Spring City Fellowship
260315Sunday
Sunday March 15, 2026 10:15AM Service

      • Psalm 150:3NIV2011

  • In Him We Live
  • We Bring The Sacrifice Of Praise
  • Somebody Say Amen
  • Worship The King
  • Here For You
  • You're Worthy Of My Praise
  • Be Unto Your Name
  • Jesus Paid It All
  • Living Hope

      • Colossians 3:15NIV2011

  • Our Theme for 2026 is “Embrace Transformation”.
    Transformation is the inward change that we experience when we become more like Jesus.
    Romans 12:2 ESV
    2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
    Transformation is a process that is ongoing throughout our lives.
    The last two months I have been reviewing the 4R’s which describe who we are and what we are about.
    Our vision at SCF is to “Encounter God’s Transforming Love.”
    How do we do that? (Four R’s)
    Respond
    Restore
    Release
    Relate
    Then I asked, “What if there was a 5th R? What would that be?”
    It would be revival - that’s what we all hope and pray for!
    But we also said that revival is a sovereign move of God - you can’t just make it happen!
    I also alluded to a strategy that is even better and more important than revival.
    It’s the strategy of making disciples.
    I have one last message on the subject of transformation before Karie and I are headed out on a ministry trip for a few weeks.
    I want to be able to sum things up - put a nice bow on it.
    When we are talking about transformation - that is really just another word for change.
    We know we have to change.
    We have talked about the process of change - the 4 R’s.
    We have talked about two different strategies for what that process can look like.
    There is the revival strategy where God miraculously shows up and transformation just happens.
    Or there is the discipleship strategy where we methodically work transformation into our lives, families and relationships over time.
    I think something is still missing.
    What is the goal of all of this - what is the goal of transformation?
    The four “r’s are not a goal - they are a process - working toward a goal.
    Revival is not the goal - it is the means to another bigger goal.
    Discipleship is not the goal - it is also the means to a goal.
    Does anyone like putting jigsaw puzzles together? I good puzzle can be both relaxing and a great mental challenge at the same time. You start out by sorting pieces according to their shape - I do edge pieces first. And according to their dominant color.
    The most important part of a puzzle is the picture on the front of the box. If you don’t have the picture - you don’t know how to sort the colors. You can’t tell if a blue piece is water or sky. You can’t tell if a multicolored piece depicts fall leaves or a stone wall.
    The pic picture puts everything into perspective and helps you put the pieces in their place.
    What is the big picture when it comes to your life, the gospel of Jesus Christ, and our place as members of a church fellowship?
    Why should we embrace transformation?
    Where is all of this change headed?
    In 1647 The Westminster Shorter Catechism was published as a primer for Christian Instruction utilizing the, then popular, question and answer format. The very first question calls the students attention to the big picture - the meaning of life.
    The question: What is the chief end of man? - In other words - what is the goal of humanity? What is the reason we are here?
    The answer: Man’s chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever!
    I don’t think there has every been a better, more concise summary of the goal of transformation and the meaning of life.
    Our lives are meant to glorify God and to reflect His goodness.
    That’s the goal!
    2 Peter 3:18 ESV
    18 But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.
    Now that you have the picture, lets sort out some of the pieces.
    What does it mean to grow in grace?
    What is the significance of knowing Jesus as Lord and Savior?
    And what does it look like to glorify God with our lives?

    Growing in Grace

    Grace is one of those words that we mostly use in church and is often misunderstood.
    In the context of the church the most popular definition of grace is “unmerited favor”
    Ephesians 2:8–9 ESV
    8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
    We are reminded that God saved us because of His goodness - not because of ours.
    In that sense - grace takes on a meaning similar to mercy.
    Grace means we get what we don’t deserve - God’s favor.
    But that definition of grace, alone, by itself, misses something important.
    God’s favor - God has favor toward us!
    We were so busy bemoaning the fact that we don’t deserve it that we miss what God is giving us -His good grace!

    God is good!

    Genesis 1:31 NLT
    31 Then God looked over all he had made, and he saw that it was very good! And evening passed and morning came, marking the sixth day.
    There are a lot of creation stories in ancient literature.
    The thing that sets the Biblical narrative apart is the goodness of God.
    In contrast to pagan gods who are immoral and violent and a creation which seems to be more of an accident than intentional.
    YHWH, the God of the Bible created a world of beauty out of chaos.
    He intricately designed every aspect of creation with intricate patterns and order.
    And humanity is the crowning glory of His creation, reflecting some of the attributes of God Himself.
    Genesis 1:27 CEV
    27 So God created humans to be like himself; he made men and women.
    God making man in His image is not just about attributes, but carries a sense of responsibility to represent God on the earth.
    God tells them to multiply and fill the earth with His goodness.
    That was before the fall, but God’s intention for mankind has not changed.
    He still wants us to fill the earth with His goodness.
    There are a lot of direction that I could go with this, but I want to just pause and remind us that God is good! - It’s all about His goodness.
    This world is a crazy, chaotic and sometimes evil place - but God made it good.
    Life is hard, often painful and confusing - but God blessed it and gives it purpose.
    Sometimes it is hard to see anything good at all - all of our time and attention is spent dealing with problems and going from one crisis to another.
    But that is not the goal - it’s just the opposite of what God intended.
    And it can so easily become a distraction.
    Life is good, because it is a gift from God and God is good!
    We need to remind ourselves of this fact.
    And why is this so important?
    Because we were made to represent God in the world and to multiply His goodness.
    To glorify him - to use the language of the catechism.
    To reflect His beauty, design and radiance.
    And how do we do that?

    Become more like Christ.

    Colossians 1:19–20 TPT
    19 For God is satisfied to have all his fullness dwelling in Christ. 20 And by the blood of his cross, everything in heaven and earth is brought back to himself—back to its original intent, restored to innocence again!
    Without Christ, we lose sight of grace - we have no complete picture of God’s goodness.
    We are left trying to assemble a puzzle without a complete picture of what it is supposed to look like.
    Jesus is the picture that helps us sort out the pieces of our life.
    They go together in a way that looks like Christ.
    Does that mean we should be walking around in first-century robes with beards?
    No, not literally - just as the idea of image is not about appearance but about attributes and representation.
    The Bible uses appearance or clothing as a metaphor - a way of describing the resemblance to Christ.
    Colossians 3:12–14 NLT
    12 Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. 13 Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others. 14 Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds us all together in perfect harmony.
    So what do you think? Do you look anything like Jesus?
    Becoming more like Jesus means becoming more like the person God created you to be.
    God created you to be good - just like Him.
    Whatever is good about you - that is part that reflects God’s image.
    Whatever is not good - that is the sinful human nature - and we all have it.
    Remember the instruction is to “grow in grace”.
    We are not all there yet - we are growing.
    Some of us are still sorting out the pieces.
    Some of us have put enough pieces together that we have sections that look like to original design.
    We also have sections that we are still working on.
    It’s ok - or we can be ok - if we are more focused on God and His grace than we are on ourselves.
    Let’s take another look at that picture...

    Knowing Jesus as Lord

    So we grow, first in grace, but also in the knowledge of Jesus as Lord and Savior.
    The central question of Christianity is “Who is Jesus Christ?”
    How you answer that question determines the course of your life and also the hereafter.
    If Jesus is God come to earth to reveal Himself and to save us.
    Then He is also the picture that tells us what the puzzle is supposed to look like.
    Knowing Jesus means studying the picture to see how the pieces of our life fit with what we see in Him.
    There are primarily two descriptions given to Jesus that will help us to sort things out.
    We know Him as Savior and as Lord.
    Let’s start with Savior, since that is where most of us begin in our understanding of Jesus.

    Jesus saves!

    Romans 10:9 NLT
    9 If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
    If you are reading these verses as a first century Jew or as the original recipient of Paul’s letter, this passage would sound almost poetic.
    The name Jesus literally means “YHWH saves.”
    The name itself is extremely common with multiple examples in the Old Testament.
    It’s the same as Joshua who led Israel into the promised land.
    It’s the same as Joshua the High priest of the community who returned from exile.
    The name is also found as a description which in retrospect also applies to a person:
    Exodus 15:2 CSB
    2 The Lord is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation. This is my God, and I will praise him, my father’s God, and I will exalt him.
    This is just one of a number of examples where Jewish believers, after Jesus’ death and resurrection would have read their scripture and noticed that what they though was simply a description, was also His name.
    As the Jewish scriptures were studied and compiled, a process which ramped up significantly during the years of exile in Babylon, the expectation of a Jewish Messiah - Anointed One - stood out prominently.
    Over the years of silence and through one military occupation after another, the anticipation of the promise that God would send a deliverer grew into a fervor.
    The only problem was that they misinterpreted the problem - they thought God was going to save them from their oppressors.
    No one seemed to realize that God was saving humanity from themselves.
    The real problem is sin - our sinful human nature.
    The real problem is that in the absence of a true picture of God - we create our own picture of who we think God should be.
    The real problem is that we make God out to be someone like us, instead of becoming like Him.
    Yes, Jesus saves, but in more ways than we usually recognize.
    Yes, Jesus paid the penalty for our sin, making a way for us to come back to God.
    But it was more than that, because we didn’t even know what or who God was and is.
    Even today, many of us resisted coming to God because we though God was harsh, angry or distant.
    We project human attributes on to God instead of taking His attributes upon ourselves.
    God loves us! - But without a proper understanding of God, we don’t even know what love is.
    Jesus save us!
    Until He reveals the Father to us, we don’t even know what want or need.
    Without Jesus as the goal, the focal point of transformation, we might be inclined to embrace a wrong idea about God.
    Thank God - He saved us by giving us Jesus as a clear picture of Himself!
    So what to we do with this knowledge?
    We orient ourselves and our lives around what we know about Jesus.
    He is the image, the model of what we are becoming and who God made us to be.
    That is why the Bible put Jesus Christ at the center of everything.
    And that is what we mean when we say… Jesus is Lord!

    Jesus is Lord!

    Philippians 2:10–11 TPT
    10 The authority of the name of Jesus causes every knee to bow in reverence! Everything and everyone will one day submit to this name—in the heavenly realm, in the earthly realm, and in the demonic realm. 11 And every tongue will proclaim in every language: “Jesus Christ is Lord Yahweh,” bringing glory and honor to God, his Father!
    Jesus not only saves humanity - He brings heaven and earth together.
    He becomes that standard bearer, not only for a transformed humanity but for a restored universe.
    I don’t know if it’s just me and my news feed, but I am seeing a lot or reports lately that we may not be alone in the universe. There are reports that the government is beginning to declassify information about alien encounters. Some are even saying that aliens have already infiltrated world government organizations and influenced leaders. Of course, it could just be click bait...
    But actually, it is not so different from what the Bible already tells us.
    We know that there are other being in the universe - angels and demons are two broad categories.
    We know that there are forces at work in the world working behind the scenes in defiance of God.
    The Bible even calls them rulers, implying that they are the influences behind those who wield power.
    Ephesians 6:12 ESV
    12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
    What we also can know from the scripture is that Jesus came, not only to save us from a corrupt humanity, but to restore order and authority in the universe.
    That is why it is so important that Jesus in not just our Savior, but our Lord as well.
    Without Jesus in His rightful place as the picture of what we are becoming, we might unsuspectingly align ourselves with other forces that are contrary to God’s good creation.
    There are those who identify with Christ, but who are not obedient to Christ - a position that is ultimately destructive.
    The goal is clear - Jesus is Lord - we are becoming like Him.
    He is the image of all powerful God - but not in a way that obliterates everything in its path.
    Jesus shows us a God who is so in control that He lays His life down and serves those He came to save.
    I can follow a man like that!
    I can serve a God like that.
    It’s not going to be easy, but I think, with God’ help, I can even become like Him in that.
    At least, that’s my goal...

    Glorifying God

    If you ask me what I want more than anything in life, I would say that the purpose of my life is to glorify God.
    I think many mature believers would say the same.
    It may be the Westminster Confession, but that is what we are taught
    and that is what many of us strive for.
    But what does it mean?
    Is there any other context where we use that kind of language?
    Do we glorify our favorite sports team?
    No, but we make a pretty big deal about them.
    We root for them, cheer them on.
    We take their wins and losses personally as if we were playing the game with them.
    Do we glorify art or music?
    We enjoy it, sometimes to the point of obsession.
    We imitate it with our own sense of style and personal choices.
    Certain artists and musicians have cultivated a brand which also represents a lifestyle.
    Glorifying God speaks to the same kind of worship toward God that people do when they idolize elements in our culture.
    You are participating in something bigger than yourself, like a sports fan following a team.
    You are taking on something you admire as part of your identity, like we do with artists or celebrities.
    The difference is that those things and those people have no real claim to us.
    God created us, redeemed us and restores us- that is the reason we glorify Him.

    Reflect God’s brightness.

    The word glorify literally means to shine brightly.
    We are generally attracted to shiny things.
    That’s why we wear jewelry.
    Everybody likes a little “bling!”
    And for some people, that is their obsession - what defines them.
    We were made to reflect the beauty of God.
    Literally, to shine as a representation of His brightness.
    Philippians 2:14–15 NLT
    14 Do everything without complaining and arguing, 15 so that no one can criticize you. Live clean, innocent lives as children of God, shining like bright lights in a world full of crooked and perverse people.
    Do you se the contrast?
    Clean, innocent, shining like lights.
    That is the beauty of humanity as God originally created it to be.
    Against a backdrop of warped and twisted motives.
    A people who are never satisfied and always in conflict.
    Somehow, God expects us to rise above all of that.
    Yes the world can be a dark and gloomy place.
    There is negativity all around us - life is hard- I get it.
    But we are supposed to shine in contrast to all of that.
    God is good.
    And someone who is focused on God can reflect that goodness.
    Even when everything around them is not.
    They are followers of Jesus Christ.
    They look to Him.
    They are locked in on Him.
    They imitate Him.
    That is how we also shine like Him.
    God is invisible to most of the world.
    Except for those who have seen Him.
    Once you see His glory, it’s hard to miss.
    And most people will only see Him when they see Him reflected in you and me.

    Reveal God’s character.

    God created the world good and He wants us to become who He originally created us to be.
    Except we don’t know what that is - or who He is.
    Until His righteous and holy character was revealed in Jesus Christ.
    And now is revealed in us....
    2 Corinthians 5:21 LBP
    21 For God took the sinless Christ and poured into him our sins. Then, in exchange, he poured God’s goodness into us!
    Most of the people that you will meet have a totally wrong picture of God.
    They are sitting there holding the pieces of their broken lives.
    They are trying to put the puzzle together, but they have the wrong picture.
    The box is missing - they are trying to make themselves look like whatever they admire.
    They have no idea who they were created to be.
    Maybe they have heard about Jesus or God - but whatever picture they have in their minds is not the real picture, and it is nothing they will ever resemble.
    ...if it’s even something they would want to emulate.
    They might embrace transformation if they even knew what that meant.
    People change all the time, but they usually change to try not to be something.
    If they knew what the goal was, they might make a change for the better.
    The goal is holiness, purity, the goodness of God.
    You can tell them about Jesus - He’s the picture of wholeness - the completed puzzle.
    But that may be too abstract for some people.
    They need to see Jesus in you.
    Let them see your incomplete puzzle; the parts that you have figured out.
    And they may just get a vision for who they can become.
    They may begin to recognize who God really is when they see His character in you.

    Questions for reflection:

    How are you growing in grace? What do you focus on that reminds you of the goodness of God? How to you reflect His goodness and beauty?
    Is Jesus Christ your Savior and Lord? Do ever stop to consider what that really means? What do you do with that knowledge? How do you orient your life around Jesus as the center?
    Would you say that the purpose of your life is to glorify God? How do you do that? Do you have a vision for who God created you to be? Is enjoying Him forever part of that vision?

      • Romans 12:2NIV2011

      • 2 Peter 3:18NIV2011

      • Ephesians 2:8–9NIV2011

      • Genesis 1:31NIV2011

      • Genesis 1:27NIV2011

      • Colossians 1:19–20NIV2011

      • Colossians 3:12–14NIV2011

      • Romans 10:9NIV2011

      • Exodus 15:2NIV2011

      • Philippians 2:10–11NIV2011

      • Ephesians 6:12NIV2011

      • Philippians 2:14–15NIV2011

      • 2 Corinthians 5:21NIV2011

  • My Jesus I Love Thee
Spring City Fellowship
office@springcityfellowship.com
(610) 948-5250
https://springcityfellowship.com
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