In this message, Pastor Jeff tackles what he claims is actually the most important spiritual question of them all. Where do you get your spiritual authority? or What is your spiritual authority? To answer that question, we are pointed to the Bible and are taught the three key elements to trusting the authority of the Bible.

Speaker: Jeff Mikels :: Passage: Various

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The oldest spiritual question is the one that remains unanswered today. Though many good answers have been given, none are fully satisfying to us. This should tip us off that maybe the question itself is misguided. Perhaps, rather than putting God on trial for his management skills, we should address the Big Question behind this popular question. Pastor Jeff addresses the question we often ask by helping us see the question we need to ask.

Speaker: Jeff Mikels :: Passage: Various

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In this introductory message, Pastor Jeff opens the discussion of how to approach the big questions of life and faith. We see that even John the Baptist faced serious doubt, and we learn from his example that we need to bring our questions directly to Jesus and be ready to hear even a surprising answer from him.

Speaker: Jeff Mikels :: Passage: Matthew 11:1-15

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Next week, we begin our new series called “Big Questions” in which I tackle some of the largest questions of life… yours.

Seriously, for the next few weeks, we will be addressing YOUR questions about life, faith, family, anything. We’ll even have live question / answer sessions at the end of every Sunday lesson. You won’t want to miss it.

Last Sunday, we asked people to submit questions for consideration, and here are just a few of the ones that came in:

Questions from November 1, 2009

• I’ve been struggling to understand if it’s right for us to celebrate Halloween. The history of this holiday is in evilness and witchcraft and even pumpkins with faces cut in them and candles were originally rooted in keeping evil spirits away. How do we know that God is ok with us celebrating this even though we don’t celebrate it for the same reasons as in the past. Aren’t there places in the Old Testament or elsewhere that discuss the sins of nations by celebrating festivities aimlessly that were previously rooted in evil not God?

• When Jesus says “give to Caesar what is his, then give to God what is His” about tithing, doesn’t that give us a clue that the 10% we must tithe on is the amount after taxes are removed, not before?

• 2 Timothy 3:16 says all scripture is inspired by God. When Paul wrote this, what was defined as “Scripture” and to what extent was it “inspired?” Was he talking about the Old Testament or can we interpret this as the canonized Bible we have today? Since it is inspired by God (yet written by sinful, imperfect men) is the Bible completely error free? Can we interpret “inspired” as men transcribing God’s every word, or did God lead them to a topic, give them an outline and they prayerfully filled in the blanks?

• Why is it so hard to believe and live as if God truly loves me?

• Is it wrong to believe that I am special and important to God?

• Can Satan be saved?

• When we get to heaven, will we have NASCAR? (Just kidding!) but seriously, will we be married, have kids, have brothers, etc?

• What does the Bible teach about savings?

• What is the correct way to stand up for yourself without passing judgment?

• Which is better, to purchase quality at a high price or to get lower quality for a good price?

• How much caffeine could Pastor Jeff ingest before he started to act like Twitchy from the movie “Hoodwinked”?

• Why is it so hard to reach out to strangers and share about Jesus?

• We seem to always have debt. How do we get out and stay out of debt?

More questions are coming! To add your question, leave a comment here or visit http://myquestions.org and post your own.

The real dilemma God faces constantly is this: How do you bless people who are never satisfied? God could give us the universe and we’d still want more. No, in fact, the only way to truly bless us is to get us to willfully release our grip on something, and to choose to be limited. Is it possible that by giving our money away, we could know greater joy in what we have?

Speaker: Jeff Mikels :: Passage: Various

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