Core Community Church of Omaha

On Sunday September 25th, something historic is happening in the city of Omaha. Coram Deo Church & Core Community Church, which have been pacesetters in the work of urban, missional church planting in the Midwest, will join forces as one church. To commemorate this momentous merger, we’re throwing a party.

ONE PLACE. ONE TIME. ONE PEOPLE.

THAT SUNDAY (SEPTEMBER 25) ONLY, we’re going to come together at 10AM for one worship gathering at Westside Middle School. Then immediately following we will move down to the football field just south of our worship space for a family picnic from 11:30AM – 1:30PM. Food and drink will be provided so bring your appetites. Formal seating will not be provided so grab your lawn chair, picnic blanket, and/or umbrella for shade. Mark your calenders now and plan on arriving early so that you have adequate time to find parking and get inside.

**PLEASE NOTE: Coram Deo Kids will only be providing children’s ministry for ages 0-3 years during the worship gathering.

Join us this Sunday for an 11th anniversary celebration of Core Community Church.

There will be lots of music, songs, testimonies and a sharing in all that God has done over the last 11 years.

I went 26 years without ever attending a Good Friday service.  For a kid who was in the church building every time the doors were opened, that is significant.  I attended 26 Easter Sunday services, but never once attended a Good Friday service.  In fact, the Friday before Easter would fly right past me, and I wouldn’t even think about Jesus.  But Core holds Good Friday services, so I thought I would be a nice pastor and show up.  Thankfully, God took me and changed my experience of Easter.  Here’s how:

1. Good Friday makes me at least be in a sober environment. I tend to want to escape emotions and just go through the motions.  But even if I don’t want to feel the true, gruesome, bloody facts of Jesus’ death, a Good Friday service makes them really hard to ignore.

2. Good Friday connects the pain of the cross to the pains of my church. Being a pastor, I regularly see pain in the church – people hurting, suffering, and wounded.  But a Good Friday service helped me connect that pain back to Jesus’ pain.  How?  By being in a room full of broken, hurting people who are all thinking about the same thing – our broken, hurting Savior.

3. Good Friday connects me with thousands of years of history. Core uses a liturgical format to commemorate Good Friday.  There is something about that format that helps me escape the urgency of 21st century church-ianity and reconnect with thousands of years of men and women who have been following Jesus.

4. Good Friday makes Easter more of a story and less an event. At least for me.  Here’s how: my heart is put in tune with the story of the Jesus beginning Friday night, and I don’t come up out of that story until the celebration on Easter Sunday morning.  Therefore, Sunday morning is no longer a one-stop party for me and my family.  It is the culmination of 72 hours of thinking on Jesus.  So, yes, we love letting the kids wear cute clothes, but that has faded in significance because we are picking out the cute clothes while remembering the death of Jesus.

5. Good Friday connects me with a city and culture who needs Jesus. All throughout our city thousands of people will be remembering Good Friday.  Some of them will simply go through religious routines that mean nothing to them.  Others will be deeply stirred by the truths of the cross.  But the truth is that many in our city will participate in a service of some sort.

Here’s the info for Core’s Good Friday service: Friday, April 2 @ 6:00pm.  At 1316 Jones in downtown Omaha.  Childcare is provided, just please RSVP to Amy Z (amy @ corecommunity . org).  Come ready to remember and reflect.

NOTE: This is a special guest post from Kathy Hitt, a deacon for Core.  It is a follow up to the Fasting Seminar that was hosted on Sunday, March 28, 2010.

Reflecting upon my talk the other day on Fasting (audio here), I thought I did not speak enough of the joy I have found in fasting – not joy because of fasting, or despite fasting, or after fasting, but joy in fasting, for I believe the Lord has met me in a special way in fasting and has granted much joy.

Now, don’t get me wrong, fasting is not fun. Being hungry is not enjoyable. It can make you grumpy, irritable, and anxious. Each time, I look forward to the time when I can break my fast and eat again. And I don’t look forward to being hungry again.

But even so, there is joy to be found in the hunger and suffering of fasting because of the way it connects us to Christ and His suffering.

2 Corinthians 7:4: I am filled with comfort. In all our affliction, I am overflowing with joy. Fasting reminds me not only of my need, but of the abundance I have in the Lord and so I rejoice.

Hebrews 12:1-2: Let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. In fasting I lay aside my perceptions of my needs and desires, place them at His feet, and allow the perfecter of my faith to fill me.

2 Corinthians 1:3-4: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. In fasting, I choose to identify with the poor, the broken, the oppressed, and plead to God for comfort so that I may share His comfort and joy with others.

Romans 5:3-5: More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. And I rejoice in fasting, for I know He is increasing my hope and dependence upon my Father, who will never fail or forsake His children.

We would encourage you this year to draw close to God and identify with his suffering this Good Friday by choosing to fast for a meal before our service together. If you are unable to abstain from food, then ask Him to reveal another way you can sacrifice a pleasure to Him in acknowledgment of the ways in which He has sacrificed for you.

Please join us for the Good Friday service, 6pm, 1316 Jones.  And May He fill you with the Joy of His Resurrection this Easter Sunday.

Easter Sunday Gathering:

Core Community Church is celebrating Easter Sunday at 9:45am at the Omaha Community Playhouse on 69th & Cass Street . We will be looking at the importance of the Resurrection from Paul’s account in 1 Corinthians 15.

Lent is one of the liturgical seasons of the church calendar that precedes Easter.  The practice started in some form or fashion in the 2nd century, long before the Roman Catholic church developed it into their modern day traditions.  The days in Lent are no more or no less holy than any other of the year.  The word lent simply refers to spring and how the days lengthen or get longer.

Historically for the church, fasting and prayer are the two focuses of the Lenten season.  Fasting, joined with fervent prayer, marks a season of preparation for God’s presence. Fasting is traditionally the act of abstaining from food, drink, or some other regular consumption for a limited time. Some give up a certain behavior or practice during the season.

We fast because it is one of the means God uses to break the power of sin in our lives, it prepares us for prayer, and it humbles us before Him.  Fasting reminds us of our hunger for Jesus and our need for Jesus.  It reminds us of our sinfulness and exposes parts of our hearts we didn’t know were there.

How does this understanding translate in Core’s life during this season?

• Each Sunday we are practicing corporate confession.  This reminds us that not only have each of us individually sin against God, but we are a unified body who has sinned against God.  Therefore, we are all in need of God’s grace to us in Jesus.
• Sunday, March 28 (NOTE: This is one week later than originally promoted), we will host a Fasting Seminar at Central Presbyterian Church (55th and Leavenworth) to talk more about the practice and how God might use it to grow us into His likeness.
• Friday, April 2 we will host a Good Friday Gathering.  This is a sobering time of reflection on the death of Jesus.  The Good Friday Gathering will be at 1316 Jones, same place as last year.
• Sunday, April 4 we will celebrate the resurrection of Jesus from the dead!  9:45am at the Omaha Community Playhouse.