What do you most need? Would you consider to be an embrace. A place where you feel heard, loved and at home. Perhaps that is what Church was always meant to be.

1. poor
The
Embrace

2. connection
Fear of coming to Church
Will I be ok
The Embrace

3. Fear
Deep in their heart they
wanted connection.
They wanted to give and
to receive
They wanted to be embraced
The Embrace

4. All long for
Fear of coming to Church
●
Gave them more information
●
Arrive late, leave early.
●
Sit at the back
●
Build a relationship before church service
●
Debriefs
●
Social Media
The Embrace

5. volv
We all long for, in our depths,
a sense of being embraced
The Embrace

6. volv
The Divine Embracing
‘On the cross the circle
of self-giving and mutually
indwelling divine persons opens
up for the enemy; in the agony of the passion
the movement stops for a brief moment and a
fissure appears so that sinful humanity can
join in.
The Embrace

7. volv
The Divine Embracing
We, the others – we the enemies
- are embraced by the divine
persons who love us with the
same love with which they love each other
and therefore make space for us within their
own eternal embrace. Miroslav Volv
The Embrace

8. volv
‘An embrace involves always a
double movement of opening
and closing. I open my arms to
create space in myself for the
other. The open arms are a
sign of discontent at being myself only and of
desire to include the other.
The Embrace

9. volv
They are an invitation to the
others to come in and feel at
home with me, to belong to me.
In an embrace I also close my
arms around the others - not
tightly, so as to crush and assimilate them
forcefully into myself, for that would not be
an embrace but a concealed power-act of
exclusion;
The Embrace

10. We come
but gently, so as to tell them that
I do not want to be without them
in their otherness. I want them in
their openness. I want them to
remain independent and true to
their genuine selves, to maintain their identity
and as such become part of me so that they
can enrich me with what they have and I do
not’. Miroslav Volv
The Embrace

11. paul
We come
Warts and all
Sinners and saints
Addicts and anchors
We embrace
The Embrace

12. greet
Greet every saint in Christ Jesus.
The friends who are with me
greet you. All the saints greet
you, especially those of the
emperor’s household. The grace
of the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit.
Philippians 4:21-23
The Embrace

13. greet
Greet (aspazomai) means to
enfold in one's arms and so
to welcome and embrace another.
The Embrace

14. common
A greeting was made not
merely by a slight gesture and a
few words, but generally by
embracing and kissing.
A journey was hindered by the embraces of
those departing and bidding farewell
The Embrace

15. eg
'Greet' was a common ending
to Paul's letters.
Greet all the brothers and
sisters with a holy kiss.
1 Thessalonians 5:26
The Embrace

16. eg
Aristarchus my fellow prisoner
greets you, as does Mark the
cousin of Barnabas
The Embrace

17. eg
And Jesus who is called Justus
greets you.
The Embrace

18. change
Epaphras, who is one of you, a
servant of Christ Jesus, greets
you. Colossians 4:10-12, 14
The Embrace

19. how
People change when they know
they are embraced
The Embrace

20. how
How do we embrace well?
The Embrace

21. how
How do we embrace well?
1. Recognise it is a work in
progress.
The one who began a good
work among you will bring it to
completion Philippians 1:6
The Embrace

22. how
How do we embrace well?
2. Humility
Do nothing from selfish
ambition or conceit, but in
humility regard others as better
than yourselves. Philippians 2:4
The Embrace

23. how
How do we embrace well?
3. Look to the interests of others
Let each of you look not to your
own interests, but to the interests
of others. Philippians 2:4
The Embrace

24. how
How do we embrace well?
4. Imitate Christ
Let the same mind be in you
that was in Christ Jesus
The Embrace

25. how
who, though he was in the form
of God,
did not regard equality with
God as something to be
exploited,
The Embrace

26. how
but emptied himself, taking the
form of a slave, being born in
human likeness.
And being found in human
form, he humbled himself and
became obedient to the point
of death— even death on a
cross.
The Embrace

27. how
Therefore God also highly
exalted him and gave him the
name that is above every name,
so that at the name of Jesus
every knee should bend, in
heaven and on earth and under
the earth,
The Embrace

28. how
and every tongue should
confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father
Philippians 2:5-11
The Embrace

37. Image cc: Mike_tn
To know that
you are loved,
you are cared for,
and that you have a place in the
world that matters.
The Embrace

38. poor
The
Embrace

39. Passage