Some of us gave up on the Bible a long time ago. Too many crazy stories that don't seem to happen anymore, too many fights over what you're required to believe before you're even allowed to open it, too much of a "why does this even matter to my life today" feeling. So it sits on a shelf, more like a museum piece than something that could matter today. Here's why I still think it's worth picking back up: I see it as an ancient collection of writings from people wrestling with the exact same things we are. How do we navigate this life? Why do bad things happen to good people? Is there a purpose behind any of it? How do I live a good life? And so many more. You've probably got a few of your own.

So let's explore the Bible through a new lens, one where you don't need to already believe a word of it. Just bring an open mind and your own story. I'll show you a way into these old stories that might surprise you, one that could inspire the next stage of your spiritual journey.

Bring someone in your life who wants a way into the Bible that inspires their life today. See you at the Spiritual Gym!

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Some days it doesn't bother you. Other days, a story you've told yourself for years stops feeling like a story and starts feeling like the truth, no matter what's actually in front of you. It might be about relationships, about God, about who you are or aren't allowed to be. This week we're looking at what happens when a story takes over, and what it costs us and the people we love when it does. You'll leave with a real way to loosen that story's grip and start evolving it, instead of staying stuck inside it. Come with the story that gets you at your weakest. Leave with a way to change your relationship to it.

Join us this Sunday, 10:30 am, at the Spiritual Gym, and bring someone who's stuck in a story of their own.

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Speaker: Vince Klassen

We've all heard someone say "the Bible clearly says so" right before defending something that made our stomach turn. Racists leading Christian organizations. Immigrants locked out. Entire groups of people told God is against them. And every one of them is pointing to the same book we are.

So who's right?

One book. 70,000 denominations. Everyone convinced they've got the corner on truth, and everyone using the exact same text to prove it.

Here's what nobody wants to sit with: maybe the goal was never to find the one correct reading everyone else missed. Maybe it's about something closer, and harder. Finding your own way through this book, one that's actually yours, not one you inherited without ever checking where it came from.

Join us this Sunday at Friends Church as we dig into it together.

For more information about this message, please refer to the following:

• Dan McLellen - https://linktr.ee/maklelan
• Bart Erham - https://shor.by/kE06
• Monte Mader - https://linktr.ee/MonteMader
• Friends Church Recommendations - https://friendschurch.ca/books

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To donate to this podcast and support the making of more of these please visit https://friendschurch.ca/podcast

Speaker: Vince Klassen

There's often a story running underneath our relationships, and most of us don't even know it's there. We feel it more than we see it: the distance that creeps in even when nothing's technically wrong, the guard we keep up around someone, even family members, the exhaustion of loving someone who isn't giving as much as we feel we are. We tell ourselves that's just how they are, that's just how it is, but underneath that feeling is a belief we've never questioned. An unconscious belief decides how we treat the people right in front of us, and our relationships pay for it.

Where are we feeling this pain? And how do we finally get honest about the stories driving it? Come find out this week at Spiritual Gym.

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You did the work. The routine, the discipline, the daily showing up. It got you somewhere real. And then, without warning, it stopped working. The thing that used to bring you to life goes flat. You try harder. Nothing moves.

This isn't just a spiritual problem. It's the same wall you hit in the gym when the weight stops moving, at work when the promotion stops feeling like progress, in a relationship when the routine starts feeling like drudgery. This talk unpacks why the strategy that used to work stops working, and why the way out isn't just trying harder or thinking more.

Come find a way out of the rut you are in this Sunday at the Spiritual Gym

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Are you waiting for life to begin?

Most of us tell ourselves that someday we'll have more time. Someday life will slow down. Someday we'll finally pursue what matters most. But what if "someday" never arrives? This Sunday at Friends Church, we'll explore a surprising perspective on time, purpose, and the choices that quietly shape our lives every single day.

Through stories, unexpected insights and practical wisdom, we'll discover why one simple question may be more important than finding more hours in the day. We'd love to have you join us - you may never think about your time the same way again.

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Have you ever had a financial advisor tell you to save less? Spend more today? Yeah, me neither. We only ever hear one message: save more, sacrifice now, future you is counting on it. But here's the question nobody's asking: what if that same logic is running your spiritual life too? What if you've been taught, without ever saying it out loud, that today you is the villain in future you's story? There's a guy from the 5th century who took that idea all the way. Lived on top of a pillar. Fifty feet in the air. No shade, no rest, nothing between him and the sky, because he believed killing off today him was the price for future him. This week, we're asking whether your faith has quietly built the same pillar for you.

Come find out at the spiritual gym.

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There's a phrase you've probably said out loud more than once: "that's just not me." Someone hands you an opportunity, an outfit, a role, a way of doing things, and something in you just knows. But have you ever wondered if there's something almost spiritual happening when you say that?

Here's the thing about church you might not expect: a lot of us walked away from religion, or are still limping through it, because it felt like one long project to fix what's wrong with us. Stop sinning. Manage the bad parts. Become someone else. But what if that's not actually the whole story? What if the parts of you that come easy, the things you're just naturally good at, aren't a distraction from your spirituality, but the actual point of it?

This Sunday I want to tell you a story about a kid who was handed armor that wasn't built for him, and what happened when he had the guts to take it off. Come find out what he used instead, and what it might mean for the thing you're carrying that was never built for you either.

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To donate to this podcast and support the making of more of these please visit https://friendschurch.ca/podcast