The image to the right is a bust that is featured at the St. Louis Art Museum called St. John the Evangelist dated 1500 AD. I saw this image first a couple of years ago at the museum. The transcription talks about the artist wanting to portray his image of John looking upon the cross and the dead body of Jesus. Every angle on the sculpture is pointing down, giving it a very somber feel. If you look at this and study it, you begin to connect with what that moment must have meant to John. I see the passion of a man who loved Jesus deeply.
The elders of North Church want to cast a vision for that sort of passion for Jesus in 2011. This image is one of sorrow, but it is a deeply passionate sorrow. We are praying that 2011 will be a year that our church engages and chases hard after the person of Jesus and that doing so will result in a passion for Jesus similar to the one captured by this sculpture.
We want to encourage you to read through My Utmost for His Highest. This is a daily devotional. This link has each day's reading on it and is very user friendly. If you have never heard of the book or have gone through it before, we want to encourage you walk with us through it this year. We will be blogging consistently about it and encourage you to engage it and engage us as we walk through this together.
George MacDonald said, "Whatever a man does without God he must fail miserably, or succeed even more miserably.” In short our vision for 2011 is that we would pursue God with great vigor in 2011 and live this year with Him.
We have also found a free on line resource from The Gospel Coalition and D A Carson. The resource is a Bible reading plan and short companion commentary. Volume 1 goes along with a family reading plan and Volume 2 goes alone with a secret reading plan.
You will be hearing more about this vision on Sunday in the sermon. If you can't make it on Sunday be sure to listen to the podcast. You will also be seeing blog entries in the coming weeks as well. So we invite you to walk with us in 2011 as we seek to chase hard and passionately after Jesus.
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