Slide 2                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

Performative religion is doing religious things to look spiritual (checking boxes, saying the right words, or seeking approval) without a sincere heart of love, obedience, and trust in God. 

Slide 3                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    Hosea 4:1-3 Hear the word of the Lord, O children of Israel, for the Lord has a controversy with the inhabitants of the land. There is no faithfulness or steadfast love, and no knowledge of God in the land; there is swearing, lying, murder, stealing, and committing adultery; they break all bounds, and bloodshed follows bloodshed. Therefore the land mourns, and all who dwell in it languish, and also the beasts of the field and the birds of the heavens, and even the fish of the sea are taken away.

Slide 4                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

Hosea 5:4-6 Their deeds do not permit them to return to their God. For the spirit of whoredom is within them, and they know not the Lord. The pride of Israel testifies to his face; Israel and Ephraim shall stumble in his guilt; Judah also shall stumble with them. With their flocks and herds they shall go to seek the Lord, but they will not find him; he has withdrawn from them. 

Slide 5                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

Hosea 6:1-6 “Come, let us return to the Lord; for he has torn us, that he may heal us; he has struck us down, and he will bind us up. After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him. Let us know; let us press on to know the Lord; his going out is sure as the dawn; he will come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth.” What shall I do with you, O Ephraim? What shall I do with you, O Judah? Your love is like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes early away. Therefore I have hewn them by the prophets; I have slain them by the words of my mouth, and my judgment goes forth as the light. For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice,  the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings. 

Slide 8                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            

“You can tell what’s informing a society by what the tallest building is. When you approach a medieval town, the cathedral is the tallest thing in the place. When you approach an eighteenth‑century town, it is the political palace that’s the tallest thing in the place. And when you approach a modern city, the tallest places are the office buildings, the centres of economic life.”  -Joseph Campbell 

Slide 9                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

If someone a thousand years from now studied our cities like archaeologists, what would they say was at the heart of our civilization? 

Slide 10                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                

If someone studied the evidence of your life or my life, what would they is at the heart of our life? 

Slide 11                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

Hosea 11:1-4 When Israel was a child, I loved him,  and out of Egypt I called my son. The more they were called, the more they went away; they kept sacrificing to the Baals and burning offerings to idols. Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk; I took them up by their arms, but they did not know that I healed them. I led them with cords of kindness,  with the bands of love, and I became to them as one who eases the yoke on their jaws,  and I bent down to them and fed them. 

Slide 12                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

Hosea 11:8-9 How can I give you up, O Ephraim?  How can I hand you over, O Israel? How can I make you like Admah?  How can I treat you like Zeboiim? My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender. I will not execute my burning anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and not a man, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath.