Oakwood Church

Our Spiritual Life Commitments

1. We will trust Jesus completely

2. We will worship Jesus passionately

3. We will walk with Jesus faithfully

4. We will work with Jesus diligently

“I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”
John 15:5

“See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you today… then you shall live and multiply, and the Lord your God will bless you… But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them… you shall surely perish. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying his voice and holding fast to him, for he is your life.”
Deuteronomy 30:15-20

Find in Jesus:

1. The Source of Life, now and forever

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser.”
John 15:1

“People are just too busy to live emotionally healthy and spiritually rich and vibrant lives… Love, joy and peace are the triumvirate at the heart of Jesus’s kingdom vision… And all three are incompatible with hurry.”

∼ John Mark Comer
The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry

“If you want to be all you can be for Jesus, you must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life.”

∼ Dallas Willard

Find in Jesus:

1. The Source of Life, now and forever

“Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.”
John 15:2

“For many of us the great danger is not that we will renounce our faith. It is that we will become so distracted and rushed and preoccupied that we will settle for a mediocre version of it. We will just skim our lives instead of actually living them.”

∼ John Ortberg
in The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry

Find in Jesus:

1. The Source of Life, now and forever

“Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.”
John 15:2

Find in Jesus:

1. The Source of Life, now and forever

“If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned.”
John 15:6

Find in Jesus:

2. Forgiveness and Cleansing, initially and ongoing

“Every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.”
John 15:2

Find in Jesus:

2. Forgiveness and Cleansing, initially and ongoing

“Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you.”
John 15:3

“You asked for a loving God: you have one. The great spirit you so lightly invoked, the ‘lord of terrible aspect’, is present: not a senile benevolence that drowsily wishes you to be happy in your own way… but the consuming fire Himself, the Love that made the worlds, persistent as the artist’s love for his work and despotic as a man’s love for a dog, provident and venerable as a father’s love for a child, jealous, inexorable, exacting as love between the sexes.”

∼ C.S. Lewis
The Problem of Pain

Find in Jesus:

2. Forgiveness and Cleansing, initially and ongoing

“Every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.”
John 15:2

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”
Galatians 5:22-23

Find in Jesus

3. Your Heart’s True Home, to rest and remain

“Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.”
John 15:4

Find in Jesus

3. Your Heart’s True Home, to rest and remain

“I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”
John 15:5

Find in Jesus:

1. The Source of Life, now and forever

2. Forgiveness and Cleansing, initially and ongoing

3. Your Heart’s True Home, to rest and remain

Then you will bear Fruit

“This brother forgot himself and was willing to lose himself for God… he no longer thought of virtue or his salvation... he had always governed himself by love without interest.”
∼ about Nicholas Herman

“We can do little things for God; I turn the cake that is frying on the pan for love of him, and that done, if there is nothing else to call me, I prostrate myself in worship before him, who has given me grace to work; afterwards I rise happier than a king. It is enough for me to pick up but a straw from the ground for the love of God.”

∼ Nicholas Herman

“The time of business does not with me differ from the time of prayer; and in the noise and clatter of my kitchen, while several persons are at the same time calling for different things, I possess God in as great tranquility as if I were upon my knees at the blessed sacrament.”

∼ Brother Lawrence
The Practice of the Presence of God

“Men invent means and methods of coming at God’s love, they learn rules and set up devices to remind them of that love, and it seems like a world of trouble to bring oneself into the consciousness of God’s presence. Yet it might be so simple. Is it not quicker and easier just to do our common business wholly for the love of him?”

∼ Brother Lawrence
Practicing the Presence of God