When Jesus spoke of a narrow gate that leads to life yet few people find (and, alternatively, a wide gate that leads to destruction which many people find), he was resonating with the deeply human experience of how hard it is for any of us to live up to our higher values. Kyle suggests that Jesus meets us there, and offers lots of help if we want to more consistently live in accordance with our values.
Read MoreBeing driven by fear or anxiety is not a joyful way to live. And, even worse, it skews our sense of priority, or in Jesus’ words, we become so focused on trying to strain out a gnat that we swallow a camel. Kyle offers some suggestions from his experience on how following Jesus can be an antidote to fear and anxiety.
Read MoreVince shares about the unique impact friendships in a spiritual context have had on him. And various leaders in the church share about ways Brown Line Vineyard can help you connect with other people in spiritual community this fall.
Read MoreEven though he didn’t grow up spiritual, Vince found himself experiencing faith in a powerful way as he reached college age. But he slowly started to feel like a cultural outsider in churches. That led to some tension… until he discovered a new way to think about faith.
Read MoreWhat do you expect from God if you pray? Jesus’ take is that of course you should expect good gifts. Vince leads us in reflecting on what can make this hard for some of us to operate with this foundational assumption, and on the unique role fathers have in helping us form this foundation.
Read MoreLove is such a different way to respond to failure than demanding retribution (demanding "someone else must suffer because I suffered"). Vince shares about his experience of being loved by friends and by God in the midst of failure, and how that opened him up to be transformed by failure, and not shut down by it.
Read MoreWhat is our assumed picture of God? Powerful? Glorious? Up in the clouds? With a quiver of lightning bolts? The picture of God that Jesus shows humanity is an inversion of this. What should our assumed picture of God be? One who lays down power to benefit others. That’s particularly hard for Americans to digest, but when we try, it can change us profoundly.
Read MoreThe question of whether you’re “going to heaven” or “going to hell” just isn’t a helpful thing to build one’s faith on. Also, it’s not actually in the teachings of Jesus, or anywhere in the Bible — despite the fact that so many people (both inside and outside of churches) assume it to be.
Read MoreHear about the various ways Brown Line Vineyard can help you connect with other people this winter. From an every other Thursday drinks night to a book study on how to raise children in racially unjust America, we’ve got lots of options…
Read MoreThe American Religious Right’s conflation of faith and partisan politics has been bad for the country and for faith... But, while Vince used to feel the best response to that was to strive to pursue an politically neutral faith (“both sides are equally bad/good when it comes to the model of Jesus”), he now feels that to be just as unsatisfactory... so what now?
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