Christianity being influenced by culture more than Christ is not a new thing. However, there is something slightly new that is happening. If you have been feeling that our culture is rapidly changing in some unique ways, you are right. We are living in a time of unprecedented deconstruction. In face of this temptation and moment, the invitation of Jesus remains the same, “follow Me”. With our doubts, insecurities, and questions, we resist the urge to settle in deconstruction and walk into a deeper faith, a reconstructed faith. “Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.” -Romans 12:2 (NLT) - Ethos is a life-giving community committed to keeping Jesus at its Center. Our vision is to be with Jesus, become like Jesus, and do what Jesus did so that we may love all people in Jesus' name. EthosOH.com Small Groups: EthosOH.com/Community ServeColumbus.org

Chances are that you or someone close to you is struggling with doubt. The reasons are plentiful. Maybe you experienced a sudden loss. Perhaps your views have changed socially or politically and that is reshaping how you understand the Bible, and now you cannot read it without noticing everything that offends you. Maybe you were hurt by the church or by someone you looked to as a spiritual mentor. You immersed yourself in science and now you are filled with piercing questions about its relationship to faith. Perhaps you have grown disillusioned after years of prayers that have been answered with silence. The list could go on and on. At this point, you are typically given two options concerning doubt; 1. Demonize Doubt – in this narrative doubt is labeled as the nemesis to faith. Or, 2. Idolize Doubt – in this narrative it feels so progressive and kind of cool to ridicule what you used to believe and then you wake up to find that you do not believe anything anymore. But there is a third option; 3. An opportunity for authentic and vibrant faith. That is what we are leaning into here. “Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.” -Romans 12:2 (NLT) - Ethos is a life-giving community committed to keeping Jesus at its Center. Our vision is to be with Jesus, become like Jesus, and do what Jesus did so that we may love all people in Jesus' name. EthosOH.com Small Groups: EthosOH.com/Community ServeColumbus.org

“At the heart of all the confusion about the Bible is a misunderstanding of what the Bible actually is and how it is unlike most any other book you will read.” - Dan Kimball “How Not to Read the Bible” As we continue our series on following Jesus in a post-Christian world, we need to understand the Bible. For many of us, the very thing that is meant to strengthen our faith, the Bible, has become a deterrent to understanding faith. However, it doesn’t have to be that way. “Then Jesus took them through the writings of Moses and all the prophets, explaining from tall the Scriptures the things concerning himself.” -Luke 24:27 (NLT) - Ethos is a life-giving community committed to keeping Jesus at its Center. Our vision is to be with Jesus, become like Jesus, and do what Jesus did so that we may love all people in Jesus' name. EthosOH.com Small Groups: EthosOH.com/Community ServeColumbus.org

As Christians, we often treat science like the awkward relative at a holiday dinner; it’s easier to ignore than it is to engage. But ignorance is a poor apologetic. Atheists treat faith as the enemy to science and Christians often treat science as the enemy of faith. However, faith and the Bible are not at war with science. Science tells us what the world is like, and Christianity tells us what the world means. We must deconstruct the myth that science and faith are at war. Almost every criticism that comes up; whether the Bible teaches the Earth is 6,000 years old or how to make sense of the earth being created on day one and the sun on day four, is a question the Bible was never trying to answer. “For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities – his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God.” -Romans 1:20 (NLT)- Ethos is a life-giving community committed to keeping Jesus at its Center. Our vision is to be with Jesus, become like Jesus, and do what Jesus did so that we may love all people in Jesus' name. EthosOH.com Small Groups: EthosOH.com/Community ServeColumbus.org

Ethos is a life-giving community committed to keeping Jesus at its Center. Our vision is to be with Jesus, become like Jesus, and do what Jesus did so that we may love all people in Jesus' name. EthosOH.com Small Groups: EthosOH.com/Community ServeColumbus.org

Jesus could have come as many different things; a priest, a revolutionary, maybe a general or emperor but He came as a rabbi, a teacher … a truth teller. Why? He knew that the war He was fighting was not in the world, but in our minds, a war on truth. John 8:31-32 records that, “Jesus said to the people who believed in him, “You are truly my disciples if you remain faithful to my teachings. And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” As He is teaching about truth, He was simultaneously saying that we are enslaved to false ideas of freedom by looking for truth in the wrong places. We’re in bondage to the tyranny of lies that hold our soul’s captive to suffering and pain. Jesus has come to set us free with the weapon of truth. And God’s concept of freedom always occurs within obedience to God’s ways. Ethos is a life-giving community committed to keeping Jesus at its Center. Our vision is to be with Jesus, become like Jesus, and do what Jesus did so that we may love all people in Jesus' name. EthosOH.com Small Groups: EthosOH.com/Community ServeColumbus.org

What would happen in the church and ultimately the world, if we oriented our lives, our marriages, friendships, finances, and time, around this inescapably simple but all-encompassing question … What does love require of me? -Maybe we would stop searching the scriptures for loopholes and we would begin searching the scriptures in pursuit of ways to love better. -Youth groups and student ministries would be characterized by honor and mutual respect. -Families would live on budgets so they could give more away. -Marriages would model servant leadership at its finest. While folks outside of faith communities may be critical of what we believe they would be envious of how well we treat one another and be stunned by how well we treat them even when we disagree with them. That would be irresistible Christianity. That’s what we are after today. And that requires three things; loyal friendships, sacrificial commitments, and generous partnerships. Ethos is a life-giving community committed to keeping Jesus at its Center. Our vision is to be with Jesus, become like Jesus, and do what Jesus did so that we may love all people in Jesus' name. EthosOH.com Small Groups: EthosOH.com/Community ServeColumbus.org

Becoming a Community of Love ​ Jesus was so brilliant…He could have made the defining characteristic of His followers anything He saw fit. He could have said, “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples if you believe something.” But instead, He said, “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples if you do something. If you love as I have loved.” The brilliance of this statement is found in our own personal experience. Let me put it this way; there are two categories of people who have made a significant impact/difference in your life. There are two categories of people who have made you the husband you are today, the father or mother you are today, the employee you are today. There are two categories of people who have set you up to be successful or not so successful in your relationships or dating relationships. These two categories of people did not impact you because of what they believe, it was not even whether they were Christian or not. It is those who have hurt you deeply or those who have loved you profoundly. Jesus has called and equipped us to become the latter. ​ “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." -John 13:34-35 (NIV)- Ethos is a life-giving community committed to keeping Jesus at its Center. Our vision is to be with Jesus, become like Jesus, and do what Jesus did so that we may love all people in Jesus' name. EthosOH.com Small Groups: EthosOH.com/Community ServeColumbus.org