Friday, February 16, 2007

Core Values

These are the core values that I put into my teachings. In everything that I teach, preach, promote, believe, and push for in the church have these 7 core values behind them. So here they are.

Hope-I believe, as Christians we should be the most hopeful group of people in the world. We follow the Life and Teachings of the one who said that he was the hope of the world. How can we be anyway else?

Love-Love is the core of the Trinity. Jesus became man because of Love. He said the core of the Torah (the Way) is, loving God and loving your neighbor. Loving God and loving our neighbors is the way we should order our lives.

Peace-At the core of the Bible is the concept of peace. In Hebrew the word is Shalom. Shalom means more than just a lack of war, but it means wholeness and oneness (with God, neighbors, and the world around us)

Purity-We are called to be pure. Sanctified. Set Apart. Jesus says, “be holy as I am holy.” As Christians we have for thousands of years that we can pure lives, that the Spirit can work in our lives and we can be pure.

Freedom-Sin at its core leads to bondage. It binds a person in its webs, literally creating slaves. Christians believe that Jesus, through his death on the cross and resurrection from the grave, is victorious over sin and death. By his stripes we are saved.

Unity-The church is one body. The Jesus says a body that is divided against itself cannot stand. We are one, instead of finding the endless ways we can divide ourselves; the church needs to be about finding the ways that we are one.

Mercy-Jesus talks endlessly in the Gospel accounts of being merciful and generous in the way that we live our lives. It is of the utmost importance that as Christians we live our lives with a sense of the mercy that God has shown to us, and how we have been blessed and in turn show the same mercy towards others.

These are my 7 core values. I understand that my brief definitions of each are but the tip of the iceberg and we could spend years talking, twisting, turning, and reflecting upon their full meanings.

May your lives be consumed with Hope, Love, Peace, Purity, Freedom, Unity, and Mercy.