God, at the core of his divine nature, is gracious. This means that God extends his favor to us as a gift, out of his delight in us. This grace is fully expressed in the coming of Jesus, and Christmas is a time to celebrate and receive the grace of God.
Jesus teaches about the importance of forgiving others who have done us harm, even saying that the Father will not forgive us if we don’t forgive. What does this mean? Why is forgiveness so important? How do we practice it? These are questions that Greg explores in this crucial sermon for our times.
God has invited us to be his friends, but what does that actually mean? And how is being God’s friend actually a more mature relationship than being his servant? This sermon addresses these questions and challenges our common notions of friendship with God.
In this sermon of our Blended series, David talks about what we may inherit from our biological ancestors, how these attributes may have shaped the lives of future generations, and how to love our families for who they are, just as God loves us.
As we continue our Christmas series, “Do you See What I See: Looking at How to See Christmas Through God’s Eyes,” we focus on the shepherds. As with most of Luke’s Gospel, being centered on Jesus’ interactions with the marginalized (including the shepherds as a key part of the birth story) is no accident. In Jesus’ day the shepherds as … Read More
In our last sermon in the series Turning the Tables, Greg takes a final look at New Testament passages often appealed to in order to justify violence. This week we examine the Parable of the ungrateful servant.
The underlying theme behind our ‘Glimpses of Truth’ series is the idea that before we had the full revelation of God in Jesus, people only caught glimpses of him. He showed himself, but like the sun on a cloudy day, people’s view was obscured by their culture, so what they saw was not the full revelation but one marred by … Read More
In week three of our ‘Glimpses of Truth’ sermon series we continue to look for portraits of God in the Old Testament that look like Jesus. This week we look at rules. The first five books of the Old Testament alone contain 613 different rules. Using Hebrews 1:1-3 as our springboard we can see that God gave rules to accommodate Israel’s needs as well as to protect and bless. In fact, in Jesus we see the ultimate expression of God’s desire, not for rule following, but for hearts given to Him in love.
As we move toward Christmas during our Across the Universe series, Seth explores what it means when God, the Creator of the universe, calls us home. This message took a look at what home means, and what we’re being invited in to, as seen through the unique lens of the prodigal son. Read More
In this first message of the Love. Walk. Do. sermon series, Greg tackles the first portion of the prophet Micah’s depiction of what God requires of us – to love mercy. Loving mercy means loving it when people don’t get the negative consequences they deserve. If justice is about collecting a debt, then loving mercy is about hating debt collecting. In a very counter cultural depiction of the Kingdom of God, Greg examines how we can’t truly love mercy until we realize the extent to which we depend on it from God. Read More