Daniel Study / Fun Stuff

Moved to Prayer

What impact does watching the news have on you? What impact does the Word of God have on you?  Sometimes, it should be the same – intense prayer.  The pain, suffering, and depravity we see on the news should drive us to call out to God.  The wonder, awe, and terror that come from getting a good view of God and ourselves through the Scriptures should also drive us to God.  In fact, the more we thoughtfully read God’s Words, the more we see the world through His eyes, and the more we will want his intervention in it. Daniel …

Daniel Study / From the Pastor's Desk / Sunday Sermons

Help for Understanding God’s Ways

When things go bad in the world, we often start to wonder what God is doing. Why is He allowing so many problems, so much trouble? We are tempted to think, to worry, that maybe God has faded from the scene or stopped caring. Because He knows our humanness and our tendencies, God has taken steps to prepare us for bad times. He has always done that for His people. Over the next few weeks, we are going to see this as we continue our study in Daniel. We are not just going to look at the “what” of prophecy, …

Daniel Study / Sunday Sermons

From Disillusionment to Joy

“He is Risen!” was not the first words some of the disciples said when they heard about the empty tomb.  Most were saying “He is Missing!”.  Maybe that is how you feel sometimes.  Sometimes  we expect God to show up in a certain way: heal a friend, fix a problem, calm this chaotic world.  Sometimes He does just what we hoped but sometimes He doesn’t.  Does it mean He is missing?  Has He failed?  Does He not really care? That is how many of the disciples felt.  Their world was turned upside down when they saw Him die on the …

Daniel Study / Sunday Sermons

Customs and Convictions

Probably the most familiar story from the book of Daniel is his rescue from the lions den.  Are you familiar with it?  Daniel’s excellence gets him a promotion and that brings great jealousy among his peers.  They set out to ruin him but the job is hard because he is too good so they… you’ll just have to join us to hear the whole story. The message today, however, is not just telling a great, true story, it’s about what we can learn from it.  How we respond in a tough situation has everything to do with our character and …

Daniel Study / From the Pastor's Desk / Sunday Sermons

Learning from other’s mistakes . . . or not

George Santayana said: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”.  It might be more accurate to say, “Those who don’t learn from the past are condemned to repeat it” because it is possible to know something without really benefitting from that knowledge.  I’m afraid I can testify that it happens a lot.  It is not good enough to know, we have to act on what we know. In Daniel 4 we saw Nebuchadnezzar learn a very important lesson by a very difficult means.  God had to drive him from the throne with a bout of insanity …

Daniel Study / From the Pastor's Desk / Sunday Sermons

How do you handle success?

We often hear that difficult times are what reveals a person’s true character, but I think that prosperous times might be just as telling, just as likely to produce a fall.  How a person handles success and prosperity is just as telling of there character than how they handle a trial.  Maybe more so. In the midst of a trial, we feel our weaknesses and they often drive us to help. In the midst of successes, however, we tend to only see our strengths and accomplishments and can be blind to dangerous weaknesses and tendencies that may ruin us.  This …

Daniel Study / Sunday Sermons

In Your Eyes, How Big is Your God?

One way we know very quickly how big our God is to us is when we have to chose between Him and something else, especially if that something else is our life. In America, in our lifetimes, it has been very rare that someone has had to choose between their allegiance to God and their life.  It has happened, but it has been rare.  More often, we have to chose on a much smaller scale how important, how big, our God is to us, but how we answer the little questions indicate how we would answer the big one. In …

Daniel Study / From the Pastor's Desk / Sunday Sermons

Trusting the God Who Holds the Future

Can anyone accurately tell the future?  Even more significantly, can anyone control the distant future, especially as it concerns world events? If you met such a person, would you trust them? Daniel chapter 2 clearly states that no human can tell the future.  It also states, however, that God can.  In fact, He doesn’t just know it, He controls it.  He has also chosen to make some of it known to us.  This week I think we will begin to see why the book of Daniel is known for its prophecy.  Chapter two of Daniel tells us about Nebuchadnezzar’s prophetic …

Daniel Study / From the Pastor's Desk / Sunday Sermons

The Importance of One

Do you feel frustrated and helpless when watching the news, wondering what you can possible do to bring good in such a dark time?  What can one person do? Do you feel small in a world where powerful companies and superstars seem to dominate everywhere? Do you feel insignificant when you look at the talented, beautiful, handsome, skilled, wealthy, (the list goes on and on) people around you? The message planned for this weeks service (1/17 @ 10:45) is all about the power, value, and influence of one person.  It’s not about being a superhero or a millionaire or a …

Daniel Study / From the Pastor's Desk / Sunday Sermons

Handling an Impossible Situation

Sometimes we can find ourselves faced with a crisis that just appears out of the blue.  Maybe it is a sudden health emergency, the unwelcome news of a job ending abruptly, a fire, a family member in trouble, or a crisis at work that you have to deal with unexpectedly.  What do you do?  What is your way of handling crisis?  Do you clam up, withdraw, become frantic, get angry, or dig a hole and hide? How should we handle a crisis, a problem, a roadblock? This message today looks at a situation that Daniel and his friends were suddenly …