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In the book of Acts, Peter summarizes a good portion of Jesus’ earthly ministry: “And you know that God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. Then Jesus went around doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him” (Acts 10:38).


We see Jesus healing many as we continue our study in Mark 6. How could anyone find fault with Jesus of Nazareth for going about doing good with God’s anointing? The Pharisees could—and did. They made it their mission to find fault with Jesus. These religious leaders from Jerusalem were devoted to preserving the culture of Judaism instead of Scripture.

Somewhere along the way, they began to believe that their culture was more important than Scripture. Too often, we are guilty of the same thing. We too sanctify our own preferences or write our own set of rules, or preserve our own culture at the expense of Scripture.

When we do, we need to heed the warning Jesus gives us in Mark 7. Watch or listen to our study from Sunday and learn how legalism always fails to accomplish what only love can.

Join us this Sunday as we continue our study in the Gospel of Mark (and read ahead)! Our worship service starts at 10am. We meet in-person; online at live.refuge.mn; and on 96.1 FM (https://refuge.fm)

Read Ahead!

Our ministry is very simple ministry. Every Sunday morning, we go through the Bible chapter by chapter, and verse by verse. We pick up where we left off from the week before (Lord willing).

We work though the word this way so that you can study ahead. It gives you an opportunity to read and study the portion during the week that we’ll be going though on a Sunday. Then on Sundays, you’ll get that much more out of our time together.

We encourage everyone to have some sort of intentional effort to read through the entirety of the scriptures on your own (Three and One is a great way to do this). Read through the Bible. Talk to Jesus before (and after) you study. Look at what the text says, consider what it means, and find ways to apply what you’ve read to your life. Then ask God to help you walk it out by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Then join us on Sundays to study a small portion of the Scriptures. This Sunday, we’ll pick up where we left off in Mark 7:24.

Check out our Bible study resource page with links to some wonderful Bible teachers, free online resources to help study, and a short & simple break-down of the inductive Bible study method.

Serving at Refuge

As a fellowship, we are called to love and serve one another by the grace God has given to us.

There are many opportunities to serve at Refuge. Are you interested?

To get started, please fill out our online volunteer sign-up form and we'll connect with you.

K-5th Proverbs 3 Study

We've been working our way though Proverbs 3 with the K-5th graders at Refuge. It's a wonderful chapter full of applications and insights into the character of God!

Part of our time with the kids is working on memorizing the chapter. It's a venture of faith, but one that we hope will bless the kids and their walk with the Lord. To help with memorizing, two awesome ladies have set the scripture (NLT version) to a tune and created actions that we've been reviewing with the kids during our time together Sundays. This video is our first take and it only covers the first 8 verses—we hope to make another version available soon with better quality and more verses but wanted to share what we have.

Even if your K-5th child accompanies you during Sunday services, we hope this video will be a blessing to you and your family as you work with your child to hide God's word in their heart. If you have any questions, feel free to connect with Pastor Nate at nate@refuge.mn.

Connect with us on our website and on other social media platforms.

We’ve updated our Instagram account to match our name change. We are now @refuge.mn

Our hearts are desperately sick, wicked, and deceitful (Jeremiah 17:9). In an attempt to tame our sick, wicked, and deceitful hearts, we are tempted to turn to legalism, hoping to earn God’s favor through outward rules, regulations, religion, and traditions.

The problem is, legalism doesn’t work. Ever. It can’t heal a desperately sick heart, let alone control it. If outward rules and regulations, and religion and traditions can’t tame a sick, wicked, and deceitful heart, what can be done?

We must be given a new heart. And if you are in Christ, He has given you a new heart…in addition to your old heart, your old nature that is “continually corrupted by its sinful desires” (Ephesians 4:22). Your old nature is still lurking, still deceiving, still desperately sick as it continually corrupts.

Figuring out how to walk in your new nature as a new creation is extremely important. But there is hope—“Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16). What a promise!