Matthew 22:34-40. The first thing you’ve got to do to do any improvements in your home is to show up to do the work. If you want change in your family, you have to understand that it's not about you, but it starts with you. Jesus taught us how to make improvements in our homes when he was asked what was the greatest commandment. Jesus answered that the most important commandment, the number one, top priority is to love God with our entire being. But Jesus didn't stop there. He went on to say tha...
May 12, 2024•21 min
Colossians 3:12-13. If you’ve lived even just a little time on earth, you’ve had someone do something to you that hurt, and you’ve done something to someone that hurt them. Forgiveness is something we have to deal with every day, isn’t it? Paul begins Colossians 3 with, "If then you have been raised with Christ". He's writing to Christians and everything that follows verse 1 is all about how Christians are supposed to live. That includes forgiving the way God has forgiven us.
May 05, 2024•31 min
Matthew 9:35-39. If you're already a Christian, what's your story of how you became one? Think about the key people who were in your life who led you to Christ? What if those people had not been in your life? What if they had not taken the time they took with you? What if they had been too busy to talk with you? Would you be a Christian today? One question we can ask to diagnose our spiritual health is to ask ourselves, "Do I care about the lost?" Jesus shows us how much he cared about the lost ...
Apr 28, 2024•30 min
2 Corinthians 7:8-11. The question we’re asking today is, “Do you grieve over sin?”. That’s an important question, because whether you’re a Christian or not, you still sin. But when you sin, the question is does it grieve you? There are two different ways we can feel sorry for our sins, Paul says. One is the way God wants us to feel and the other is the way the world feels sorry for wrong. Godly grief is sorrow for having sinned against God, for having lost God’s approval. But it includes making...
Apr 21, 2024•28 min
Mark 6:30-37. An important part of our Christian lives is to care about the needs of others, which we see in the life and teaching of Jesus. We also see the early church made this a priority. Naturally, we think of caring about the physical needs of others, like food, clothing, or other kinds of material help. But Christians should also help meet the spiritual needs of others. What we see in Scripture is that the church grows when we meet the spiritual and physical needs of others.
Apr 14, 2024•29 min
1 Peter 1:3-11. Have you ever heard someone say they love Jesus, but they don’t like church? Have you ever felt that way yourself? It can sound ideal to pursue a kind of spiritual individualism where loving Jesus is enough and there’s no need for the church. But we’re going to see in the Bible that love for God and his church go together. Peter's command to love one another deeply flows from our new life as a member of God’s family. Loving our brothers and sisters in the Lord’s family are the pr...
Apr 07, 2024•29 min
Hebrews 11:16. There’s a lot to love about traveling and seeing new places. There’s a lot to love about this world. But there’s something the Christian must always remember – that how that hotel room or AirBNB isn’t your real home, this world isn’t our permanent home. The Christian’s real home is in heaven with our Savior. Abraham and all those named in Hebrews 11 were looking not for a new country here on earth, but for a better country found in heaven. But how is it that Christians are able to...
Mar 31, 2024•30 min
1 Timothy 4:7-10. We understand what it means for a person to be focused and disciplined to achieve goals in sports, in music, education, in their career and even in their physical health. We applaud them for their hard work and accomplishments. But do we place the same value on being disciplined spiritually? The most important thing in your life, the most valuable thing you have is your salvation if you are a Christian. That’s what we’re supposed to value the most and work on our spiritual heal...
Mar 24, 2024•34 min
2 Timothy 3:16-17. There are many sayings and sources that want to tell you how to live and offer advice on how to live. In Disney’s Pinocchio movie, Jiminy Cricket said, “Let your conscience be your guide.” A couple of decades later, singer Marvin Gaye sang the song, “Let your Conscience Be your Guide.” Others have said, “Just follow your heart.” Or “Live your truth.” And you can find these restated in different ways by all kinds of influential people in our culture. But the Christian is not su...
Mar 17, 2024•30 min
Psalm 63:1. Going to the doctor is probably not on your list of favorite things to do. Doctors like to ask lots of questions and they also like to run tests. But their reason for doing so is to better diagnose your health. It's important to take care of your physical health. But what's even more important is taking care of your spiritual health. Where you will spend eternity is of utmost importance. The first question we're asking is, "Do you Thirst for God?" and we look at a psalm David wrote a...
Mar 10, 2024•31 min
2 Peter 3:1-18. In our daily lives, we think about waking up and getting ready for the day of school or work or running errands. We think about getting ready for our game, for our recital, or our performance. Then we get ready for dinner and get ready for bed. We get the house ready for company. We get the car ready for the trip. But what Peter has to say in this last chapter is of far greater importance than those daily concerns. It is of eternal importance because it’s about being ready for th...
Mar 03, 2024•28 min
2 Peter 1-2. Maturity is observable. It can be detected and seen. Peter says Christians should, "make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love." Salvation isn’t something you just have internally, and it makes no difference in your life. Salvation changes your life externally too, and...
Feb 25, 2024•32 min
1 Peter 5:1-14. Peter closes this letter with something to say to elders, to younger Christians and to all Christians. One word captures the essence of what Peter is teaching - humility. He says several things about humility including, "Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another" in vs. 5. Christians are supposed to tie themselves up in humility. That's not typically what we see portrayed from social media influencers, celebrities, athletes, politicians and even friends and ...
Feb 18, 2024•33 min
1 Peter 4:1-19. Peter writes to Christians, "Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human passions but for the will of God." Christians are to have a "no matter what" faith. No matter what we suffer for our faith, as Peter discusses, we are to live our lives not according to our passions, but according to the will of God...
Feb 11, 2024•31 min
1 Peter 3:1-22. Peter ends chapter two reminding Christians what Jesus suffered in order to save us from our sins. That by his physical wounds, we have spiritual healing. Then he moves to say some things about relationships in chapter three, and we learn that righteous relationships in the home, in the church and in the world glorify God. And that’s what Peter calls us to – to have righteous relationships.
Feb 04, 2024•30 min
Today was our annual Service Sunday where we put an emphasis on members being fully engaged in the life and work of the church. We had a brief message explaining that we serve the Savior because of the gospel. In other words, because of the saving news of Jesus, we willingly serve him. We spent some time digging into what that looks like. Then, we enjoyed to brief presentations about various areas in the church where members can serve.
Jan 28, 2024•38 min
1 Peter 2:1-25. When you become a Christian, you are saved, but you are not yet all that God has called you to become. Peter calls Christians to become what God intends us to be – to grow spiritually and to be holy in whatever situation we are in and wherever we may live. To live lives of holiness, set apart for God’s service and his glory is what God's people are called to.
Jan 21, 2024•35 min
Ecclesiastes 12:13. If you look throughout all of human history, a common thread you will find is man searching for purpose. And if we're honest with ourselves, we still wrestle with that question, because we all want to find purpose in our lives. When we look at Solomon's words in Ecclesiastes 12:13, we find what we're looking for.
Jan 14, 2024•36 min
1 Peter 1:1-25. Peter, who was very close to Jesus and with him during his ministry, wrote to these Gentile Christians to encourage them to hold on to their hope of heaven during persecutions. But Peter also calls Christians to live lives of holiness. It is our eternal hope that moves us to strive for holiness.
Jan 07, 2024•30 min
2 Corinthians 5:20. As ambassadors for Christ, Christians are supposed to see the opportunity to represent him wherever they go and bring Jesus into the world. When a person becomes a Christian, God gives them a ministry and a message. The ministry is the ministry of reconciliation and the message is the good news of salvation in Christ. We’re at the end of the year. Think about when you come to the end of your life, what will you want to have been true about your life? Will you want to look bac...
Dec 31, 2023•31 min
Mark 10:43-45. When we look at the story of Jesus coming into this world, miraculously born to his mother, Mary, and we understand why Jesus came to earth and believe in him, we can’t help but serve him. Christian's lives are to be marked by service. It's a part of our identity. The Christmas story isn’t about a cute baby, but a mighty Savior. Jesus was born in a manger, but he came for a cross. He came to serve God by giving his life as a ransom for many. So we live in service to him out of tha...
Dec 24, 2023•26 min
Ephesians 5:25-32. When a person becomes a Christian, they enter into a special relationship with Jesus. You are added to his church, which the Bible says is the Bride of Christ. That’s what we’re talking about today. Jesus chose to use the highest expression of commitment between two people to express his commitment to you when you become a Christian. The Bible uses marriage between a husband and wife to show us the kind of relationship we have with Jesus. Your identity then, is wrapped up in h...
Dec 17, 2023•27 min
1 Peter 2:9. The priests who served in the tabernacle had two basic characteristics: They had access to God and they offered sacrifices to God. Today, Christians are the royal priesthood of God. We no longer access God through a priest in the tabernacle, we have direct access to God. We no longer take our animal sacrifice to the priest to offer God for us, we offer God spiritual sacrifices by how we serve and worship him. Our spiritual sacrifices include our bodies, our praise and our good works...
Dec 10, 2023•32 min
2 Corinthians 6:18. When you were conceived and then born into this world, you became a child to your parents. You belong to their family. In that sense, all people are children of God because he is the one who creates us, and we are born into this world. But a Christian is both the created child of God and the recreated child of God because they are made new, or born again, in Christ.
Dec 03, 2023•26 min
2 Corinthians 5:17. Culture tells you, “You are what you possess, you are the image you project, and you are what your status is.” These external, worldly measurements will always shift and change. Take those away and who are you? Our true identity needs to come from something more stable and sure than that. We can bounce around constantly trying to find our identity in the fleeting and temporary or we can find our identity in God, which is true and lasting. This series is about the Christian's ...
Nov 26, 2023•30 min
Mark 15:1-16:20 The whole gospel of Mark has led up to this point where Jesus would complete his mission of bringing us salvation. Mark will fully reveal Jesus to be the Christ, the Son of God who died on the cross for our sins and then was raised by the power of God. We learn that we have salvation in the Son of God by his death, his resurrection and by believing in him. Finally, we see in Acts 2 what people did when they believed this wonderful message of Jesus.
Nov 19, 2023•33 min
Mark 14:12-25 Jesus and and his disciples will celebrate the Passover meal, which goes back generations for the Jewish people as they remembered God's salvation from Egyptian slavery. Except tonight is different. Jesus will change everything. Tonight he will give them the Lord's Supper which will commemorate his death that will save believers from the slavery of sin and death.
Nov 12, 2023•27 min
Mark 11:1-11 The triumphal entry, as it’s called, is when Jesus entered Jerusalem on a Sunday at the beginning of his last week on Earth. All that is written in the gospels has been leading up to this week. He has told his disciples three times now that this time was coming. Now it was time for this to be fulfilled. This story is called the “Triumphal Entry” because Jesus enters Jerusalem triumphantly as a king. But it doesn’t look like that to us, at first. So, what is so important about this m...
Nov 05, 2023•31 min
Mark 10:1-31 The Pharisees try to trap Jesus in the hotly debated subject of divorce, but he takes marriage back to God's creation and intent and shows the Pharisees the hard heartedness of the people. A young rich man asks Jesus what else he needs to do to inherit eternal life and Jesus points out something in his heart that is still holding him back. But in between these two moments is the story of the children coming to Jesus. Jesus says something to us about marriage and money in this moment...
Oct 29, 2023•26 min
Mark 8:27-9:13 Mark gives us a fascinating behind the scenes look at how Jesus was teaching the disciples to increase their faith in him, to see him more clearly for who he is and to truly believe what he says. The message also points to us. Do we see Jesus clearly? Do we listen to what he says about himself and surrender ourselves to him?
Oct 22, 2023•30 min
