A word from Dr. Paul David Tripp

“In the current climate in America, sides are being taken everyday. Some are believing that the church is becoming too liberal. Some believe that the Church lacks compassion. It can be divisive and it can be detrimental to the life of a church. Our church is made up of people from all different walks of life, and understandings of justice. However, we are all called to mirror our Creator in doing justice and caring for the marginalized in our society. Far too often biblical matters have been relegated to being political matters as though our civic duty comes first from the party we align ourselves with. Christians must be careful of this, for if not, we can find ourselves categorizing even fellow believers into awful categories not based on biblical standards but political ones. We wanted to post a video that appeals to the church on some of the very issues we fight for in our church and from the same hermeneutic. This video is from one of the most prolific Christian writers, speakers, and leaders especially this pressing one and one of the friends of our church Paul David Tripp. Very few people have a firm grip on the grace of the gospel like he does and it is worth hearing what he has to say on any topic, especially this important one. Please take the time to listen to these words. The entire video is about 20 minutes long and it’s worth the time. After watching, do the difficult thing, reach out to someone not of your background and ask questions. It's easy to be affirmed by people who already agree but we are stretched and sharpened by those who don’t. We desire Cottage Grove to be a Unified church and pray to this end especially during this season. I pray you are blessed, encouraged and challenged by this video and that it would help lead to conversations in the future.