How do I hope for God to judge all the world's evil, wickedness, and sin-twisted corruption when I, myself, am implicated in that very judgement?

As we prepare for Advent, we turn to the prophet Isaiah, who announces the counterintuitive truth that God's promises of peace arrive through and in the midst of His judgment. The city that once sheltered justice, Jerusalem, has abandoned the widow and the fatherless, it has given itself over to other, lesser things. Yet, Isaiah proclaims God's promises to remove its corruption and restore its faithfulness. Hope begins with recognition: Not ours, but God's as He confronts that which we have become, and what we have given ourselves over to.

Isaiah reminds us that hope is subversive: weapons become tools for cultivation; God walks among us; power become a helpless infant, light reaches into darkness; a small, fragile shoot sprouts from a tree stump long thought dead and gone.

Judgment, though, perhaps, frightens us? But maybe rightly so. Evil cannot endure if creation is to become and remain good, and we cannot place ourselves outside that reckoning. Yet in Jesus, the Messiah foretold in Isaiah, we can come to expect more than mere destruction: through what feels like struggle, violence, pain, and even death, God restores peace and brings us back into relationship with Him. The end of judgement is, ultimately, reconciliation.

Questions for reflection:
• Do we expect God to judge sin, including our own? What makes that frightening?
• Where do we confuse the end of evil with the end of hope?
• How might hope in restoration through judgment reshape our prayers and relationships this week?
• What would change in our prayers and relationships if we desired that restoration for the people we find hardest to love, as well as for ourselves?

Scripture References: Isaiah 1:21–31; 2:1–5; 7:10–14; 9:2–7; 11:1–10.

From our pre-Advent series, Building Expectation · November 1, 2026

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How do we look honestly at ourselves--recognizing both the content and intent of each affection, attention, and action--with unflinching courage and compassion, without turning confession, contrition, and prayer into just another bit of performative, introspective, religious theatre?

Especially, when we consider the fact that we are called saints before we have finished becoming saints--certainly long before most of us feel like saints anyways. As we have said, the name "saint" is both a gift and a task: God sets us apart in Christ, precisely BEFORE and WHILE we learn to live into that identity together, with all that we are—spirit, soul, and body. Our ordinary habits matter because they form us through who/how/where/why/what we attend and respond to during each moment, every hour, all the days of... YOUR life.

This week we practiced the Examen. We recall who we are in Jesus, settle into the Father's love, notice God's presence and our response, bring our resistance out into the light, and entrust tomorrow to the grace and embrace of Jesus known and felt today. The distinction between consciousness and conscience matters: we attend both to where we received God's nearness and to where we ignored it. We ask the Spirit to help us see clearly, confess honestly, and take a concrete step toward restoration. Christ loved us, even died for us, while we were still sinners; so now we can face what needs fixing and hold what needs healing without fear or shame.

Questions for Reflection

• Where did you notice God's nearness this week, and how did you respond?
• What habit helped you relate to God as Father and to others as brothers and sisters?
• Where did you resist the Spirit's leading, and what step toward restoration might you take tomorrow?

Scripture: 1 Corinthians 1:2–4; 1 Thessalonians 5:23–24; Psalm 139:7–18, 23–24; Luke 6:39–42; 1 Corinthians 2:1–16; Romans 5:6, 8.

From the series Simple Saints

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Tired of consumer Christianity? So are we.
Come rest in Jesus. → Sundays at 10:10AM
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Christ City Church is a faith family following Jesus together in east Dallas.
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What does listening to God have to do with the body you live in, the work you do, and the people you find difficult to hear?

Our name, saints, is both a gift and a task: we are, thus, set apart in Christ and called to become who we have been named, together. By Simple Saints, we refer to simplicity as the harmony of our whole selves: spirit, soul, and body receiving and sharing in the life God gives.

Yes, the body, too, belongs to that hope. Though it grows tired and passes toward death, it will be resurrected; it is where the Spirit saves and forms us even now. Romans 12 calls us to offer our bodies as a living sacrifice, with minds being renewed to discern what is good. The habits of an ordinary day matter: how we work, care for what has been entrusted to us, and attend to one another.

In 1 Kings 19, Elijah moves from the triumph of Carmel into fear, exhaustion, and the conviction that he is alone. God meets him with food and sleep, then with a still, small voice and a calling to return. Elijah discovers that God has been at work beyond what he could see, including among people he did not know were faithful.

We enter this passage through Lectio Divina, a practice handed down through our faith family across generations. We listen to Scripture, meditate on what we hear, respond in prayer, and rest with Jesus. Before we speak, we listen. As we learn that habit with God, we can begin to practice it with our spouses, neighbors, and even our enemies. Our whole selves participate: bodies at rest, minds attentive, hearts and wills open to God.

Questions for Reflection:

• Where do you treat your body or your ordinary responsibilities as though they have little to do with life in God?
• What changes when you offer them as worship?
• Where do you recognize yourself in Elijah’s story: afraid, exhausted, convinced you are alone, or being invited to return? What do you notice about how God meets him?

• As you listen to 1 Kings 19:1–18, what word, detail, or person draws your attention?
• Ask God how it connects with your life today, respond in prayer, and leave time to rest with Jesus.

Scripture References: Romans 12:1–2; 1 Kings 19:1–18 (with the context of 1 Kings 18); 1 Thessalonians 5:23–24; 2 Corinthians 7:1.

Voice referenced: St. Irenaeus of Lyon,

Simple Saints

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Tired of consumer Christianity? So are we.
Come rest in Jesus. → Sundays at 10:10AM
642 Brookhurst Dr, Dallas, TX 75218.
Christ City Church is a faith family following Jesus together in east Dallas.
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If one day our bodies will be raised anew in, with, and by Jesus, what does that say about how we live in them now?

Our bodies tire, ache, deteriorate, and change. The Christian faith names that honestly (perhaps, sometimes even emphasizes our physical and spiritual vulnerability a little too much). Still, historically, Jesus people have always held that the body that is wasting away is also the body God promises to raise. Thus, we cannot understand life with Jesus by leaving our our bodies--our fleshly, material, physical, dirt and dust filled bodies--out of it.

In Holy Body, we consider the whole person, our whole selves—spirit, soul, and body—and Paul's insistence that we are the temple of the living God. With Irenaeus, we attend to the flesh as the place where God's life saves and forms us. With Augustine, we consider why our loves can restrict us: even beautiful, good things cannot give us lasting rest when we cling to them as though they must last forever.

That brings us back to the work of living. The way we make and care for a life, the way we begin a day, the habits that keep us attentive or distracted, aware or distant, present or promiscuous... as the case may be. We can begin by offering ourselves to God through the work already before us, praying the Lord's Prayer as people who have received this day. We can ask whether our habits help us notice the person across from us--including the person we would rather avoid. And we can worship as a body, with our bodies, receiving together the life we cannot manufacture for ourselves.

Questions for reflection:

• Where, when, and in what circumstances have you experienced an alignment of your complete self: spirit, soul, and body?
• What practices are dividing your body and spirit? What would it mean to turn from them today and tomorrow?
• Do the habits of your day make you more attentive to God and to the person beside you, or make it easier to avoid them?

Scripture: 2 Corinthians 6:11–7:1; 2 Corinthians 4:8–18; 1 Thessalonians 5:23–24; Romans 12:1; Matthew 11:25–30; Psalm 1. In the liturgy: Psalm 84; Romans 8:27–28.

Voices: Irenaeus, Against the Heresies; Augustine, Confessions; Hans Urs von Balthasar on receiving life from God.

Explore Simple Saints

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Tired of consumer Christianity? So are we.
Come rest in Jesus. → Sundays at 10:10AM
642 Brookhurst Dr, Dallas, TX 75218.
Christ City Church is a faith family following Jesus together in east Dallas.
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Our bodies wear down, but our inner life can be renewed day by day.

In Simply Soulful, we turned to 2 Corinthians 4:13 and ask what it means to attend to both the soul God is renewing and to God, through the ordinary practices of the Examen, contemplation and conversation, shared devotion, and Sabbath.

Reflection Questions:

• Where, when, and in what circumstances have you experienced soul satisfaction?
• Is your "inner self" being renewed day by day? If so, how? If not, why, and what could you do differently tomorrow?

Scripture: 2 Corinthians 4:13; 1 Thessalonians 5:23; Psalm 103

Simple Saints

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Tired of consumer Christianity? So are we.

Come rest in Jesus. | Sundays at 10:10AM

642 Brookhurst Dr, Dallas, TX 75218.

Christ City Church is a faith family following Jesus together in east Dallas.

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What does it mean to be "spiritual?" What is the difference between spirit and soul?

This week we consider Paul's prayer that our whole spirit, soul, and body be kept blameless. Our life does not begin with us. We receive life from God, and we grow into that life through repentance, confession, listening, attention, and worship.

This is not a call to escape ordinary life. It is an invitation to become whole within it, to receive God's life in our homes, work, relationships, and responsibilities.

Questions for reflection:

• Where have you become aware that there is more to you than you?
• What in your life needs to be brought into the light with God?
• What might change if you looked at Jesus, looked at the person before you, and kept looking at Jesus in them?

Scripture: 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24; 1 Corinthians 15:43-45; Genesis 2:7.

Simple Saints

---Tired of consumer Christianity? So are we.

Come rest in Jesus. | Sundays at 10:10AM

642 Brookhurst Dr, Dallas, TX 75218.

Christ City Church is a faith family following Jesus together in east Dallas.

Learn more at www.christcity.life

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How do you stay whole even as contemporary life pulls you in different directions?

Saint Paul calls the church "saints": people made holy in Christ, set apart, and called to grow into that gift of holiness... together. In the second message of our fall series, Simple Saints, we consider how God's own undivided life gives shape to that calling. Drawing on divine simplicity—the harmony of God—the sermon asks how our desires, actions, and relationships can become whole and holy in world of fracture and brokenness.

Questions for Reflection:

• Where, when, and in what ways have you experienced the wholeness of being set apart by God?
• Where do you feel divided or mixed up in spirit, soul, or body?
• As you bring those places to God, how does Paul's promise, “He who calls you is faithful,” shape your hope?

Scripture References: 1 Thessalonians 5:23–24; 1 Corinthians 1:2–3; 1 Thessalonians 3:11–13; James 5:7–8; 2 Corinthians 3:18; 1 Peter 1:13–16; John 1:9; Exodus 3:14.
Liturgy: Psalm 116:1–9; Romans 8:27–28.

Voices/Quotes: Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible (Elwell and Beitzel); Eugene Peterson, Practice Resurrection; Michael Gorman, Inhabiting the Cruciform God; Augustine, Confessions 1.3.3–1.4.4; Peter Leithart, “What Sort of Parts is God Without?” Aristotle.

Sermon Notes & Liturgy | Simple Saints

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Tired of consumer Christianity? So are we.
Come rest in Jesus. → Sundays at 10:10AM
642 Brookhurst Dr, Dallas, TX 75218.
Christ City Church is a faith family following Jesus together in east Dallas.
Learn more at www.christcity.life

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What's in a name? Really?

The first message from our Simple Saints series begins by gathering the 'fruit' of our summer in James. James ends his letter calling us to speak life over one another, to draw one another into life — which is another way of saying: live into who you are and who's you are... Live into your family name. So... what is our family name? You might be thinking "Christian." But did you know that the name "Christian" appears only three times in the New Testament? And, it wasn't a 'family' name, but was given by outsiders at Antioch who noticed this group kept talking about Jesus. The name the early church took for themselves was "saints" — Paul's most common way of addressing the churches, thirty-nine times over.

A saint is one set apart by God, for God: a holy one, distinct because of their relationship to God. It is not a title of distinguished accomplishment but of received blessing, one that gives shape to the identity and actions of the person so blessed. What we are called by, who we are called to be and to become and... Who it is that calls us... in every sense is our "call-ing." Which is why Paul greets the church in Corinth as those already "sanctified in Christ Jesus," yet "called to be saints" — made holy, and becoming holy. Saintliness is both a gift and a task. But, it is derivative: it comes from Christ and is being given to us. For fourteen years, this has been our quiet work as a faith family — becoming simple saints in life together, ones who cannot be described or understood apart from God's intent and attention.

Questions for Reflection:

• What emotions, thoughts, doubts, or affirmations arise as you read Paul's greeting as addressed to you: "to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints"?
• "Saint" names you by what God does in and for you, not by what you do for God. Where do you struggle to believe that?
• What would it look like this week to live into the name you have already been given?

Scripture References: 1 Corinthians 1:2-3; Romans 1:7; 2 Corinthians 1:1; 2 Corinthians 13:13; Ephesians 1:1; Philippians 1:1; Colossians 1:2; Philemon 4-5; James 1:2-4; James 5:13-20; Acts 11:26; Psalm 34:1-10; Romans 8:27-28.

Voices/Quotes: Eugene Peterson, on Paul's use of "saint"; Michael Gorman, on saintliness as gift and task; James D. G. Dunn, on holiness as the beginning and the process of salvation; John Webster, on holiness as indicative and imperative

Sermon Notes & Liturgy | Simple Saints

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Tired of consumer Christianity? So are we.Come rest in Jesus. → Sundays at 10:10AM642 Brookhurst Dr, Dallas, TX 75218.
Christ City Church is a faith family following Jesus together in east Dallas.Learn more at www.christcity.life

Follow us on...IG: @christcitylifeX: @christcitylifeTH: @christcitylifeFB: christcitychurchdallasYT: @christcitylife