REFOCUS | Jesus Changes Everything | Jan 7, 2024 | Erik Lindeen

Pastor Erik Lindeen discusses the paradox of Jesus's divinity being sometimes perplexing yet he urges followers to keep faith even when faced with such dilemmas. His sermon revolves around the story of Jesus’s childhood when he stayed back in Jerusalem, at twelve, detailed in Luke 2:41-52. Pastor Erik insists that despite it seeming like an odd story from Jesus's life, it holds immense importance as a precursor to the full Gospel story.

The underlining message of the sermon is that following Jesus requires faith and conviction, as the journey is often marked with complexities and challenges. To illustrate this, he recounted the life of Elizabeth Elliot, who held onto her faith, even when her husband was slain by a remote tribe. He further emphasized that a believer’s journey is more about growth and progress rather than perfection. In this context, he implored followers to extend grace to themselves.

Wrapping up the sermon, Pastor Lindeen recommends three key practices: growth in wisdom, achieved through reading the Bible daily, journaling, listening to erudite Bible preachers, and watching bible-centered videos; growth in maturity, by fostering robust community ties with other believers; and growth in grace, by undertaking activities that test one's boundaries. To implement a strong spiritual commitment to growth, he introduced an initiative of 40 days of deliberate prayer, urging followers to pray every day at 02:52 PM as a routine reminder. The sermon ends reiterating the need to refocus, foster wisdom, maturity, and grace to truly align with Jesus's teachings.