Category: From the Pastor’s Desk

Last week we dug into the question, “What is success in parenting?” (watch here if you missed it) and we looked at God’s teaching on the matter.  This week, with that target in mind , we will discuss strategies for teaching our children’s life’s most valuable truths. Now if that statement brought and eye roll because you think I will suggest adding some formal program to your already packed schedule, don’t tune me out yet!  That is not the purpose of this message.  Rather, I am suggesting that we take a look at many of the things we are already doing …

What does it mean to be a successful parent?  So often we are just caught up in surviving that we forget to consider the end goal.  We are so focused on what we are doing that we don’t think about why we are doing it.  In this message we want to address the question of our goal as parents and begin the process of looking at how to reach it.  I hope you will join us for this important mini-series.  I believe it will be helpful for everyone, whether you are currently a parent or not.

What are some barriers that prevent people from hearing the Gospel of Jesus Christ?  What are some barriers that prevent us from sharing the Gospel with certain people? Today, we want to discuss some of the answers to these two questions and address them with a third question: “What would Jesus do?”  You see, Jesus gave us a great pattern to follow in the Gospel of John.  We want to look at that account and learn from the Master.  Join us as we hear the call to address the barriers holding people back from meeting Jesus.

What prevents many Christians from sharing the life-giving, world-changing news of the Gospel?  What is it that keeps us from sharing God’s grace in personal, powerful ways?   It is fear. Now sometimes fear is a good, God-given gift  for the purpose of preserving our life.  More often than not, however, it becomes an excuse to keep us from doing what we should.  Fear holds us back from so many good actions and thereby prevents us and others from experiencing God’s blessings.  In the Bible, in the book of Proverbs we read ” The lazy man says, ‘There is a lion …

“We love because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19) or you could say “We Grace Bomb because He first Bombed us”  In my last message I introduced the idea of sharing God’s grace through Grace Bombs.  But why would anyone want to give a surprise, generous gift to someone they might not even know, someone who has never done anything for them? The above passage from the Bible tells us why.  Jesus was the first and ultimate Grace Bomber.  He gave Himself for us.  He loved us in spite of our rebellion against Him, in spite of all the …

We tend to think of relationships as transactions: we give to get.  But if you have put your trust in Jesus Christ alone to deliver you from sin and lead you, you have experienced grace – getting something that we neither paid for nor ever have the capacity to repay.  You have experienced what it means to be grace built. The gift, however, is not meant to stop there.  God has blessed us to bless others.  In the Bible, in the book of Ephesians, God said, “we are His [God’s] workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God …

What is your faith system like?  What is yours like?  Is it big enough to answer the hard questions?  Can it sustain you when the bottom falls out in your life? We all have a faith system. Whether it is secular humanism, which puts faith in things like chance, the goodness of man, and the ability of science to answer our questions, or whether it is a faith that believes in one or more deities, we all have faith in something.  This message is about faith in the God of the Bible.  Faith that is based on what God’s Word …

This week we wrap up our series with an in-depth look at one of the most essential elements of God’s training for us.  Some people take full advantage of this crucial aspect of Christianity, others despise it, to their own loss. I am speaking of the church.  As believers, we are all part of the universal church, made up of all believers from Pentecost to the Rapture.  Most of the time, however, when the Bible uses the Word Church, it refers to the local church.  God intends for us to function in locally organized assemblies.   We are told not to …