Denver Community Church

June 6, 2010: Speaking at Last – Michael Hidalgo

Paul has gone through the entire letter telling the people in the Colossian Church how to live. In our world today, if faced with philosophical arguments, like the ones facing the Colossian believers, I suspect we would want to know how to respond … verbally. We often frame things in a very logical way … and attempt to assemble our words, thoughts, and evidence in a convincing way. However, all this does in the end is win and argument, rarely does it change minds.

Paul’s admonition is to be wise, redeem time, be full of grace, to allow the words to taste good … so that the Colossian believers would “know how to answer everyone.” It seems that they were to speak when they were asked. Some believe the assumption was that they were living such different lives that people would start asking. Their life was to speak … their word were to explain it. Perhaps this is why Paul says, “Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders …” first – because the way we act speaks louder than anything.

May 30, 2010: Always Aware All the Time – Michael Hidalgo

Most of our days are spent trying to accomplish a series of tasks. Often we just try to survive the day. Paul’s instruction challenges that. He speaks about a constant state of living. Being watchful … making the most of every opportunity. We are to live aware of our surroundings. We are to wake up to the world around us. 

What would it be like if we lived with greater awareness of God in our midst? What would it be like if we saw every encounter with another person as a divine appointment? I imagine that we would dwell more fully in grace, which, in the end, is what our speech is to be full of.

May 23, 2010: The Servant Master – Dave Neuhausel

So masters it seems are slaves to. After all Paul does speak about their “Master in Heaven.” He also calls them to a higher standard. Telling them to “provide what is right and fair …” Is Paul telling the masters to pay his people, or at the very least give them a good living – maybe pay “room and board?”

If Paul gives this instruction to masters, in reflection of their Master in Heaven, what does this tell us about God and his loving-kindness? What can we learn about his provision for us?

May 16, 2010: Slaves of All – Michael Hidalgo and Steve Cohen

Today, slavery is wrong. There are few who would say differently. Yet Paul does not come right out and say that slavery is wrong. A few things to keep in mind (not that any of these things make slavery right). First, slavery in the Roman world was much different than slavery as we have seen in American history from our founding right up until today. Second, some of these slaves worked for Christian owners. So what do we make of this?

 

We will spend time looking at abolitionist theology and the perspective of those who were slaves. With slavery being a large human rights issue today, what can we do and how should we think about this so as to make a difference?

May 9, 2010: From Father to Son – Michael Hidalgo

Paul addresses little kids and fathers. From our perspective, who is the one more responsible? Certainly children have to listen and obey, but if we think about the roles we would most certainly hold the father more responsible. In the Colossian context fathers were the heads of the household. They were in charge. It was “their way of the highway.” Here, Paul calls on them to be a more gentle kind of person. 

Which is understandable. Why is it that father’s play such a large role in our lives as kids? What connection does this have to our understanding of God as father? How can those, who were embittered, no longer live a discouraged life, but find healing from the wounds of their Dad?

May 2, 2010: An Institution We Can Live With – Michael Hidalgo

For some the idea of marriage is intolerable. Not just the idea of being married but the idea that one has to submit. Or one has to lead. Or one has to have a certain role. At first glance it seems that Paul is supporting Aristotle’s ideals in which he suggests that a man is more fit to lead than a woman. This however is not the case. The reality is that in marriage both husband and wife are called to be more like Christ. Paul compares marriage to Jesus’ love in Ephesians 5 … maybe the posture of both husband and wife, in their relationship, should be to allow themselves to be “crucified” daily. Sacrificing oneself for the other.

April 25, 2010: Faith As Culture – Michael Hidalgo

Many followers of Jesus frequently try to understand how to engage the culture we live in. But what if our faith was our culture. What if everything we did emerged out of our Kingdom mindset and loyalty to the Kingdom of Heaven? How would this affect our politics? How would this affect our consumerism? How would this affect the way we use our hard earned cash? 

We will look at our engagement with our world as Kingdom citizens. What is it that informs our actions? When is it okay to “get political”? Why is it that we are comfortable talking about all sorts of things outside of a Sunday morning context … but on Sunday morning we get very uncomfortable?

April 18, 2010: Calling It Something – Dave Neuhausel

How do I do everything in the name of Jesus? Doesn’t Paul know how mundane much of my day already is? Perhaps this understanding begins by what Paul has just said, “Let the message of Christ dwell among you …” If this is the reality then our minds and hearts are fixed more fully on him. And everything we do is for him, in him, and through him.

As we move toward this way of living, we may just end up in a place that we enjoy being. All of words, tasks, deeds, and our very lives will be lived not out of our drudgery but out of joy. One might even refer to this kind of living as a “calling.” Maybe this is what the message of Christ is after all.

April 11, 2010: Sharing With God – Michael Hidalgo

Shalom is not just the absence of war. When somebody flashes the peace sign and says, “Peace dude.” They may only be saying, “End war.” While the absence of conflict is good, it is only one small snapshot of what peace is. Shalom is its fullness is having all parts of your life and your world make sense. It is having all parts of your life and your world exist in harmony with each other. 

 

Many Hebrew words, the word we commonly translate as peace, shalom, has a wider latitude of meaning than the English word. We tend to understand it as the absence of war or as calmness of spirit. But along with these ideas, the Hebrew word shalom also carries a greater connotation of well-being, health, safety, prosperity, wholeness, and completeness.

 

In modern Hebrew, the common greeting is, "Mah shalomkah?" Meaning, how is your shalom? How is your well-being? In the Aaronic benediction, when it is said "May the Lord look upon you with favor and give you his peace," it is a much broader, wider blessing that we may think, talking about God supplying our physical and material needs as well as our emotional needs.

 

One important concept that has to do with shalom, peace, is that it also speaks about having a covenantal relationship with God. When the covenant was first enacted between God and Israel, some of the sacrifices were peace (shelem) offerings, to celebrate the relationship between the people and God. 

This is the Hebraic understanding of salvation, not just that we will go to heaven when we die, but that we have an unbroken, loving relationship with God here on earth.

Most sacrificial offerings were given entirely to God, but the peace (or fellowship) offering was different. Part of it is eaten by the worshipper, as if he is sharing a meal with God, the ultimate picture of friendship. The Passover meal was a type of peace offering, because it was a sacrifice that the people ate from. When Jesus held up the bread and wine as a new covenant, he was using this as a peace offering to show their new relationship with God. Through atonement by his blood, God offers all of us shalom. 

April 4, 2010: The Resurrection is Within You – Michael Hidalgo

We can say we believe this or that. But the truth is that what we say we believe about God, life, love, or anything for that matter is often a false representation of who we are. We need moreso to look at the way we live our daily life. How do we treat our friends? What do we privately scheme in the recesses of our minds? How much do we consume? The answers to those questions are what penetrate us deeply … getting to what we really believe. 

 

When we go there, that is often a difficult depressing place. Perhaps this is why Paul frequently calls followers of Jesus to die and rise again with Christ. To experience a rebirth a new life. But we cannot experience this new life without dying first … and we have to die every day so that every day we can be reborn. 

And if we are a people who are reborn and experience new life everyday, then we become a people of the resurrection. Which means that wherever the people of God are, there is the resurrection. So we ask, “Where is the resurrection true?”