Celebrate the Reformation

Reformation Day is Coming Up

On October 31, 1517, a German Monk named Martin Luther nailed a document calling for reform in the Catholic Church to the door of the local church in Wittenburg. What followed was a movement that has changed both the Church and the world to this day!

SOMETHING TRUE, NOT SOMETHING NEW

The triumph of the Reformation wasn’t the development of new doctrine that took the world by storm, but the rediscovery of the biblical gospel. It was the recovery of “the church’s true treasure,” as Luther said time and time again.

At Cross of Grace, we gladly locate ourselves downstream of the heritage and theology that flowed out of the Reformation. “Reformed Theology” is one of the 7 Shared Values that mark our family of churches. The story of the Reformation is important to us because it’s a story that helps us better understand ourselves. It points to the shoulders of the gospel-centered saints of old that we still stand upon today.

RESOURCES TO KEEP US REFORMING

You can find an excellent summary of what the Protestant Reformation was all about and why it remains relevant today in the article Does the Reformation Still Matter? by Stephen Nichols. In addition to this, below you will find a selection of resources that will immerse you in the story of the Reformation as you sing, watch, and listen to the events which have shaped our church and the world around us.

  • Sing

    • The Five Solas by Psallos puts the 5 summary slogans of the Reformation (Scripture Alone, Faith Alone, Grace Alone, Christ Alone, & God’s Glory Alone) to music and drives the truth of the gospel down into our hearts.

  • Watch

    • Luther: The Life and Legacy of the German Reformer - Available to stream for FREE. “Watch this documentary to discover the events God used in Martin Luther’s life that led him to rediscover the gospel of justification by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.“ You can also download Ligonier’s free accompanying study guide.

    • The Story of Martin Luther - a short, kid-friendly animated film surveying the life of Martin Luther.

  • Listen

    • Luther: In Real Time - There are 2 seasons to the podcast. It was first released 500 years after the events described, this podcast allows you to walk in Martin Luther’s footsteps from his heresy charges to his famous stand for the authority of God’s Word at the Diet of Worms.

We hope this list makes you grateful to God for his work in the past and also encourages you to keep the spirit of the Reformation alive as we seek to always be reforming our church and our lives according to God’s Word. Semper Reformanda!

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This Week at Cross of Grace

OCTOBER 8 - OCTOBER 14

Every Tuesday we publish a blog post to lay out in one place what’s going in the life of the church for the upcoming week. See below for a snapshot of what’s on the calendar this week:

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 10: FRENCH PARK RUN CLUB

  • 6:30am - French Park grass area

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 10: MEN’S MEETING

  • 7:00pm - Hopper & Burr (202 W Fourth St, Santa Ana 92701)

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 13: SUNDAY GATHERING AT THE EBELL CLUB

  • 10:00am - Meeting Room: Ballroom

MONDAY, OCTOBER 14: THE BRIDGE COURSE

  • 7:00pm - Hopper & Burr (202 W Fourth St, Santa Ana 92701)

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Celebrate the Ebell Club

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 16TH

Our meeting space is turning 100! Come out next week to celebrate this milestone and share in some Santa Ana history. Drop by for the open house event between 5:30pm and 7:30pm. Enjoy lite refreshments. Meet new neighbors. And give thanks that we get to gather in such a beautiful place!

Check out all the details here

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What a Time to Be Alive!

THE YEAR OF THE LORD’S FAVOR

What do you think of the times we’re living in? As we lookout on the landscape of a cultural moment where it feels harder than ever to be an ordinary Christian. Crushing inflation. Hurricanes sweeping the nation. Wars abroad. Another polarizing and divisive election season here at home. It’s not difficult to point out what’s broken all around us. Even more, it’s impossible to run away from or deny what’s broken within us. Are things going from bad to worse? Is the future not so bright? Contrary to how things might appear, Isaiah 61 comes to us to declare it’s actually a good time. Because in these moments where everything seems to be moving toward decline, the grace of God is never in decline. At bottom, the truest, realest, most fundamental thing about the year 2024 is that it is “the year of the Lord’s favor.” The time of God’s salvation spreading across the earth! Giving fresh starts to those captive to sin, growing his Kingdom through the mission of the Church, and cultivating his people into something beautiful.

LISTEN TO THE SERMON HERE

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An Opportunity to Share in God’s Goodness

SMALL GROUPS EVERY 1ST & 3RD FRIDAY AT 7 PM

Our small groups encourage genuine relationships within the church. Each group meets in a home, splitting their time between singing, praying, and discussion. All groups welcome guests. Outside of Sunday mornings, small groups are the most important moments in the life of our church. Make it a priority to attend one this Friday.

For more information about our small groups, click here.

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Call Sunday a Delight

ENJOYING THE LORD’S DAY

A couple Sundays ago, we were challenged to receive Isaiah’s charge to “call the Sabbath a delight and the holy day of the Lord honorable” and apply it to the Sunday Lord’s Day we experience every week (Is 58:13). To call Sundays “a delight” and see them as a gracious opportunity to rest our bodies and souls in God.

To help us do this, here’s 7 ways to get all that God intends for our Sundays. 7 commitments to embrace in order to best enjoy the Lord’s Day:

  1. Treat them as a day different from the other 6. Anticipate them. Plan for them. Prepare for them. Pray for the Lord to meet us as we gather. Read the sermon text in advance. Pick out your clothes the night before. Go to bed early on Saturdays. Do what you need to do on the other 6 days to get the most out of Sundays.

  2. Rest from your regular labors and work and chores. Taking 1 day out of 7 to stop, rest, and proclaim - to the weary soul within you and the watching world around you - that, “I am limited, but God is not. I am weak, my body grows tired, and I am utterly dependent on God for my existence. Yet, he is strong, he never tires, and he is utterly dependable to sustain me in body and soul. God’s got me. God’s got us. God’s got my family and he will provide for us! I don’t need to work right now, because God is always at work. I can take the day off, because my God never takes a day off from being a good Father to his children.” Practicing a pattern of rest designed to free up your hands, give your body a break, and relieve your mind and heart from doing or even thinking about work. It’ll still be there on Monday.

  3. Find your delight in God and his people on this special day. Psalm 16:2-3 says, “I say to the Lord, “You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.” As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones, in whom is all my delight.” More than anything else, we’re released from work for the purpose of corporate worship. Gathering with God’s people in order to share in who God is and all he’s done. Coming together to remember that God is our Creator and Sustainer (Gen 2:1-3) and confessing our utter dependence upon him. Assembling to celebrate his work of redemption which has brought rest to souls today (Mt 11:28-30; Deut 5:12-15) and guaranteed us a future of eternal rest for endless days (Heb 4:8-10). Every weekly Lord’s Day Sabbath looking forward to that final Sabbath when we’ll enter into the fullness of all that Christ has promised in the gospel and purchased upon the cross.

  4. Keep the Lord’s Day in response to grace. God does not command his people to observe this day (or give themselves to any other practices of worship, devotion, or spiritual disciplines) as some sort of means to earn his grace or stay on his good side. It’s meant to be kept because we have received grace! Don’t consider the command that “you shall not do any work” (Ex 20:10) to be legalistic and burdensomely binding - but an opportunity to receive God’s blessing. As one Puritan author says, the Lord’s Day is “the great means of the means” through which all the means of grace are made available to the people of God. A time to bask in the goodness of the gospel through singing, praying, hearing God’s word proclaimed, taking communion, witnessing baptisms, and serving one another in the power of the Spirit. We don’t deserve any of this, but Jesus Christ, “suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God” (1 Pet 3:18). So that, every Lord’s Day thereafter, we might draw near with the empty hands of faith to freshly feast upon his amazing grace.

  5. Turn away from pursuing your own agenda and give yourselves to God’s aims. Sunday is not a day for cramming in more work, getting ahead on the week, ‘resting’ by refraining from gathering with God’s people, sun-up to sun-down sports, or a blank check to do whatever you want all day (as long as it’s not work) signed off by God. He has far better to give us than these fleeting attempts to please ourselves: glad-hearted worship, serving his people, advancing the mission of our church, showing mercy to those in need, and enjoying sweet fellowship every step of the way. Give yourself to these things with the expectation that God will glorify himself, satisfy your soul, and shape you after the likeness of Christ through them.

  6. Perform what theologians call, “works of necessity” - as needed. Like medical staff going to work, first responders on the job, pastors serving the church, fixing a flat tire in order to get home, and the other stuff of life that is so urgent that it just can’t wait. The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath (Mk 2:27). So if there’s something exceptional that must be dealt with, God wants you to be relieved from any false guilt or fear that you’ve sinned against him or squandered his gift of rest.

  7. Pursue God-honoring recreation that flows downstream from your delighting in God. This means that while it would be perfectly good and right to have morning and evening church services, spend the afternoon in family worship, or set aside the day entirely for the pursuit of spiritual disciplines, there is a place for active and purposeful recreation as well. A pursuit of leisure guided by devoting this free time to that which reorients our hearts to God, refreshes our souls, and draws us deeper into appreciation of what he says is good, beautiful, and true in the wonderful world he’s made. Which means we can spend fun and sweet time together after church, picnic in the park, or grab lunch at 4th St. Play with our kids. Enjoy the beach. Go on a hike. Read a novel. Listen to an album that makes our heart soar and sing along in the kitchen. Host a big Sunday night feast with our family and neighbors. Have a gathering in our home, a game night with friends, and yes, even watch sports. Enjoying it all as the good gifts of God to us. Receiving them not as entitlements, not as ours to do with what we please, not as something we’ve deserved, but as blessings from God with a posture of thanksgiving. In such a way that our gaze is drawn up in gratitude toward the Giver. Allowing our appreciation of these things to be governed by the priority of adoring God as first in our hearts and rightly ordering our loves. Not skipping church to enjoy God in nature. Not pitting other events and activities against quality time with our families and fellowship with our brothers and sisters. Not hurriedly and frantically rushing through the day to be maximally productive at the expense of being present to enjoy all this. Not lazily, idly, and purposelessly vegging out, couch-potatoing it, and streaming the rest of our day away. Start the day in worship by freshly anchoring “yourself in a supreme, full, and expanding love for God” and “then” with the precious few hours that remain, “let your enjoyment of his gifts run wild” (Joe Rigney).

Cross of Grace Church, let’s work hard to rest in God, worship him wholeheartedly, and enjoy his gifts from week to week. 

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This Week at Cross of Grace

OCTOBER 1 - OCTOBER 7

Every Tuesday we publish a blog post to lay out in one place what’s going in the life of the church for the upcoming week. See below for a snapshot of what’s on the calendar this week:

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 3: FRENCH PARK RUN CLUB

  • 6:30am - French Park grass area

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 4: SMALL GROUPS

  • 7:00pm - Houlton, Roenicke, & Erkelens Home

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 6: SUNDAY GATHERING AT THE EBELL CLUB

  • 10:00am - Meeting Room: Ballroom

MONDAY, OCTOBER 7: THE BRIDGE COURSE

  • 7:00pm - Hopper & Burr (202 W Fourth St, Santa Ana 92701)

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What it Feels Like to be Spiritually Satisfied

TASTE AND SEE THAT THE LORD IS GOOD

On Sunday, we were joined by guest preacher, Eric Turbedsky from Sovereign Grace Church of Orange. He came to us with a story about how delicious bread is. Through the feeding of the 5,000 in John 6:1-15, we learned how hunger teaches us about what it’s like to be satisfied in Christ. We fervently try to stuff our souls and to fill that vacuum with anything that will make us feel full. But Jesus alone fulfills our deepest longing. If you don’t have him, you’ll starve. But if you do, you’ll feast upon the bread of abundant life.

LISTEN TO THE SERMON HERE

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Women's Meeting is Tonight

ALL LADIES, HIGH-SCHOOL AGED AND OLDER ARE INVITED

With the summer potlucks behind us, we are transitioning back to a discussion based format. Tonight the ladies of CGSA will meet to spur on each other’s walk with Christ as they gather around his word and pray for one another. We hope to see you there!

JOIN IN TONIGHT AT 7PM AT THE CUNNINGHAM HOME

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Children’s Ministry Training Day

ALL CHILDREN’S MINISTRY VOLUNTEERS REQUIRED TO ATTEND THIS SATURDAY AT 9:00AM

Our mission to spread the joy of Jesus to our Santa Ana neighbors includes our very nearest neighbors: the kids of Cross of Grace Church. Each week our Children’s Ministry Team comes alongside the parents of our church to show our kids that there’s nothing better than believing in Jesus and belonging to his people. To all these volunteers we say a big “THANK YOU!” and are eager to provide this upcoming training so that you can “excel still more” (1 Thess 4:10).

Whether you’ve been actively serving in Children’s Ministry or if you’ve just recently joined the team, please plan on arriving at the Livingwell Multipurpose Room by 9:00am. Pastor Jason will lead a time of equipping and encouraging and our CM Lead, Rebecca will be conducting a time of practical classroom training.

We’ll have coffee and refreshments. Childcare will be provided, please reach out to us to get the details.

PLEASE CONTACT LIZ WITH ANY QUESTIONS

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