In this series, we are zooming out to get a bird’s eye view of the Story of God contained in the Scriptures.

It is so important that we all understand this deep reality we live in.

So as we zoom out, we will also zoom in to pay close attention to what we are calling the “chapters” of God’s story - from the beginning of the world to the picture of the world to come. And the theme of this story - which is a real story, a true story - is that God is a God of redemption and restoration -- a God always calling people back to himself, who makes all things new, and who never, ever gives up on His people.

God is a God who in Creation made everything that exists, out of love. And even though God gave us everything we need, human beings fell into sin because of our own choices at the Fall. And our relationship with God, with each other, and with God’s good creation was ruptured.

But God didn’t give up on us. He called to himself a Chosen People and made of them a great nation. But humans fell into sin again and again and failed to live in God’s good ways, despite kings and prophets and priests whose stories are in the Old Testament.

So God himself came to the rescue. In the fullness of time, God became a man - Jesus, and lived among us as a flesh and blood picture of the Father’s love and grace. And Jesus taught humanity how to live, and then he died in our place, to pay once and for all the price for our sin, our failures, our fallenness. And he defeated death. And he lives now and is the leader of the church.

Today we live in the Church Age in which God’s new community, formed in Jesus, powered by the Spirit and set free from sin and death, is given one mission - to spread the grace and mercy of Jesus throughout the whole broken world, and to love our neighbors in the same way in which God has loved us.

And one day, one great day the New Creation will come … Jesus will come again and call all who follow him to himself and heaven and earth will be one, sin will be finally defeated, and there will be no more war or death or pain or human brokenness. God will restore and renew and repair and redeem all things, for ever and ever. And Jesus will reign.

So we hope you’ll join us over the next 6 weeks as we Zoom Out to gain a greater understanding of how big and wide and good God’s story is, and then Zoom In to gain a better understanding of the beautiful chapters of that story.