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We read large sections of Daniel together and wrestle with what faithful living looks like under cultural pressure, from the small compromises of comfort to the public cost of courage. We trace God’s sovereignty over kings and empires while asking what it means to trust him with a steady “but if not” faith across decades.  • why slowing down to read longer Scripture forms us in an entertainment-driven culture  • Daniel as real history and ordinary people God uses  • conviction in youth and faithfulness across the decades  • when to seek the good of the city and when to draw a clear line  • prayerful courage that makes the appointment before the answer comes  • “our God is able, but if not” as a model for suffering and trust  • comfort as a quiet rival to holiness and allegiance  • pride that dehumanizes and a God who humbles rulers  • holding leaders accountable while remembering God’s sovereignty  • Daniel in the lions’ den as a picture of deliverance and resurrection hope  If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

We start a new series in Daniel by tracing how God’s people end up in Babylon and what it means to live faithful lives inside a broken kingdom. We wrestle with God’s discipline, the pain of paying for sins we didn’t choose, and the hope that God never wastes sacrifice because he did not waste his Son.  • why the church turns to the Book of Daniel now and what faithfulness can look like in a fractured culture  • the storyline from creation to exile and the warning against wanting the best of God and the world  • Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, and the pressure to treat God as one option among many  • the core theology of Daniel: one God over all places, all times, and all power  • why God oversees discipline needed for good ends  • suffering reframed as God removing goodness rather than simply adding pain  • a clear picture of hell as the absence of God’s good gifts  • Manasseh, leadership sin, and why judgment can be appropriate  • the reality of paying for the sins of parents and rulers we did not pick  • God never wastes sacrifice and God never wastes faithfulness  • how Daniel’s story echoes Jesus through Psalm 22 and the promise of hope  If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

We chase confidence in all the wrong places, then wonder why fear keeps winning when life gets hard. We open Hebrews 10 to see how the finished work of Jesus and the resurrection create a clean conscience, steady hope, and a community that helps us hold on.  • why Easter confidence is built for dark days  • welcoming the seasoned churchgoer, the seeker and the skeptic  • what Hebrews means by confidence through the blood of Jesus  • defining sin as missing the mark  • the three default moves: ignoring sin, outperforming others and trying to pay for it  • why endless religious effort is exhausting and cannot erase guilt  • the jet ski story as a picture of self-reliance and suffering  • “it is finished” as the foundation for assurance  • drawing near with honesty plus full assurance  • holding fast because Jesus is faithful even when we are not  • stirring one another up through encouragement, love, good works and meeting together  Grab one of the cards that’s in front of you. It’ll give you a chance to jot down a prayer. It’ll give you a chance to meet with the pastor, receive prayer. There will be a number of us praying on the back porch if you want to join us.  If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

The last lines of Colossians look like a throwaway list of names until you realize Paul is doing something intentional: he’s putting faces to the gospel. We walk through Colossians 4:7–18 like end credits, showing how Christian doctrine becomes a lived, shared reality through people who serve, encourage, pray, forgive, and keep going when it costs them. We talk about Onesimus, a runaway slave who meets Jesus and then walks straight back into the hardest conversation of his life as a “beloved brother.” We trace Mark’s arc from quitting and causing a painful split to being welcomed again as “useful,” a concrete picture of forgiveness without an asterisk. We don’t skip the quiet hero, Nympha, who hosts a church in her home, reminding us that faithfulness in ordinary work is still worship. The tone sharpens with Demas, who starts near Paul and later deserts him “in love with this present world.” That warning leads into Epaphras’ prayer for spiritual maturity and full assurance in the will of God, plus a clear, grounding answer to the question “What is the chief end of man?” To glorify God and enjoy Him forever, learning to delight in Him instead of using Him. If you want to grow, encourage others, and finish well, this one is for you. If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

We open Colossians 3:18–4:1 and let God’s design for a household confront our instincts, our excuses, and our scorekeeping. We keep returning to the same aim: serve the Lord Christ first, and let that reshape marriage, parenting, work, and the way we use authority. • why this passage creates tension for every role in the room  • the hierarchy of a godly household as an aspiration, not a weapon  • why this is about household order more than a generic gender debate  • God’s design confronting what culture calls sensible  • service replacing scorekeeping and moving Jesus back to the center  • why Scripture starts with service before authority  • wives submitting in the Lord with safeguards and humility  • husbands loving without harshness and using truth with rejoicing  • a real-life look at how tone changes hard conversations  • encouragement for singles, divorced, and widowed to rejoice in Christ’s faithful love  • children obeying because it pleases the Lord  • fathers disciplining without provoking, vexing, or discouraging  • bondservants and masters as a complex relationship under a higher Master  • the Exodus 21 image of pierced belonging pointing to the cross and a new family If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

The moment we stop treating Colossians 3 like a checklist and start wearing it like a robe, everything changes. We open with the text—compassion, kindness, humility, patience, forgiveness, love—and name the tension: these can feel like smoke in the eyes or like warmth by the fire. From there we walk the path Paul lays out, moving from “put to death” to “put on,” from battle to belonging, and we talk candidly about what happens when grievance sets up camp in the heart. We share why “Do I forgive?” is the wrong question and how “How do I forgive?” becomes a doorway to freedom. Drawing on Jesus’ parable of canceled debts, we confront our quiet desire to be “small sinners” and discover the joy of being greatly forgiven. We also get practical about pace and posture: letting the peace of Christ rule looks like moving slower, talking less, and resisting the urge to fix everyone else. The only thing we’re called to control is ourselves, and that self-control reframes when to correct and when to wait, choosing the good of others over the itch to be right. Harmony doesn’t come from sameness; it grows where love binds differences. We explore how a community can teach, admonish, and still sing together without fracturing—because gratitude keeps the heart soft and the word of Christ keeps it steady. Along the way we touch on worship nostalgia, why restraint is a form of wisdom, and how a simple pause at the door—asking God to let peace rule—can transform a home, a team, or a church. If you’re tired of carrying old wars into new rooms, this study invites you to lay them down and live clothed in Christ’s righteousness. If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

What if your most disciplined efforts still can’t touch the root of your struggle? We open Colossians 3 and confront two convincing counterfeits: the treadmill of strict rule keeping and the treadmill of frantic escape. Both have an appearance of wisdom. Neither can kill sin. The gospel offers a better way—run to Christ, not away from failure or toward performance. We walk through Paul’s freeing order: you have died with Christ, your life is hidden with Christ in God, and you will appear with him in glory. That sequence reshapes how we fight sin, moving us from white-knuckle “stop that” to worshipful “seek this.” From there we face the hard list—sexual immorality, impurity, evil desire, covetousness—and the everyday poisons of anger, malice, slander, obscene talk, and lying. Rather than tolerating a “manageable” level, we learn what it means to put sin to death and to put on the new self that is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its Creator. You’ll hear a practical, two-minute framework to retrain your thoughts using Philippians 4:8: name the dominant thought, test it through true-honorable-just-pure-lovely-commendable-excellent-praiseworthy, replace it with Scripture, and take one concrete step of obedience. We apply it to jealousy, anxiety, and lust—with Scripture-shaped sentences and next steps that shift your focus from running from sin to running toward Christ. Along the way, we celebrate the unity of the body where labels fade and “Christ is all and in all,” and we anchor the whole journey in communion, where we receive what we cannot produce: forgiveness, power, and presence. If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

Legalism creeps in wearing the mask of spiritual ambition. We take on extra rules, elevate our preferences, and forget that Paul calls them shadows while the substance is Christ. Today we sit with Colossians 2 and let its sharp “therefore” reframe everything: don’t let anyone judge you on food, drink, or special days; don’t let anyone disqualify you with ascetic flexes, angel talk, or breathless visions. The gospel cancels the record of debt, disarms rulers, and places you on a podium you did not earn—so stop letting secondary standards steal your joy. We trace how this plays out on the ground. From Peter and John’s calm defiance in Acts 4 to Jesus’ teaching on fasting with the Bridegroom present, we see that wisdom is good, but “Jesus plus” is deadly. Loud voices often rise where Scripture stays quiet; that’s our cue to raise antennas, not new rules. We name the modern list—hair, diets, school choices, entertainment, frequency of communion—and show how majoring on minors wrecks churches, marriages, and friendships. Then we anchor in a picture you won’t forget: two high jumpers choosing two golds. Your gold doesn’t dim because someone else has one; grace multiplies without dividing. If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

A strange question opens a surprising door: why was Jesus baptized if he had no sin? We take that question straight into Colossians 2:11–15 and uncover the heartbeat of the Christian life—union with Christ. Not a slogan, not a side note, but the reality that relocates us into Jesus’ death and resurrection, where our record of debt is canceled and the powers that shamed us are put to open shame. We trace three vivid pictures that make union tangible. First, representation: like David defeating Goliath for Israel, Christ wins and we share the victory. Second, marriage: two become one, and Paul says this mystery points to Jesus and his people—real attachment, not mere agreement. Third, adoption: a Father who delights to give, teaching our anxious hearts to stop storing scraps and trust his table. These images carry us to two signs—spiritual circumcision that marks our belonging to Christ, and baptism that proclaims we are buried with him and raised to new life. Along the way, we press into the engine of it all: through faith, not works. Faith joins us to the righteousness of Another. That changes everything. Penalty is gone because our debt was nailed to the cross. Power is broken because Christ disarmed rulers and authorities. The battlefield that once terrified us becomes ground for courage and joy. Baptism isn’t a box to check; it’s a living map for discipleship—down into death to the old self, up into the newness of life by the Spirit. If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

What if the most dangerous ideas aren’t the obvious lies but the ones that feel like common sense? We walk through Colossians 2 to expose the “plausible arguments” that quietly drain spiritual life, then rebuild on a better foundation: receiving Christ, walking in his Spirit, and abounding in thanksgiving. Along the way, we unpack Paul’s twin qualifiers for a healthy walk—rooted and built up—and why truth without love feels like a threat while love without truth collapses under pressure. We get practical about discernment in a world of experts and 38‑second reels. From the “elemental spirits” of the age to human traditions and slick self-improvement scripts, not everything is false, but the center matters. Instead of treating your soul like a device due for an update, we explore how Jesus gives a new heart and then renews us day by day. Using a “panning for gold” approach, we share how to swirl what you watch and read until the weighty things settle—Scripture, the fruit of the Spirit, tested wisdom—while the chaff washes away. Anchored by Job 28’s aching question—where does wisdom come from?—we point to the fear of the Lord and the fullness of Christ. If all the fullness of deity dwells in him and we are filled in him, then faith can’t be tucked into Sunday; it must shape mind, habits, relationships, and hope. Expect strong takeaways on resisting cultural drift, building convictions that are kind, and practicing a whole-life Christianity that breathes gratitude. If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

What if the point of pain wasn’t punishment but participation? We open Colossians 1:21–23 and hold the phrase “for your sake” up to the light, letting communion re-teach us who we were, who we are, and what we’re becoming. Christ didn’t hand us a map; he stepped into our alienation and reconciled us by his own body and blood so we could be presented holy, blameless, and above reproach. That purpose pulls us beyond a “get out of trouble” faith and into a life that matures, serves, and sacrifices with joy. We talk candidly about continuing in the faith—stable, steadfast, and not shifting—and how the real anchor isn’t our perfect track record but our stubborn grip on the hope of the gospel. Expect spills. The bike isn’t the problem; the rider is learning balance. From confession without hiding to correction without shame, we explore a rhythm of growth that trades coasting for courage. Suffering becomes a classroom where God builds breadth in our love and depth in our character. Along the way, we widen the lens: Paul rejoices in his sufferings “for your sake” and for the sake of the church he may never meet. That’s our call too. We reveal the riches of Jesus to neighbors and nations not with spectacle but with steady, sacrificial presence. We also share how we’re approaching a capital campaign through prayer, not pressure—inviting everyone to move from convenience to discipline to delight in generosity so we can pay down debt, make room to grow, and serve the community with open hands. The window for sacrifice is brief; glory closes it forever. So let’s redeem the moment, hold fast to the gospel, and ride together. If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

What if your 9–5, your Sunday worship, and your hardest relationships were all reshaped by two truths: Jesus leads the church he bled for, and he reconciles all things through his cross? We open Colossians 1:18–20 and Philippians 2 to trace how Christ’s headship and humility give uncommon dignity to ordinary work and real hope to fractured places. We start by dismantling the sacred–secular divide. Drawing from Tim Keller’s insight, we explore why no task is too small to hold the weight of glory when done as an image bearer. Jesus doesn’t lead from a distance; he is the firstborn from the dead, the one who holds all things together and was willing to be torn apart. That love lifts the gathered church beyond routine and calls us to prize the 90 minutes we share—singing one song, opening one Word—as something Christ deeply values. Then we look at Jesus’ work ethic: service, emptying, humility. Philippians 2 invites us to “have this mind,” not as an unreachable ideal but as our new operating system. We live as stewards, not owners; servants, not sovereigns. Instead of clinging to a comfortable middle, we practice a life-giving rhythm—filled to capacity by Scripture and worship, then poured out in generosity, presence, and witness. Built on Christ, not charisma, a church can limp without collapsing because its center holds. Finally, we press into reconciliation. Colossians claims that through the blood of the cross, Christ reunites what sin fractured in heaven and on earth. That promise disarms bitterness, loosens control, and makes forgiveness plausible. It also moves mission close to home: caring not only for the nations but for our neighbors, dwelling with people as Christ dwelt among us. When work feels small, when conflict lingers, when hope thins, we return to the cross—the only place where lasting peace is made. If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

Start with the biggest claim you can make about a person: He is the image of the invisible God. We walk through Colossians 1:15–17 to meet Jesus not as an abstract idea but as the One who made all things, owns all things, and holds all things together—and then we ask what that means for a regular week at work and at home. If everything is by Him, through Him, and for Him, then purpose saturates both the cosmic and the ordinary. We unpack what “firstborn over all creation” really means: not first created, but highest in rank, rightful heir, and head who sets the agenda. That lens turns stewardship into a way of life. Your time, gifts, relationships, and decisions belong to Christ; you manage them under His authority. We trace how this touches discipleship, mission, and everyday obedience, trading ownership for trust and hustle for faithfulness. To right-size our worries, we zoom from ant farms to the Bubble Nebula and back to the heart: the same Christ who flung stars into their places is the Christ who never shrugs at your pain. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together—marriages on the mend, friendships in tension, bodies that ache, plans that change. We look honestly at our limits in authority, holiness, and power, and then locate our worth where it belongs: in the One who represents us and loves us with a permanent, nail-scarred resolve. If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

What if you stopped guessing God’s will like a blindfolded dart throw and started walking in it every day? In Colossians 1:9–14, we unpack Paul’s prayer and discover that guidance isn’t reserved for crises or special moments. It’s the steady result of being filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so we can walk worthy of the Lord and live a life that fully pleases Him. We start by reframing what a “good week” looks like under the supremacy of Christ. Then we lay out God’s general will that applies to every believer: care about souls, pursue sanctification, be filled with the Spirit, silence fools by doing good, and expect suffering to become a platform for the gospel. From there, we move to practical discernment for the 10,000 decisions Scripture doesn’t list—relationships, jobs, school, care for aging parents—using a clear four-step framework: pray to be Spirit-filled, confirm through the Word, evaluate the fruit over time, and invite faithful believers into your process. This approach replaces anxiety with purpose. As we walk this way, Colossians promises real outcomes: we bear fruit in every good work, grow in the knowledge of God, and receive strength according to His glorious might for endurance, patience, and joy. Gratitude rises because the Father has delivered us from darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of His beloved Son, where redemption and forgiveness define our identity. If you’re ready to trade guessing for guidance and activity for fruitfulness, press play, take notes, and let’s walk worthy together. If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.

A man in chains asks for one thing: an open door for the word. From that surprising request, we follow Paul’s greeting to the Colossians into a sweeping vision that can reframe a whole week. We talk candidly about why trying to “be more patient” on a Tuesday often runs on fumes, how starting with the supremacy of Christ changes our reserves, and why hope laid up in heaven becomes fuel for faith and love on the ground. We set the scene in Colossae: a church likely planted through Epaphras, growing but pressured by Gnostic whispers of “secret knowledge” and the lure of legalism. Those old currents have modern twins—spiritual shortcuts and algorithmic certainties that promise answers without wisdom. Against that, Paul centers us on Jesus: supreme over all, sufficient for us, and the true head of the church. From there, we explore calling beyond church walls. Whether you’re a teacher, engineer, parent, or retiree, your daily work can be received as God’s assignment to serve. Scripture threads this theme—from Joseph and Moses to Esther and Jeremiah—reminding us our placement isn’t momentum or accident, but sovereign timing. Grace runs through everything. We unpack five streams—common, special, justifying, sanctifying, and persevering—and how they reshape ordinary choices. We also get practical: praying with coworkers, interceding for churches we pass, and remembering persecuted believers by name even when we can’t pronounce them. Finally, we linger over Paul’s triad: faith grows as we look back at God’s works, hope grows as we look forward to Christ’s future, and love grows as we look around at what God is doing today. The simple question remains: where do you forget to look—and how might hope refuel your faith and love this week? If you want to learn more about the MidTree story or connect with us, go to our website HERE or text us at 812-MID-TREE.