is confidence or trust in a person or thing.  We practice faith every day - crossing the street, going to the dentist, getting your hair cut.  You trust that the car will stop at the red light, the dentist will pull out the right tooth and the hairdresser will make your hair look good.  Is it by blind faith you do these things?  We know that the driver, dentist and hairdresser have licenses that show/prove that they are qualified and understand their responsibilities.

Is God trustworthy?  How will you find the answers to this question?  Have you been relying on third person accounts of who He is?  A relationship with someone through a third person can only go so far.  How much trust can be invested in someone you don’t know personally?

This passage lists people who practiced faith in God.  The first verse defines faith for us as “being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see”.  The men we read about were able to move, act and make decisions BY FAITH because they knew exactly who God was in their lives.  God loves us the same and created us to live abundantly in joy, peace, love, etc. but many people are not experiencing this kind of full and meaningful life … why is that?  Because: 1. We don’t understand who God is, 2. We don’t embrace God for who He is, 3. We don’t focus on who God is.

It’s difficult to lay down something you value, especially your life, into the hands of someone you don’t know.  If you don’t know them, you obviously can’t trust them. In order to trust someone,  you need to get to know them and spend time with them.  Do you really know God for all of who He is?  Are you seeking to find Him?  Check out this video: Awareness Test - just as the tagline reads, “It’s easy to miss something you’re not looking for”.  Let’s seek God for ourselves, find Him for ourselves and experience a deeper love relationship that He desires for us.

LG #2: Community at Columbia

Passage: Ecclesiastes 4:4-12

You are a Lego piece, designed to be connected to others.  Standing alone, you can’t do much but in connection with other Lego pieces, you can build towers, buildings, cities and more!  As a Lego piece you have a limited number of connection points so you you have to make a couple decisions - How will you pursue significant connection?  With whom will you choose to connect?  Your answers will significantly shape how you are changed and how you will help to change the world.

No matter where you stand in your spiritual journey, we hope that you would join us in learning about the kind of community Christ established and desires for us.  As seen in the passage, labor and achievement tend to be driven by our comparing ourselves with the next person.  God did not create us to live a life of envy and pride, chasing after the wind.  He doesn’t call for us to just give up and not do anything either.  He wants us to enjoy this life and enjoy the company around us.  He wants us to experience peace, encouragement and warmth as a community.

As a KCCC community, we strive to help one another in our individual/personal journeys with God by building up a community that is:
- Living in authentic community
- Moving toward one another when life is hard and messy
- Challenging and encouraging one another in grace and truth
- Pointing each other to Christ

To experience the Gospel together -  join us for Large Group and sign up for Small Group!  Get plugged into a community that centers on Christ so connections can be made as it was intended by God.  (If you’re interested in learning more about or signing up for Small Group, click here and let us know!)

A launch into the new year with FIRST LARGE GROUP!

To those of you who were able to join us tonight for the FIRST LARGE GROUP of the school year, we were so EXCITED to see you all.  :)

For those who were unable to stop by, we missed you - but here’s a recap of the evening’s talk, entitled “Why are you at Columbia?”.

The passage came from Genesis 12:1-8.  And here’s the gist …
We are all in pursuit of SOMETHING, seeking FULFILLMENT.  Where will we find ultimate fulfillment?  What if our lives are part of a bigger, much greater story?  God told Abram, “Leave YOUR country, YOUR people and YOUR father’s houshold …”  Abram had to let go of everything he had identified himself with.  Then God told him to “GO to the land I will show you.”  God had something greater in store for Abram.  God said LEAVE and GO but didn’t stop there.  God made a PROMISE that “to your offspring I will give this land.”  Abram underwent significant change and discovered something (someONE) much greater than anything he had known before and anything he could have imagined for himself.

We believe that change happens through the power of the Gospel, for the glory of God and the good of people.  KCCC is committed to 3 main priorities:

1. Embracing the Gospel personally - go deeper into the Gospel to honestly recognize personal sin and genuinely celebrate Christ’s grace to us
2. Experiencing the Gospel together - engage in authentic community to move forward together.  Real and lasting change occurs with community
3. Extending the Gospel to others - look for opportunities to be used by God to impact the lives around us (by displaying, demonstrating and declaring the Gospel)

We invite you to join us in this journey of discovering who we were created to be, what we are called to do and how this bigger story involves us helping to change the world and experience the change ourselves.  :)

We hope you would join us for LARGE GROUP + Suite Night next week.  God be with you!  :D

WELCOME, Class of 2016!!

Welcome to Columbia University!

We are so excited to welcome you to our beautiful campus.  We can’t wait to meet you!  You can learn more about opportunities to meet and get to know us on campus with various events we’ve prepared for you.  Please visit our Facebook Page and our Class of 2016 Group to learn more about Korea Campus Crusade for Christ USA, Columbia, NYC, events and more!  :)