This Sunday, February 23 (9am, 10:45am), we will have a special Sunday with Walt Heyer and Dr. Jennifer Bauwens on the topic of Embracing God's Design.
This week we will explore Genesis 17:1-27, Names According to God.
What is your name? How did you get it? What does it mean?
We all have names...and stories behind our names. Sometimes we like them, sometimes we don't.
In Genesis 17, God changes Abram and Sarai's names. Linguistically it is not a big change. Abram and Abraham are pretty close in meaning, so are Sarai and Sarah. But there is a world of difference in the significance.
Abram and Sarai are names given to them by their earthly fathers.
Abraham and Sarah are names given to them by their heavenly Father.
God declares to them their identity and their destiny.
The Abrahamic Covenant assures Abraham and Sarah that despite their failures and mistakes, God's faithfulness and love remain the same. God will bless them. He will multiply their descendants. He will give them the land. He will be their God for all generations.
As a sign of the covenant, God calls Abraham and all males in his household to be circumcised.
That seems like a strange sign of the covenant?! The rainbow seems a lot better
But God has meaning in this act. It is the dedication of the most intimate part of myself to Him. It is a picture of the cutting away of the flesh and the need for a new heart.
There's a lot to cover in Genesis 17! But, praise God, we also learn in this chapter that He is El Shaddai. He is all-sufficient and all-powerful. He is more than enough!
And we will celebrate communion together as a reminder that we are part of His New Covenant with us!
May we come to a deeper understanding of who we are in Christ and may we know our true name in Him!

This week we will explore Genesis 16:1-16, Failure According to God.
Have you ever failed?
Or perhaps a more important question...
Have you ever felt like a failure?
Deep down we all want life to work. We want to succeed in our plans. We want to feel secure, to be significant, to fulfill God's purpose for us.
But life often doesn't happen that way. Disappointments, discouragement, doubts, mistakes, fears, sorrows, confusion, conflict, loss of control...all have a way of confronting us with our own weakness and sense of failure.
Genesis 16 records the low point in the faith of Abram and Sarai.
They are tired. They are broken. They are confused.
Life is not shaping up the way that they expected. And God's promises seem like a carrot on a stick... always just out of their reach.
In their pain, Sarai decides to take matters into her own hands...while Abram grows increasingly passive and takes a backseat.
A young Egyptian servant by the name of Hagar is stuck in the middle.
In trying to fix a problem, Abram and Sarai create a mess.
Yet, even in their failures, God's faithfulness remains the same.
He is the God who sees.
He sees our deepest sorrows and failures and loves us still the same.
May God minister to the depths of our hearts like only He can do. And may we come to a deeper and deeper understanding of His incomprehensible compassion and grace!

🌍 This Sunday’s featured speaker for The Great Commission 101 is Abram Ebersohn! He will be teaching “How to become a World Christian.” 🌍

Abram is married to his wife, Helen, and is a proud father of three. He currently serves as the Sending Director at The Chapel. He is currently pursuing his Master’s degree at Dallas Theological Seminary and is a graduate of Radius International, a program focused on cross-cultural missions training. Before his role at the Chapel, he and his wife served as missionaries in China for two years with Global Serve International.

This week we will explore Genesis 14:1-24, Courage According to God.
Abram was a man of peace.
In chapter 13, Abram took the initiative to live at peace with Lot. He acted in humility and grace to resolve their conflict.
But in chapter 14, Abram takes up arms and rescues Lot from his captivity to a group of invading kings from the east.
Abram was a man of peace prepared for battle.
There is much that we can learn from Genesis 14. On the surface, it may seem like a strange chapter but it highlights the historical reality of Scripture, places Abram in the middle of a world conflict, and shows how a person of faith is to live in the midst of a dangerous world.
Genesis 14 also introduces us to one of the most mysterious figures in all of Scripture -- Melchizedek. Who is this man? Where did he come from? And what is his significance in this story?
We will explore all of this on Sunday... and celebrate communion together as fellow partakers of God's grace!
May the God of peace and strength give us wisdom and courage to face the challenges of our day!

🌍 We are excited to have John LaRavia this Sunday teach on “Where Christ is Not Named: The Remaining Task of World Evangelization” for The Great Commission 101! 🌍
John has been married to his wife, Katie, for nearly 18 years, and they have two children. In 2009, The Chapel sent them to plant churches in East Asia. They believed college students were the key to seeing gospel movements spread from the campus to the unreached peoples of East Asia and beyond.
John and Katie helped start Campus2Campus, an organization focused on church planting in global university cities around the world! John serves as the director of C2C while Katie works as the Member Care Director.

This week we will explore Genesis 13:1-18, Peacemaking According to God.
Conflict is a reality in all of our lives.
As much as we may want peace, we can often find ourselves struggling with tension, frustration, disagreements, disappointments, and arguments with others.

This Sunday’s featured speaker for The Great Commission 101 is Shane Folks! He will be teaching “The Unstoppable Advance: A History of Global Missions.”

Shane Folks earned his PhD in World Religions from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, where his doctoral research examined the Islamic view of the Apostle Paul. He also holds an MA in Muslim Studies from Columbia International University and an M.Div. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary.

With over fifteen years of ministry experience, Shane has served as a musical worship leader, pastor, adjunct professor, and Christian K-12 educator. He has taught courses on missions, evangelism, and world religions around the world.

Shane currently works for LSU Online and worships with Christ Covenant Church in Baton Rouge. Above all, he is a devoted husband to his wife, Hannah, and a loving father to their daughter, Addie, with another child on the way in April.

This week we will begin our journey through the life of Abraham with a look at Genesis 12:1-20, Blessing According to God.

Genesis 12 is one of the key chapters in the Bible. In this chapter, God calls Abraham to leave his country and his family and to follow Him. He promises to bless him and to make his name great. And He promises to bring blessing to all the families of the earth through him.

ALL the families of the earth.

Every nation.

Every person.

Blessed through the seed of Abraham.

This is the foundational promise of the Abrahamic Covenant.

This is the redemptive promise of the coming Messiah.

This is the unconditional promise of God's grace.

As we study Genesis 12, we will see Abraham's obedience to God's call. We will see his great faith and his heart-felt worship of God. And we will also see his short-sighted failures and fear-driven mistakes.

But through it all, God's grace remains consistent and abundant.

And His promises are sure.

May we rejoice in the super-abundant grace of God and remember His great promises to us in Jesus Christ!