Learn about the mission and vision of High Point Church and keep up to date on current happenings in our church community.
On May 12 and 19, Nic Gibson, our Preaching Pastor, gave us all something to think about in terms of how God views His Church and how we are a part of what He’s doing.
This was a handout that people got to walk through while Nic was giving his sermon on May 19.
Have you thought about the questions yet? What is God revealing to you?
If you missed the sermons – catch up here!
In the last post I discussed the five purposes of small groups at High Point church. Our vision for small groups is for them to be Christ centered, transformational communities. The five purposes and practices of small groups are designed to build these communities.
To review, the 5 purposes are:
1. Community
2. Spiritual growth
3. Prayer
4. Supporting mission
5. Service
In part 1 I broke down in some detail the practice of community. The second purpose and practice of small group community is spiritual growth.
Continue reading Five Purposes & Practices of Small Groups: 2. GROWTH
The next five posts will be about the five purposes and tasks in small groups. There are many things that cannot be done on Sunday morning. Some cannot be done because of time constraints. Some cannot be done because of the large group context. But when large group and small group gatherings work in concert with one another, great things can happen to the local church. It’s amazing what can happen to the local church when the local church is working right.
So to give you a summary, the five purposes are as follows:
Continue reading Five Purposes & Practices of Small Groups: 1. COMMUNITY
Everyone laments that we don’t talk to people different than ourselves and that it’s killing our culture, and then almost nobody does it. This annoys me – not just that people are hypocritical about this, but because I am too. Recently I’ve gotten together with three “progressive” Christian clergy to do something called theology pub or spirituality on tap. Essentially the concept is from the emergent movement, but is simple enough. Some people don’t like coming to churches or being on religious people’s home turf. However, this doesn’t mean they are shallow and don’t like talking about spirituality, God, morality, meaning and so on. So, you take the conversations about those things to their turf and of course that means going to a pub/bar.
Most Christians are okay with not really understanding how the different books of the Bible fit together. But it really is a big problem. To miss it can end up being to miss the gospel, or to radically change it in extremely unhelpful ways. Recently someone in my church gave me the book
The First Idiot in Heaven. The basic premise of the book is that only Paul’s 13 epistles are really for non-Jewish Christians, Paul preaches a gospel of absolutely pure grace, and that leads to ultimate reconciliation for everyone – ultimate universalism. I don’t think that misrepresents book, though I didn’t read very much of it – 50 pages or so.
No doubt many people in ministries and leading small groups are wondering what’s coming next after missions month. For several months we have been planning to do a series called, “The Gospel Through The Bible.” The point of this series is twofold:
Engage & Equip 