[IN] Can we keep hold of truths about God even when things have gone wrong?

 Challenge: Rehearse what you know of God's character

Worship - Job 1

Job is introduced to us like in any other story - but it is hard for us to locate Uz geographically and in what time period he lived. Maybe that helps us. Perhaps it is better for us to read Job thinking 'this was just a guy in some place at some time'. What we do know is that he was well blessed - a lovely family with extensive wealth, livestock and servants. We are also told he was blameless and upright - he knew his place before God and he shunned evil. He had deliberate rituals to keep himself and his family right before God.

[UP] How do you feel about God when things get tough?

 Challenge: Choose to worship God no matter what

He is Risen! Mark 16

When looking at the Easter story it is worth giving a shout out to the women. They are the ones who tough it out at the crucifixion scene on Friday, watching Jesus die. They are the ones who are up early on Sunday (Easter) morning, coming to the tomb to finish the job of the proper burial of an important person. For on the Friday it was evening - already sabbath - by the time the body was put in the tomb. There was no time to properly treat the body, so that had to be left until Sunday morning.

Deadly Prediction - Mark 9

Many of us pray for revival - hoping for fresh waves of God that enable many to turn to Jesus. They will be great days ... but we shouldn't forget that revival coming does not mean that there is no cost: it will require people to lay down their lives, be prepared to be disrupted, all to join in with what God is doing.

Extravagant Heart, Costly Action - Mark 14

In Mark 14 Jesus is at a meal, but it is interrupted by a woman coming in and performing an extravagant act. She pours a whole bottle of expensive perfume over Jesus - causing surprise to all present.

[OUT] Where is God calling you to lose life in order to gain it?

 Challenge: Put yourself on the line for His cause

Feeding the Many - Mark 8

In both this and the Mark 6 feeding miracle it is like the ultimate Foodbank! People need food ... and it gets provided. The actual Ely Foodbank has been like it (albeit food provided by donations!) - the donations have kept coming to the tune of 584 tonnes over the 10 year lifetime, with just 2% being purchased. Even with the recent 60% increase in demand only certain items have run dry for short periods. This is God's economy of abundance!

Sabbath People - Mark 2 & 3

In some countries if you think and act in certain ways, you can land in serious trouble. Various regimes clamp down on people for daring to question or think different. The police who crack down become known as the 'thought police', because you get arrested for what you think. In the time of Jesus the Pharisees seemed to be the same - calling out people who thought or acted in certain ways as ungodly trouble-makers. When Jesus and his disciples were going from A to B, and took some corn as they passed through cornfields for an on-the-go snack, but it happened to be the Sabbath, it was the Pharisees who took issue with them.

IN - Are we letting 'the Jesus Way' transform our ways?

 Challenge: Take seriously the sabbath and kingdom principles of Jesus