16 min
SERMON | 1 Peter 1:17-23 | A LIVING HOPE - 2. "Loosening the Bonds" by Rev. Joseph Sanford at Sellersburg United Methodist Church in Sellersburg, Indiana. Sellersburg United Methodist Church Sermon Podcast
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- Christianity
SERMON | 1 Peter 1:17-23 | A LIVING HOPE - 2. "Loosening the Bonds" by Rev. Joseph Sanford at Sellersburg United Methodist Church in Sellersburg, Indiana.
Do you know you are loved?
Our full display of LOVE is God coming to us in Jesus Christ…
to tell our story in a new way…
to bring healing to our very hearts, minds, souls, and bodies…
to face and embody our rejection…
to suffer at the hands of our sinful pride and need to judge and control…
and to not condemn us.
to not respond with resentment.
to not respond in kind.
But to pray for us…
to forgive us…
to call out to us…
to wash our feet and kick in those prison doors anyway…
to dust us off and restore us to our original beauty…
to offer us LIFE…
to LOVE us.
Because that’s what God did through Jesus Christ.
That’s our trust and hope—in resurrection.
And, as people freed, we are to go and LOVE in response.
Not because we are supposed to, but because that’s all we know to do when we have arrived at the place of trusting and hoping in God alone.
___________________________________________________________________
Friends, Jesus Christ has freed us and continues to lead us into that freedom.
Embrace the full reality of freedom, leave your cell, and walk the path of discovering how valuable and loved you truly are.
Live in such a way that reflects this truth…that others in prisons around you may know of the fullness of joy that lies beyond the walls of their prisons.
Let us live, as freed people, committed to dismantling the prisons all around us so that everyone may live and walk as free as anyone and everyone else.
Let us continue to leave our prisons of judgment and condemnation behind us so that we may live into the true freedom of LOVE as revealed in Jesus Christ.
Live in such a way that reveals to people the truth you have come to know…
that we all are beautiful, priceless, and LOVED works of art formed in the image of God.
Christ IS Risen!
SERMON | 1 Peter 1:17-23 | A LIVING HOPE - 2. "Loosening the Bonds" by Rev. Joseph Sanford at Sellersburg United Methodist Church in Sellersburg, Indiana.
Do you know you are loved?
Our full display of LOVE is God coming to us in Jesus Christ…
to tell our story in a new way…
to bring healing to our very hearts, minds, souls, and bodies…
to face and embody our rejection…
to suffer at the hands of our sinful pride and need to judge and control…
and to not condemn us.
to not respond with resentment.
to not respond in kind.
But to pray for us…
to forgive us…
to call out to us…
to wash our feet and kick in those prison doors anyway…
to dust us off and restore us to our original beauty…
to offer us LIFE…
to LOVE us.
Because that’s what God did through Jesus Christ.
That’s our trust and hope—in resurrection.
And, as people freed, we are to go and LOVE in response.
Not because we are supposed to, but because that’s all we know to do when we have arrived at the place of trusting and hoping in God alone.
___________________________________________________________________
Friends, Jesus Christ has freed us and continues to lead us into that freedom.
Embrace the full reality of freedom, leave your cell, and walk the path of discovering how valuable and loved you truly are.
Live in such a way that reflects this truth…that others in prisons around you may know of the fullness of joy that lies beyond the walls of their prisons.
Let us live, as freed people, committed to dismantling the prisons all around us so that everyone may live and walk as free as anyone and everyone else.
Let us continue to leave our prisons of judgment and condemnation behind us so that we may live into the true freedom of LOVE as revealed in Jesus Christ.
Live in such a way that reveals to people the truth you have come to know…
that we all are beautiful, priceless, and LOVED works of art formed in the image of God.
Christ IS Risen!
16 min