After eight weeks of meeting together to address individual hurts and needs in a small intensive group format, participants in this season’s Redemption Groups at Mars Hill Church Shoreline celebrated the redemptive work of Jesus Christ. It was a night of praise, worship, and individually written psalms similar to those written by David in the Old Testament. The evening was completed with participants taking communion and lighting candles to represent forgiveness.
Redemption Groups are held throughout the church’s 15 locations throughout the year, bringing people of all walks of life, backgrounds, and lifestyles together to deal with issues of sin, whether committed by or against participants. Throughout the course of eight weeks, Redemption Groups at Shoreline taught through the Exodus to shed light on how God’s story of redemption is being played out in every single life and how the gospel holds the answers to every hurt and need.
Every Redemption Group series ends with a night of celebrating what God has done in the lives of participants. It isn’t uncommon to hear people share that their life has been utterly transformed throughout the course of the groups or that they’ve faced secrets they thought they would take to the grave. About 35 people attended Shoreline’s latest celebration, which opened with Pastor Aaron Gray leading worship to celebrate Jesus’ redemptive work. And, to personalize the moment when Jesus rescued his people, Pastor Jim Tomisser read Isaiah 6:1–8 and led a corporate reading of Psalm 107.
During Redemption Groups, participants are encouraged to write a psalm. These psalms express whatever is in the author’s heart, from repentance to praise to visceral expressions of real pain. Several people read their personal psalm during Shoreline’s celebration, including one woman who lives in chronic pain. In her psalm entitled “Almost Godless” she wrote, “You (God) are better than this. I didn’t think that ‘you and me’ meant this.” And yet, she trusted that God was so much better than her pain and she would trust him. Redemption Groups don’t ‘fix’ people or promise to take away suffering. Rather, they deal with sin and suffering and equip participants to walk forward through the story a good, faithful God has written for them.
Another psalm, “I am a Terrible God,” revealed a young woman’s confession that she didn’t know how to be a child of Jesus and that she was exhausted and miserable from trying to be her own god. She acknowledged her deep need for God to be the only God in her life.
When asked how the eight weeks changed her, another young woman said that she really didn’t think she had any issues when she first started attending the sessions. She acknowledged that she was proven wrong, which allowed her to be more humble about the areas of sin in her life. She was able to get a glimpse of what God sees when he looks at her. Her desire is to continue attending the next Redemption Group for the following quarter and to seek out godly women to mentor her. She’s also looking forward to becoming more involved in the church. What did the Redemption Group do for her? It broke her down but showed her how Jesus makes us whole.
When dealing with sin, the subject of forgiveness is never far away. Often, this means not only walking in the forgiveness we receive from God but extending that forgiveness to others who have sinned against us. At the celebration, candles stood ready for participants to light, representing the decision to forgive.
The evening ended with everyone gathering in their own group to pray for each other and participate in communion. You could sense the peace and joy in the room as each attendee experienced firsthand the redemptive work of Jesus.
For more information on Redemption Groups, or to sign up, visit marshill.com/counseling.
