Eph. 2:19-22 We are members of his household with Jesus as the chief cornerstone. In Him we are being built together. Gentiles and Jews become one: this is a mystery. Paul is creating a picture of what this looks like with Jesus as the cornerstone. We are all together a temple. This happens every time we are with believers: this is what is happening. This is fascinating and has requirements for this to happen. Jesus just doesn’t float around: Jesus became a man and deals with us within our physical bodies.
· We must talk together.
· When two people get together, creativity happens. We create things!
· We move around each other; ie: we had to move to even get here, to worship.
Part of being shaped (into a temple) is we talk, create, and move together. There is vulnerability to this. This creates a very good, beautiful vulnerability. Did you know that 90 percent of the world’s church have 70 or fewer people? These are millions of little temples all over the world.
BUT…it doesn’t work this way. SHAME is like the word “pornography.” You know it when you see it. You know shame when you feel it. “Now the man and his wife were both naked, but they felt no shame.” The Hebrew people could have said they felt joy or happiness…but instead, they said they felt NO SHAME. It’s a foreshadowing of what will rip us apart: SHAME.
Shame: Eric’s story of shame: it’s like playing b-ball in high school when the coach told me to tie my shoes but I didn’t. I once tripped over my shoelaces: this was exposure and I thought something was wrong with me. This is an example of shame. Another example: You lie and get caught…or children tell you your nose is really big like you are Jewish…Let’s understand what is happening physiologically when we are shamed:
When you are born, you want to know and be known. You want a safe place: Mom and Dad. You then want to explore. You come back to the safe place. At some point you try to head to something dangerous and your parents say NO. The nervous system freezes: You have an innate biological sense that is now confused: what is safe (parents) now feels unsafe. You fight or freeze: a shameful thing brings on this experience: frozen and/or can’t speak. Creativity won’t happen. Movement won’t happen. This is the weapon of the enemy and what he uses to destroy the beautiful construction of the world and the church. This shame will make life difficult. Shame makes a
The Village Church’s sermon podcast is more than just a weekly message. It is an invitation into the great and ongoing story of God’s work in the world. Pastors Eric, Mark, Susan, Daniel, and other leaders open the Scriptures not as a collection of abstract ideas but as the living, breathing witness to God’s kingdom breaking into our midst. Each episode is a call—not merely to listen, but to take part, to step forward into the life of faith with renewed vision and purpose.
Week by week, the pastors and leaders explore the deep rhythms of Christian discipleship—prayer, fasting, generosity—not as isolated duties but as part of a larger, richer, and more beautiful whole. They unpack these ancient practices in light of Jesus himself, the one in whom heaven and earth have come together. But they also turn their attention to the realities of everyday life—relationships, finances, the struggles and joys of being human—demonstrating how the gospel is not merely about what we believe but about how we live as God's renewed people in the present age.
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