Category: Sermons

What kind of reputation do you have? If we were to ask your friends or people who know you, what kind of reputation would they say you have? Reputation can be based on fact or fallacy or a bit of both mixed together. Your reputation can also change. Galilee and Nazareth both had a reputation depending on who you talked to. Joseph and Mary also developed reputations. Joseph had one opinion about Mary, which changed when he found out she was pregnant, and then it changed again when he found out the truth about how it happened. It’s possible that some still held an erroneous reputation about them for many years. But the real truth is centered around the fact that Mary was the chosen vessel by which God would enter this world as an infant. He is the one of whom the angel said would save His people from their sins. You can believe what you want about Jesus, but the truth is found in the Word of God. He is our hope of salvation.

What is your view of time? Most of us probably think we don’t have enough of it. There never seems to be enough time to get everything done on our list. We may even conclude that what we don’t get done today, can be done tomorrow, but none of us is guaranteed tomorrow. Our view of time is certainly different than God’s view of time. He is ever so patient for just the right time. That’s what we find out in our passage, which tells us that He sent His Son at just the right time to redeem us so that we could become part of His forever family. It’s a guarantee that was sealed by the Holy Spirit. If you don’t know Christ as your Savior, today is the time for you to make that all important and eternal decision. Do it while you still have time.

The psalmist invites us to sing a new song. Not necessarily one that is new because it was just written, but one that is new because every day we wake up with a new sense of wonder at God and the salvation He has given us. One that is new because His mercies are new today. One that is new because we revel in the fact that we were made a new creation through Christ. This psalm tells us we are to sing with passion, sing with purpose, and sing with perspective. One day Christ is going to return and that is something we can sing about now. His reign will be with holiness. What a day of rejoicing that will be.

Do you have different clothes that you wear in public from what you wear at home or when you’re working outside? I do. Paul tells us that when it comes to our character there should be one set of clothes. We should wear the character of Christ wherever we are and in whatever we are doing. Do people see His character reflected in everything you do? It should be evident. In that way, God gets the praise.

I love your new car. I love to eat at this restaurant. I love your outfit. I love to watch the sunset. I love my spouse. Those are all things we say we love and we mean different things by them. From the text in I Peter 1:22-2:3 Rev. Dan Green talks about two things that we should absolutely love. From what Peter tells us in this passage we should love the saints and we should love the Word of God. When it comes to the things you love, where are those two on the list?

When you pray, do you include thanks to God for others? Do you thank Him for their faith? Do you thank Him for their love for others? Do you thank Him for the hope they have in what is yet to come? Paul did. He was grateful to God for what he had heard from his friend and fellow servant Epaphras. Yet Paul has somethings that he prayed for on their behalf. He wanted them to grow in understanding the will of God and to be strengthened in their faith. Those are things we can pray about for each other as we give God thanks. It’s my prayer for you.

In this message, Elias Abdi, missionary with Child Evangelism Fellowship, shares from Acts 16 about Paul’s call to go into Macedonia with the gospel. While there, he had a conversation with an influential woman who worshipped God but needed to know about salvation. After hearing Paul’s explanation about her need for a Savior and she responded in faith. Following that experience, Paul and his traveling companion Silas, were imprisoned. While giving praise to God through prayer and singing, the jail was rocked causing all the doors to break open. Through their testimony afterward to the jailer, he and his whole family came to believe in Christ. The Word of God has the power for salvation. Do you have faith to believe what it says about your need for a Savior?

In our passage today we are reminded by Paul that we are to pursue unity in the body of Christ. He shows us how our walk is displayed and then defined. It’s displayed by having a walk of humility, of gentleness, of patience, of bearing with others in love. When we let the Spirit of God develop those in us, the result is peace.

Another aspect of this unity is in the giftedness of the believer. The church has been given gifted men to lead them to spiritual maturity so that they in turn would use their spiritual gift to benefit the rest of the body of Christ so that they are motivated to spiritual maturity, the result of which is unity.

How are we doing?

How do we live victoriously in a world that challenges our faith or opposes it altogether? Paul shows us that there is divine enablement. My toaster requires a source of power to enable it to cook my bagel. If we aren’t tapped into the resources available to us, we will not mature in our faith. Get plugged in.

In this final psalm written by David, he gives us three reasons for praising God – praise God for His deity by looking at His worth, His wonder, and His works; praise God for His dominion that exalts His attributes, His acts, and His affection; and praise God for His deliverance based on His character and our cries. God is worthy of all our praise for who He is and what He has done. This praise isn’t for us alone. We are to include others in an anthem of praise. We are also to pass on that praise to succeeding generations. Praise God from whom all blessings flow.