Life in Deep Ellum: Recent Episodes
Life in Deep Ellum
This week, Daniela Coats finishes our sermon series on Exodus. We've been exploring the themes of Exodus throughout the series, and Daniela focuses on redemption -- our collective physical redemption and our individual spiritual redemption.
This week, Marcell invites us to consider the ways that Exodus challenges our notion of sin as primarily individual in nature.
This week, Jamie Stanley (a former LIDE pastoral staff member!) joins us. In the first part of her sermon, she gives a beautiful history of LIDE -- its mission, its values, and what it meant to her personally over the years.
In the second half of her sermon, she helps us continue the Exodus series by focusing on the theme of justice. How does God's justice differ from our own?
This week marks our first in-person services since March 2020! Chris opens a new series on Exodus by introducing the book as a piece of literature that challenges our worldview.
You can find more information about upcoming services and events on our events page.
If you want to watch any live services, you can find those on our Facebook page.
On Palm Sunday, we are invited to read and reflect on Jesus' triumphal entry into the city of Jerusalem. The passage is found in Luke 19.
Today, Chris reflects on what we can learn about Jesus' view of the world on Palm Sunday. Jesus invites us to see that seeking power and control is not the way forward. Instead, we should trust that the world is ordered according to love.
Courtney Cleveland, traveler extraordinaire, invites us to reflect on the final section of Job. As God chastises Job's friends and Job's wealth is restored -- what might this mean for us as we walk through the wilderness? And can we come up with an answer to the questions 1) Is God just? and 2) Is the world ordered according to justice and fairness?
We take the story of Job and mix it into a bowl with the season of Lent, connecting Job's ancient experience of suffering with Jesus' trials in the desert. Let us bravely enter the wilderness together. This week, Marcell Steuernagal walks us through a difficult section of the book: God's response to Job and his friends. What is the invitation we find in Job as we enter into this Lenten season?
If you want to learn more about Job, we recommend these helpful videos from The Bible Project: Overview of Job and Job as Wisdom Literature.
We continue our wilderness exploration of the book of Job for Lent this week. Daniela Coats, a member of the LIDE faith community, walks us through Job's protests -- to his friends and to God -- as he reflects on the suffering he experienced. Daniela responds to the question, "What can suffering teach us?"
Today, we continue our Lenten series on Job. Jeremy Tillman, a member of the board at LIDE talks about how Job's friends treat him and speak to him through his suffering. What did they get wrong, and what did they get right?
During this Lenten season, the LIDE community will be engaging with and exploring the book of Job. Job can be challenging and difficult to understand, but helps us to grapple with the wilderness that we're invited into during Lent.
This week's service was a live Facebook discussion with the whole LIDE staff. First, the staff discuss Lent and why LIDE participates in the rhythm of the liturgical calendar. In the second half of the service, we dive into the prologue of Job: how it's structured, how strange it sounds to modern ears, and the questions we're invited to ask by the prologue. Those questions are 1) Is God really just? and 2) Is the world ordered according to justice and fairness?
Here are some helpful links if you're interested in a deeper dive on Job:
The Bible Project: The Book of Job (video)
The Bible Project: Overview of Job (video)
The Bible Project: Job Poster
On Ash Wednesday, many people choose to have the sign of the cross placed on their forehead with ashes. This is a symbol of our dying with Christ and looking toward Easter when we will celebrate the new life we experience in him.
The Lenten weeks leading up to Easter are a season for us to humble ourselves before the Lord and seek him. Whether you can be physically present or not, we encourage you to take time to turn your heart toward Easter.
Follow the service with this home guide. You may want to use your own version of ashes and also grab a cracker and some juice to fully participate with the service.
Music Credits
Service of the Word - Performed by Chris and Carrie Norwood
I Shall Not Want by Audrey Assad - Performed by Chris and Carrie Norwood
Gina ends our "Let There Be Connection" series with a reflection on how everything we've talked about so far -- excavation, inclusion, conflict, kindness -- all give us glimpses of what we're truly after. We're pursuing connection with God, with ourselves, and with others.
If you want to engage with some of the music and poetry that Gina mentioned in her sermon, see below:
Poem: "The Rumor" by Gina R.Song: "Anthem" by Leonard Cohen (Spotify link)
Today, Amy Nickell preaches in the Gathering for the FIRST TIME EVER! She continues our Let There Be Connection series with a simple call for all of us: "Kindness changes everything!"
Today's text comes from Luke 10:25-37
Chris continues the Let There Be Connection series with a focus on what happens when inclusion doesn't go quite as planned. How can we continue to see ourselves as the body of Christ -- one whole, many parts -- when we run into conflict?
Today's text comes from 1 Corinthians 12:12-26.
Today, we have a repeat prayer episode from Rachel. In this episode, Rachel helps walk us into a deeper awareness of how and where God is moving all the time.
On today's weekly podcast, we are featuring the community conversation that we premiered on Facebook on Wednesday, January 20th.
Initially, this conversation was meant to be a conversation surrounding current events (specifically the protests/riots on January 6th), and how we as a faith community ought to respond. The conversation evolved into a question of how we can continue to be authentically ourselves with one another in a faith community -- where we hold the values of diversity, unity, and faith in Jesus.
The conversation includes Loh-Sze Leung, Chad Thorpe, Chris Baca, Aarin Jones, Preston Fogle, and Marcell Steuernagel.
Something a little different this week, y'all! This week, Gina Morreale (LIDE Communications Director) spoke LIVE with Evan Strube and Daniela Coats, two longstanding members of LIDE. The conversation revolved around unity, and how we live with and love one another in the midst of diversity.
In today's prayer, Rachel invites us to listen to our bodies. What can they tell us? How can what they tell us lead us closer to the truth of who we are, and who God is?
Joel sits down with Chequan Lewis to talk about the difficulty of personal transformation and spiritual growth.
This conversation was recorded on Facebook Live after the January 12 sermon. Stick around at the end for a little easter egg!
In today's Digital Gathering, Chris talks about inclusion as the next logical step on the spiritual journey, once transformation has happened. Ultimately, God invites us into transformation so that we can begin to include those who are different from us -- and that inclusion brings further transformation.
Today's Scripture comes from Acts 10-11.
In today's guided prayer, Rachel helps us meditate on the spiritual path. So often, when we face hardship or difficulty, we can tend to view it as lonesome and individual.
Rachel reminds us today: "The spiritual path is not solitary. It always leads us deeper into community."
Following the events at the Capitol Building last week, we want to offer several conversations to help us work through how we ought to respond as people of faith and in the spirit "Umbrella Man."
For our first conversation, Chris talks with Hank Habicht. Hank is a member of the LIDE community, and has worked at several levels of politics over the course of his career. He has worked with the Department of Energy, in the Justice Department, and with a few different administrations. This gives him a unique perspective as both a person of faith and what it means to work in bipartisan environments.
This is an extended version of the conversation that we aired on last Sunday's Digital Gathering. Jump to 8:30 if you want to skip past the first part of the conversation that was in that service.
As we start a new year, LIDE is also starting a new series: "Let There Be Connection." In this series, we are attempting to address and provide a solution to the difficulties we faced as a community and society in 2020. LIDE holds a strong belief that the way forward is through personal connection -- with God, with one another, and with our communities.
In today's sermon, Joel reflects on Paul's personal, radical transformation in Scripture. Paul's own transformation provides a roadmap to spiritual growth and connection in our own lives.
Happy New Year friends! There are plenty of things we can hope for when we enter a new year: motivation to change, productivity, and so on.
Today, Rachel offers a chance for self-reflection, and a few minutes to help us remember that God works slowly.
Near the end of the prayer, she uses Pierre Teilhard de Chardin's "Prayer for Patient Trust." You can find a link to that prayer here. Feel free to print it out and put it in a place to remind you of God's slow, steady presence in our lives.
It's a new year! Chris reflects on what it might look like to cultivate the beautiful and the good in our lives, day in and day out, as we move forward in 2021.
"The Gandalf Option" isn't something I came up with on my own. I got it from an author named Alan Jacobs. You can read a post where he talks about the idea here.
- What a year, huh?
Today, Rachel leads us through a prayerful review of the year -- where we are encouraged to entertain the possibility that Jesus' loving presence has been with us all year long.
As a bonus, we have included a companion piece to this episode. You can find that companion piece and read along with the episode here.
We're continuing our interviews with our Community Partners -- finding out what drives them, how our missions overlap, and how we can continue to support the work they are doing.
Today, Joel interviews Lesley Snelson, who is the executive director at Muscle Memory Dance Theatre. LIDE has partnered with M2DT for many years, providing a space so that they can continue to contribute to the arts in Dallas.
Rachel ends our Advent prayer series with a meditation on the nativity scene from Luke 2, and a remembrance that God's loving presence is always with us.
Merry Xmas (ya filthy animals)!
Is Christ above culture? In culture? Opposed to culture? Joel tackles our obsession with turning everything into a battlefield for the culture wars in today's mini-episode.