Epiphany 04: "What Have You To Do With Us?"

Redemption Church KC Sermon Podcast

1. Early in the sermon, Tim talked about the power of naming and names. He also talked about a name’s power to connect, connote, create meaning, and conjure memory.
Think about your own experience of and relationship to naming and names. Have you ever named a person, pet, project, or something else? What did it feel like to have that responsibility/power? How did you go about choosing?
What about your own name? Or nicknames you’ve had? Do you have thoughts or feelings about not only the names themselves, but also those who bestowed them? Share with the group about different ways in which you see the dynamics Tim talked about showing up in your own experiences of naming and names.
2. In his sermon today, Tim talked about the way in which ancient Jews at the time of Mark’s gospel generally dealt with people & things that were unclean and out of sorts. They tended to isolate and exclude these people, and create distance between themselves and these situations. Tim also pointed out that we tend to do the same thing.
Where are places in your world that you may tend to try to isolate from, exclude, or simply avoid these types of challenging people and situations? How does that dynamic shift and change when the people & circumstances are closer-to-home or more distantly removed?
3. Tim preached about the fact that Jesus focused his rebukes and challenges on corrupted institutions and social codes, and when it came to personal failings, he simply offered grace. At the same time, he noted that many Christians today tend to do the exact opposite.
Why do you think that is? Where do you see that tendency in yourself? How much comfort and reassurance do you find in your sense of your own personal piety? How does that relate to the degree to which you feel a duty to challenge those same cultural institutions and codes that were present and are present in many (if not all) spheres? Does one feel more important? Does one feel more urgent?