God, don’t just watch from the sidelines. Come on! Run to my side! (Psalm 71:12, Message Bible) Have you ever lost something you valued, only to find it again? Of course you have, and it is a happy moment. I have a stainless steel travel mug I have lost at least 3 or 4 times, [...]
“How can we picture God’s kingdom? What kind of story can we use? It’s like a pine nut. When it lands on the ground it is quite small as seeds go, yet once it is planted it grows into a huge pine tree with thick branches. Eagles nest in it.” With many stories like these, [...]
January was a month devoted to thinking about — and praying from — the essence of our Christian faith. We hope that our Westside Creed has become more meaningful to you through the process. As we end this series, we realize this month’s teaching is a call to a beginning, to move from the position [...]
At Westside King’s Church we have made it an annual tradition to begin each new year with days of prayer. This has now become part of our annual rhythm, one of the ways we stay committed to a vibrant, clear and focused Christian life. We know that Christian life must be lived out in active [...]
We have been reviewing the essence of Christian faith this month through our series Seeking the Radical Middle: a Westside Creed. You can find the creed at our website (wkc.org/aboutwkc/whatwebelieve). This past Sunday we talked about the Holy Spirit, the third member of the Trinity, whom someone once called the shy part of God. What [...]
For the month of January we are considering what it means to be faithfully Christian, to embrace the big idea of Christianity without feeling the need to be a special brand. In fact, we are interested in the possibility of being non-branded Christians — “mere Christians” to borrow the title of CS Lewis’ famous book. [...]
It’s time to stop and worship. The long month of busy preparations are nearly over. Family and friends and church community are ready to gather. Decorations are in place, gifts are wrapped, food is prepared. The moment comes — after all of the distraction, after all of the busyness, after all of the build-up — [...]
This Christmas at Westside we have decided to shine the light on the life, rather than the birth of Jesus, the man rather than the baby. Of course we do celebrate Christmas as God’s entrance into the world. But at the same time, it is possible to become over-sentimental about that, to miss the biggest [...]
We have entered into the Advent season, the time marked off in the Christian calendar when we pay attention to what God has done for us through the miracle of the incarnation. Advent comes from the Latin adventus, which means coming or visit. Advent means that God has come to us in the person of [...]
And so we come to the end of the story of Jonah. Many of you have told us how much this little book has surprised you. The story of an obviously flawed man — running and returning, petulant and pouting — has provided for many of us an imaginative way to understand our own lives [...]
The story of Jonah is fascinating for so many reasons, and not least among them because of the way the story ends. After all that Jonah goes through — his run away from God, the big storm, his prayer from inside the fish, his eventual reluctant journey to Nineveh — we find this story surprisingly [...]
Then the word of the LORD came to Jonah a second time: “Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you.” Jonah obeyed the word of the LORD and went to Nineveh… (Jonah 3:1-3a) We are making our way through the story of Jonah and thinking about what [...]
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