Introducing Our Fall Preaching Series
Dear Mission Cincinnati,
I recently heard a quote that “A mystic is someone who wants to experience tangibly what they believe theologically.” This is what I want for my own faith journey and what I pray for you to experience in yours: that you wouldn’t just hear words about Jesus, but encounter Jesus at work in your life, your family, your vocation, and your neighborhood! That you wouldn’t simply agree intellectually with ideas about Jesus, but you would place your faith and confidence in the God revealed in Jesus, the Scriptures, creation, and the best of church tradition, in ways that would transform your life and our world for the better.
Why do I want this experienced reality of God for us? Because there comes a point (truthfully many points!) when following Jesus where faith gets hard. The credibility of the Christian community who taught us the faith is stressed by the moral failures and corruption of its leaders. The plausibility of doctrinal truths is challenged by new learning. Perhaps the hardest question isn’t, “Is it possible to believe these things?” but, “Is believing these things GOOD for me and for my neighbor?” When we face questions like these, we need deep wells to draw from, strong supports to lean on, and a Jesus we can trust because we know He’s personally present with us, and companioning us through our days.
This fall at The Mission we will introduce or re-introduce you to one of these deep wells and strong supports we have inherited in the Nicene Creed. Over the next 10 Sundays, we’ll journey through the Creed, preach from the Scriptures that reveal the truths the Creed affirms, retell some of the story of the Creed’s origins, discover how the truths of the Creed really are good news for us and for our neighbors, and demonstrate how the Creed helps us share our faith and teach the faith to our children, friends, or newer believers in our lives. In all of this, my hope and prayer is that the Creed will shift in our minds from being simply a summary of Christian belief to a life-giving place of encounter with the Living God. And that as this shift takes place, we will discover or re-discover the Creed as an ancient well for modern thirst.
In addition to Sundays, we’ll discuss our learnings and wrestlings in our fall small groups that kick off next week. We’ve also created a beautiful discipleship guide written by Rev. Kristen and designed by Arian Armstrong that you can use for group discussion and personal devotion. You can pick up your free copy of the guide in the hallway at the church on Sundays.
Finally, if you’re interested in diving deeper in the origins of the Creed or how to practically apply the beliefs of the Creed in your life, here are a couple additional resources:
What’s a Christian Anyway? - Glen Packiam
The Creed: What Christians Believe and Why It Matters - Luke Timothy Johnson
The Patient Ferment of the Early Church - Alan Krieder
I can’t wait to share this journey with you church! May we all emerge from these weeks knowing Jesus more, and may He renew our desire to join Him in His mission of making all things new!
Fr. William