We use the word love to mean many things. But the love of God for us primarily means the intentional choice to think and do what is kind, good, and best for another. God made the choice to love us, to do for us what is best. That is why Jesus came!

In Jesus we remember and celebrate that He is our source of great joy. In this world we all face various trials of various sizes. But in Jesus we have everlasting joy offered to us in spite of our sufferings.

We often times think of peace as the absence of conflict. And that is true. But it’s incomplete. Peace, as understood by the Biblical word peace, is both an absence of conflict, and the presence of flourishing. It is thriving free of stress and worry. And in Jesus we have peace with God, with one another, and within ourselves.…

As was revealed to Simeon in Luke 2, Jesus coming to us to live just like us brings the fullness of Hope to believers. Even when we don't have the answers for why things feel hopeless, we can know our Savior stood in the same, difficult circumstances we too stand in. Our God is one who knows our heartache and gives true Hope!…

Paul is addressing Jewish Christians in Rome to remind them that they are not "better than" the lost without the power of Christ. We have all sinned and are separated from God, but praise Jesus who lowered himself so we might be made righteous! Remember His holiness at work in you when interacting with others.…

Paul is eager to preach the Gospel, for it is salvation from the wrath of God against all ungodliness and unrighteousness. In communicating the good news, Paul wants to help people see the bad news they are living in apart from the Gospel. The bad news being, that we walked away from God, and He let us have our way.…

In John 20, the power of Jesus is on display as he calls the name of Lazarus and he comes out of the tomb. We see here that anything is possible when Jesus calls our name. So, how will you respond?

As Paul begins the body of his letter, he starts by telling the Romans why he is so eager to see them in person. He wants to mutually build one another up and reap a harvest among them by preaching the Gospel. The gospel according to Paul is the secret ingredient that brings life and helps a person grow, and Paul is obligated to, eager to, and unas…

Around the year 55 AD, Paul writes and sends a letter to the church in Rome to help explain the gospel of God so that the church will respond with gospel-fueled obedience - to His glory and their good.

As the story of Esther concludes, we see a great and remarkable reversal take place. What was meant for evil, the Lord turned and leveraged for good. And as people we are instructed and reminded to remember who God is and what He has done on our behalf.

God is a God who saves, who comes to our rescue. And the natural, and appropriate response to our rescue is rejoicing and gratitude.

Whether in this life, or the next, God will always oppose the proud, and lift up the humble. For His glory and the good of all people.

At all times, God is faithfully at work to fulfill His promise and lead us to abundant life in Him. Even when we cannot see Him, even when we don’t acknowledge Him, God is faithfully working for our good. For us, the questions are: Will we trust Him? And will we live in such a way to be ready and be used by Him?…

God’s desire has never been for us to settle, to become complacent. God is always interested in us pouring our lives out, here and now, for the increase of His kingdom and for the good of others around us. We believe God is on the move in our body and is calling us to set roots in our city where we can multiply, increase, and bless others around us…

God is a God who relentlessly pursues every single one of us. God is a God who diligently seeks after us. Until we are found. Do we share the same heart as God? Do we relentlessly pursue the one that is in our life and needs to know and find life in Jesus?

We want to be a church, a people, of overflowing, cheerful generosity, giving generously of what we have first generously received from God. We must be these people! Overflowing, cheerful generosity is the way of God, and should be the way of His people – to His glory, to the good of others, and to our own good as well.…

In closing this short letter, warning believers of false teaching creeping into the body of Christ, Jude directs our gaze back to Christ. Praise be to the Christ who presents us blameless to The Father with great joy!

As a people called to live under and contend for truth, we must keep ourselves in the love of God, while always showing mercy to those outside of faith and doing whatever we can to bring salvation to all.

While the church is meant to be a safe haven for all, there are those who seek to destroy it from the inside by luring us away from Christ. In this passage, Jude reminds his listeners of the dangers of those who deceive God's people, and he offers guidance for how to identify them from among the flock.…

God is gracious, merciful and kind. But God is also just, Righteous Judge, and wrathful towards sin. This is good, right, and loving. We have the opportunity to repent and return. The choice is ours.

If a danger has entered into your presence, you can’t just sit idly by, but you must oppose it. This is the situation Jude is writing about. A dangerous and insidious faction has entered the community - perverters of grace - and it is imperative that they oppose lies for Truth.

Life comes with many challenges. Obeying the LORD even at times is challenging. That’s not a bad thing. It’s actually a good thing. We grow and learn more in the challenge than in the easy. The good news is that even as we traverse forward through various challenges, in the footsteps of the LORD we already have victory. He is a King, and His is a k…

“But from this day on I will bless you.” What does it mean to be blessed by God? How do we get God’s blessing? Do we have to obey to get God’s blessing? The Israelites, in trusting and obeying, were blessed by God. We will be too.

What do we do when the road of obedience ahead of us seems too big to handle? What do we do when we feel small and dejected and defeated? When we are afraid of all that could go wrong? We look to and lean into the One who is bigger than any challenge and obstacle set before us. We keep moving forward no matter what, trusting that God is with us and…

As people created for connection, we must learn the ways that God informs us to form, build, and keep those relationships. Today we look at the Biblical commands to honor one another, and to speak what is true and good to and of one another.

Maya Angelou once said, “People will forget what you did; they’ll forget what you said. But they’ll never forget how you made them feel.” People long to feel connected, long to belong, long to feel seen, wanted, valued. Nothing can make a person feel the complete opposite than not being welcomed in, not being show hospitality. In showing hospitalit…

Probably one of the most difficult topics to discuss, loving one another. Something that is so simple, yet so complex. How is it that we are supposed to love one other then, and where can we get the power to love those around us? Listen as we look through scripture to see how the Spirit alone empowers us to truly love one another!…

We are created for connection. We all long for, because we are designed this way, deep, lasting, secure relationships. But how do we build these friendships? How do we keep them? What do we do? First, we need to look to Jesus and trust Him as friend. But then, we need to commit to being the friend to others that we hope they will be to us.…

Jesus wants us to know and be known by him deeply. In this sermon, we look at how Jesus views friendship with him, ad how we are to pursue that connection everyday.

Every single person desires to have deep, safe, lasting relationships. We all want to know and be known. And that’s because we are created for connection. In order to both survive, and thrive, we need relational connection with others. Both God and others. So how do we do this? Build, keep, nurture relational connection?…

When we die, we will all face judgement before God. What will He say when we are judged? Guilty, or Righteous (Innocent)? We all know that we are not perfectly innocent before God. So what is our hope? Easter. The death and resurrection of Jesus to pay the price for our sins and justify us, make us right with God.…

There are many things in life that can give us a blurry vision of who Jesus is. No matter what those things are for you, Mark 8 shows us that Jesus’s desire is that you may see him clearly for who he is! He tells us that when we deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow him, we see him clearly for who he fully is and get to live in the victory …

Sometimes, God will call us to receive from others. Sometimes God will call us to give to others. In both giving and receiving, we are to be in need. Why? So that we will learn experientially that He is the one who meets all our needs. So that we can learn to do all things - have or have not - in Christ who strengthens us.…

As we press on to know and become like Jesus, we must learn the ways of following Jesus. Rejoice, be reasonable, do not be anxious but rather pray, think about what is good and right. As we establish these rhythms of life, we will better know and become like Jesus.

In our journey to know Jesus and become like Him, we must stand firm, knowing there is an adversary who wants nothing more than to steal, kill, and destroy. We must be willing to identify and correct any weak points by which the enemy could attack. One of those weak points - disunity. We must agree in the Lord for the sake of knowing Jesus and beco…

By nature, we are creatures who observe, are influenced by, and then imitate others. It’s how God formed us. Which is why it is so so important to choose wisely who and what we let influence us and who / what we imitate. Since something is influencing us, we want to make sure we are being influenced toward Jesus, and not away from Him.…

We all have goals and ambitions in life. But there is one ambition that is greater than all - knowing Christ. Since we are all a work in progress when it comes to knowing and becoming like Jesus, what do we do? We press on. We intentionally and relentlessly pursue knowing and becoming like Jesus.

How do you know you’re getting the real thing? No one wants to be duped in anything. How do we know that we truly have a relationship with God? Jesus, only Jesus. Jesus is our only and certain hope. Nothing else will do.

Our created purpose is to reflect God’s image with our lives, to become like Jesus. As Paul said in Philippians 2:12, we are to work out our salvation, put in the work to become like Jesus. Ok, I’m in. Now what? What does that look like? “Do everything without grumbling or disputing”. A life free of grumbling and disputing is a life that trusts and…

We all follow the lead of something, or someone that we believe is true, right, good and best for our lives. It’s just naturally how we are made. But what if we are following the wrong thing? Jesus invites us to follow Him, be His disciple, and thus find life.

Joy is a feeling of happiness, pleasures, and gladness. God is for our joy! In fact, He commands us to rejoice, to pursue and choose joy in our lives. But how? How do we feel joy? How do we pursue joy? “Behold”, the angel said, “I bring you good news of great joy for all people.” In the birth of Jesus, joy came to us. May we be filled with eternal …

The Bible defines peace both as the absence of conflict AND the presence of wholeness. Who doesn’t want peace? We all do! Where does this peace come from? How do we get it? That first Christmas, Jesus was born, and He was called by Isaiah, the Prince of Peace. If we want to know peace, it starts and ends with Jesus.…

Advent is time of waiting, watching, anticipating Jesus. He came once, as promised. And He will come again, as promised. This is a sure and certain hope. In the resurrection and ascension of Jesus, we have a steadfast hope to lean on and carry us to the end. Jesus is our hope.

Paul continues his message to the Philippians that with their whole lives, become like Jesus, work out your salvation. It’s God who first works for us and then continually in us, so that we can actually work out what He has worked in.

In order to live lives worthy of the Gospel of Jesus, lives of loving God and loving others, we must do nothing out of selfish ambition, and everything out of other ambition. We must learn how to consider others as more significant than ourselves and look to their interest and not just our own.

The Church in Philippi faced real, tangible persecution. Paul’s call the them was to be unified by their likeness in Christ to stand firm in the face of persecution. When the church is unified in Christ, His good news is illuminated through them. He is worth whatever cost comes from being unified in Him. We can learn so much from what Paul is teach…

"When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” This proverb speaks to hope, to optimism, to finding good in a sour situation. Paul, while writing in prison, being afflicted by others who should be brothers, potentially facing the death penalty, is still living a life of joy. How? Because what makes a good day for Paul is being able to honor Christ. A…

Philippians is known to be a letter written with much joy. Why so much joy? Because of love in action. The Philippians are practitioners of love, which compels Paul to pray that they would abound in more and move love. May we be practitioners of love and ask God for love to abound in us, and in others.…

The letter to the Philippians was written by Paul, with the help of Timothy, for the purpose of encouraging the church in Philippi to joyfully live their lives in a manner worthy of Christ while maintaining unity and taking every opportunity to advance the gospel of Jesus.

Faith is belief that moves us to action. Faith is not real faith unless it moves us to trust and live according to that belief. Habakkuk is faced with a decision in the midst of calamity: will he trust and follow God even though God’s ways are not how he would have imagined? Spoiler alert - Habakkuk remains in faith. How? What kept Habakkuk faithfu…