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Sunday Flyer
Join us for the first part of this 2-Session leadership training for new Group Leaders. Whether you are interested in leading a co-ed group, men's, women's, college, or other specific group, this is the starting point. There is no obligation after attending the training to lead a group. We look forward to having you there.
Join us for a baptism class on Sunday, July 12, 10:30am or 12:30pm, if you would like to be baptized at the Crown Point Shores on Wednesday, July 15th.
Mark your calendar for a meaningful summer together with other Floodsters.
Join us for the first part of this 2-Session leadership training for new Group Leaders. Whether you are interested in leading a co-ed group, men's, women's, college, or other specific group, this is the starting point. There is no obligation after attending the training to lead a group. We look forward to having you there.
Do you love plants and have a desire to create a beautiful and welcoming space for our church family? Do you have availability to help water and care for our plants 1x-2x a month? If so please join the Plant Team!
God repeatedly invites us to trust Him with our finances, promising that God will provide. We are encouraging you, our church family, to increase your financial giving toward God's work and look forward to seeing how God provides, blesses, and grows our faith.
Open Hearts, Open Doors
We're so glad you joined us!
Discover community, purpose, and hope at Flood Church. You’re invited to join us as we grow in faith together.
The Cross and the Colosseum: How the Heart of Romans is the Hope of the World
MESSAGE NOTES: JULY 12, 2026
The Mindset of the Spirit:
Living as God’s People
Pastor Kathy Pham
Romans 8:1
Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus...
"Romans, chapter 8, by common consent, is one of the most spectacular pieces of early Christian writing. It is the very heart of Romans — and, with that, it has a claim to be near the heart of what the Bible, and Christianity itself, is all about." —N.T. Wright, Into the Heart of Romans
ROMANS 8 SERIES PREFACE
Every one of us carries both a concept of God and an image of God. Our concept of God is what we believe about God with our minds; our image of God is how we experience and feel about God in our hearts. The two do not always match.
These two images of God lead to two very different trajectories in life. One leads toward the cross of Christ, marked by loving trust, and abundant life. The other leads toward the colosseum of the Roman Empire, marked by fear, coercion, and death.
When Paul writes to the churches in Rome, he is addressing believers who are wrestling with both their concept of God and their image of God. Instead of allowing the Spirit to form them into a community shaped by God's presence and purpose, they have been influenced by the sarx (flesh), resulting in division, insecurity, and power struggles. Paul's letter calls them—and us—to reject the way of the colosseum and embrace the way of the cross, where love overcomes fear and communion replaces competition.
"God being for us is a concise summary of the gospel."
—Charles Cranfield, Romans
ROMANS CONTEXT
Paul likely wrote Romans from Corinth around AD 56–57. After two decades of missionary work throughout Asia Minor and Greece, and with a desire to extend the gospel to Spain, Paul wrote to instruct believers and advance his missionary vision. He sought to influence his fellow Jews who did not believe that Jesus was the Messiah, while also helping Gentile converts who came from a Roman religious system that was largely procedural rather than relational.
The recipients of the letter were a network of house churches composed of Jews and Gentiles, slaves and free people, men and women, rich and poor, and both the powerful and the marginalized. Adding to this complexity was a significant shift in leadership and influence between Jews and Gentiles. In AD 49, the Roman Emperor Claudius expelled the Jews from Rome, leaving Gentile believers as the majority within the Roman churches. When the Jews were permitted to return in AD 54, a pressing question emerged: How would these two groups be reconciled and reunited as one people of God?
Many scholars suggest that Romans is structured into four major sections of four chapters each: chapters 1–4, 5–8, 9–12, and 13–16. Within this framework, Romans 8 stands at the center of the letter, both rhetorically and theologically. It serves as the pinnacle of Paul's argument about salvation, life in the Spirit, and God's redemptive purposes for creation.
As New Testament scholar N.T. Wright observes, “Romans 8 is one of the most spectacular pieces of early Christian writing, at the heart of Romans and at the heart of what the Bible, and Christianity itself, is all about” (Into the Heart of Romans).
Romans 8:5–11
5 Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. 6 The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. 7 The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. 8 Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God.
9 You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ. 10 But if Christ is in you, then even though your body is subject to death because of sin, the Spirit gives life because of righteousness. 11 And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you.
Sarx (flesh) = human existence under the power of corruption, rebellion, and death.
Pneuma (Spirit) = God's life-giving presence and power.
Pneuma (Spirit) = God's life-giving presence and power.
Soma (body) = whole embodied person, our entire public, personal reality
Phronēma (mindset) = Our orientation, our posture, our trajectory, our way of thinking
Romans 12:2
Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.
What we repeatedly choose to think about, desire, and pursue eventually becomes who we are.
Rule of Life IN COMMUNITY
What do you think will be your biggest challenge?
What do you think will be your biggest challenge?
What is the one think you sense the Holy Spirit directing you to start doing now?
What might be one thing you want to stop doing?
Who will you invite to encourage you to make these changes?
What might be one thing you want to stop doing?
Who will you invite to encourage you to make these changes?
The Spirit Gives Life so Choose LIFE
God's Spirit Now Dwells in God’s People
Romans 6 = Exodus
Romans 7 = Sinai
Romans 8 = Tabernacle
God dwells not just among us, but in and through us!
“The story of human beings made in the image of God is that even when we are not godlike in any way, and perhaps especially then, God is still for us.” — Lucy Peppiatt, The Imago Dei
Next Steps
Express faith through Baptism
Class July 12 after both gatherings
Beach Baptism on July 15
Sign up for Alpha, contact Kathy
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