I spoke recently on Zoom to St. David’s Church in Exeter and their Thrive community. It was a great afternoon, so I wanted to share my talk with all of you as well. Please accept my apologies for the lack of eye contact, I recorded this video using a separate device to Zoom, so I never looked at the camera.
In this talk I explore how Jesus reframes our narrative from “What is wrong with you?” to “What happened to you?”, the expanded meaning of “sin” and “forgiveness” that Jesus uses in Luke 5, and how confession is vital to us creating communities that help people find freedom and healing. I finish with a couple of tips on what to do if life is too dark to see God right now. I hope and pray that this is an encouragement to you.
Matt Merriam 
Hi matt
How are you guys doing? I just listened to your talk on creating communities of healing. The book you’re reading sounds interesting. I’m in the middle of reading “the body keeps the score” by bessel van der kolk and he also stresses the importance of communities to help us heal. He says that when we go through trauma, we lose connection with ourself (things like amnesia, dissociation, sensory processing issues) and we lose connection with people around us. Healing comes by reconnecting and community helps us to do that. I share your sense of hope that church can be that kind of healing community if we take time to ask “what happened to you?” instead of judging and thinking “what’s wrong with you?” I found it interesting to hear the origins of the words used and to learn that the word for forgiveness means “released” or “sent away”. It makes me think of the passages about our sins being sent “as far as the east is from the west” or the scapegoat from leviticus symbolically carrying our sins and taking them far far away never to be seen again. I would have loved to see you mention more about HOW our sins are released/sent away – taking time to reflect on the beauty of our loving Saviour who cares so much about us and the things that are destroying us that He was willing to pay the highest price for our release! Lovely to see your face and hear your voice. Your accent has got slightly more British haha. Would love to see you all in person sometime. We no longer have a car but perhaps a train ride to a beach near you?
How’s things going with your church? Did you manage to resolve things or did the time come to walk away? Continuing to pray for you all.
Stacey x