Watch/Listen
Topic: Love
The Enemy Within
Jesus gives us the greatest commandment, to love God, and to love our neighbor as ourselves. We’ve all heard this command, but we tend to resist the basis for loving our neighbors — loving ourselves. The “small story” we often live in focuses on what we’ve done, what was done to us, and what we dislike about ourselves. The Big Story is the eternal perspective. It includes not only us, but what God has done, is doing, and will do through us. In Christ, we are to see our story as part of the Big Story. With God’s help we can embrace this process to overcome the evil within. Read More
The Incarnational Community
Central to Greg’s message today was that the incarnation was not simply a historical act that ended at Christ’s ascension. It goes MUCH further than that! The Church IS the Body of Christ – we are the hands, the feet, the ambassadors, the temple, the Body through which God works. Therefore, we must share Christ’s attitude summed up by this phrase: be present, in love, without judgment. Read More
The Kingdom’s King
Lately, Greg has been talking about the importance of being “awake” and “single-minded.” In this sermon he discussed how both of these things are understood most fully in Christ. He focused on Christ’s compelling love and the distinction between saying that you believe something and allowing a truth to penetrate so deep into your very being that it compels you. Read More
Kingdom Single Mindedness
Willing just one thing, the love of God, is our only task. Our hearts are pure and our minds are sound when we overcome the double-mindedness that we unconsciously live in by submitting to God (James 4:7). Greg called our attention to how our minds are caught up in routines that produce behavior that is harmful to ourselves and others. Working toward kingdom single mindedness moment by moment will focus our energy where it should be: on the love of God for us and on loving ourselves and others because of it. Read More
Kingdom Consciousness
Greg compares life to a “magic eye” picture: if we focus on the immediate appearance of things, life is very busy and active, even chaotic. But if we are able to see what’s in the depth of life, we begin to see Jesus. We see the love of God manifest in ways and in places that we might never have thought possible. We begin to develop “an eye for the kingdom of God,” or what Greg calls “Kingdom Consciousness.” To behold the kingdom of God requires an intentional awareness. Read More
Love in Truth and Action
In this final sermon of Dwayne’s “Wounded Healer” series, he discussed how our character cannot be divorced from our actions; how we choose to act reflects who we are. 1 John 3:11-18 provides God’s ideal for us – nothing less than perfection! The author of 1 John asks us whether we will behave like Cain or like Abel. Dwayne challenged us to think about the difference between simply responding appropriately when we see that others have needs and actually dying for someone, which is what God demands. Read More
As Christ Loves Us
Dwayne delivered a powerful message that challenged us to love as Christ loved us. We frequently emphasize the fact that we should love one another and what “the loving thing to do” might be. But this message had to do not with the “that” or even the “how” but the “why.” Our motivation for any act should be love, which requires that we have a heart that is responsive to the prompting of the Spirit of God. Read More
The Wounded Healer
Our wounds (emotional, physical, psychological, spiritual) in no way disqualify us from ministry. In fact, God often uses our healing experiences to assist others who are suffering from similar wounds. Dwayne affirmed this truth for us by appealing to its scriptural basis and by sharing a personal experience as a wounded healer. Read More
"Thank you all the way from Oregon. I deeply appreciate being shepherded by Pastor Greg and everyone else on the panels. You are a rare find in the church nowadays. Tackling tough questions with humility and a kingdom perspective. It has been life changing for me in such tumultuous times."
– Heather, from Oregon