Prayer: Ever-present God, When I feel small and alone, remind me of your great love. When I feel tired, refresh me with hope. When I am angry or sad, breathe whispers of peace into my ears. Amen. (From the Sparkhouse Facebook page)
Reading: Romans 6:1b-11 (Click to read text) Stop and GROW: After reading the text, discuss/ponder the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's Book of Faith questions, which are part of Camp Mount Luther's GROW Time with campers. QUESTION 1: What scares, confuses, challenges, or doesn’t make sense to me in this text? QUESTION 2: What delights me in this text or is my favorite part of the story? QUESTION 3: What stories or memories does this text stir in me? QUESTION 4: What is God up to in this text? Reflection: This is a difficult passage to write about… (pause for a thoughtful silence). What I am confused about is how can I be dead to sin? Yet alive to God? I had to break out one of my old college books to get a grasp on this one – “Hard Sayings of the Bible” had a section about this passage, so I sighed in relief that I was not the only one perplexed by this saying. Even after reading more about this, being united with Christ aka Pauline mysticism, it was still a lot for my mind to digest. But here is what brought me hope: We are sanctified by God as we grow in our faith and live united with Christ. When we choose to live for Christ, we will still have days when we feel like sinning and we sin. But the amazing part is we can choose to live for Christ and his love shines above all! We are no longer slaves to sin. We can choose to turn towards Christ, and when we make this choice our life radiates Christ’s life and love. We are justified by our faith; God’s great grace displays his love for us and his desire for us to live a new life with him. We are dead to sin, it does not have the power to control our lives for eternity. We are alive to God, we will rise again with Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord. Thanks be to God. --Anne Harshbarger
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