Welcome to August, friends! Did you know that the month of August was named for the first Roman Emperor, Augustus Caesar (the one who followed Julius Caesar)? It is a word that means “consecrated, venerable, worshipful.” That has nothing to do with my article for this month, but always find it a fun fact to share!
Worship this month will focus around a theme (much like July did). Instead of being around a particular Biblical book, this month’s worship theme is focused around an idea: Live Your Life.
I hear the phrase often and see tee shirts, Facebook memes, and other social media influences that say things to the effect of, “Live your best life!” Or “10 Steps to Your Best Life.”
It got me to thinking: Do we ever stop and reflect on what it means to live our lives of faith? What does it mean to “do” faith and not simply claim the idea of it or some basic teachings or beliefs?
All this month we’re going to explore passages from I Kings and Ephesians that will help us to flesh out a bit more what it means for us, as people of faith, to live our lives of faith.
Here’s a bit of a preview:
August 4: “Live Your Life” (Ephesians 4:1-16). We’ve all been called to new life by God in baptism and given gifts to share God’s love and to work to build God’s beautiful ends. What are your gifts? How are you using them? (Worship Video – “Live Your Life”)
August 11: Joint Worship (Lesson learned here: Live your life in community!) (Worship Video)
August 18: “Live Your Life: Part 2” (I Kings 2:10-12, 3:3-14; Ephesians 5:15-20). Living our faith out loud in the world should cause us to pause, think, reflect and ask, “Am I representing Jesus Christ in the world? Or am I trying to show the world just how self-righteous I am?” (Worship Video – “Live Your Life: Part 2”)
August 25: “Live Your life: Part 3” (I Kings 8:1,6,10-22, 22-30, 41-43; Ephesians 6:10-20). Living a life of faith means carrying ourselves as little churches of God everywhere in the world. What does the worship inside of us look like? How does it get shown to the world? Do people know we’re Jesus followers because of our actions…or our Facebook status? (Worship Video – “Live Your Life: Part 3”)
Hopefully during this month (a venerable, holy, worshipful month) we will all find our gifts, how to use them, how to be Jesus people in the world and how to keep Christ’s kingdom first and ours last.
Happy August!