Monday Recap: THE BIGGER PICTURE, Week One

So great to begin our new series on the book of Daniel yesterday. And so great to welcome The Barstool Pastor, Jeff Hathcock as he talked about his ministry to the "BARbarians" who are nowhere near a church. If you missed him, check out the video which will be posted later today on the front page of our website.

The Big Idea for the whole series is: GOD IS ALWAYS IN CONTROL.

Yesterday we looked at Daniel 1 and saw that the key tension in the passage is "How should someone who is following God interact with their culture"?

There are really three options for us:

1. We can create an alternative culture ("Christian" everything).
2. We can fight against the culture.
3. We can ignore the fact that we live in a culture that at some points comes into conflict with the Kingdom of God.

Daniel showed us the way:

He UNDERSTOOD his culture.
He IDENTIFIED with his culture at every point he could, in every way that does not violate Gods values.
He allowed God to use him to TRANSFORM his culture.

The rest of the book of Daniel describes how that transformation took shape.

We can do the same thing in our own culture, because Jesus did those three things for us.

The key takeaway was this: all of us belong to some sort of subculture, some sort of "tribe".
Maybe it is motorcycle riders, or young moms, or football fans, or guys who like to work on cars.

You are not in that tribe by accident - God has placed you there so that lives can be transformed!

Where's the most urgent growth area for you - understanding your tribe, identifying with the people in it, or allowing God to use you - daring to risk what might come - to transform the lives of the people in your tribe?