February 2011 Prayer Letter

After surviving the Snowpocalypse, I sat down to put together my latest prayer letter. In it, I highlight some ways to pray for our Canvas Group and the Worship Team. Also, Aimee has begun a monthly excerpt on her involvement in ministering to the women at The Rock.

Hope it's a blessing!

By the way, Aimee has a blog. Here!

Sermon Series: Idols

One of my roles at The Rock is serving on the Programming Team, the group who puts together the creative elements of our Saturday services in order to most beautifully portray the Gospel. We began this semester with a series on Idols. For four weeks, we are exploring different aspirations we have that easily threaten our dependency on Christ and our pursuit of Him.

Week One: Identifying Our Hidden Loves
We have deceived ourselves if we think that there are no idols in our lives. We define these as anything that removes Christ from the throne and places itself on it instead. Even the morally neutral become idols and in this talk, we unpack what that looks like.

Week Two: Love is Not All You Need
College students are no exception to the lie that says "If you just find true love, you'll be happy." Love in itself of course is not a bad thing but it is perverted as soon as we let it take the place that God intends for himself in our lives.

Week Three: The Seduction of Success
John calls it the performance trap. Constantly running the hamster wheel, climbing the ladder, chasing the American Dream - call it what you will, we often worship at the alter of personal gain at the expense of our souls.

Week Four: Money Changes Everything
Especially in the midst of a recession, money can so easily become a dominating thought and pursuit in our lives. During this week, we will unpack how striving for financial success can lead us away from God.

The idea during this series is not to say don't pursue these things but instead to help us remember that God is not one to take the back seat very kindly. When we let love, success, money, whatever subtly grasp our full attention, we will pay the price. Instead, it is the Gospel that saves and we hope to communicate that beautifully.