February 26, 2023 | Ephesians 4:11-16 |
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In Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, he gave them a vision for being a church that builds up believers in love, growing them to spiritual maturity in Christ Jesus. We can get a vision for being built up in love, growing up to spiritual maturity in Christ Jesus.
February 12, 2023 | 1 John 4:7-21 |
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All along, we are being shaped by these various relationships. We seek acceptance, but we are so bent and broken by sin, that we often experience rejection and in like manner, cause others to feel rejected by us. This is the human condition apart from God. We are all deeply wounded relationally. We are hurt. And hurt people, hurt people.
We’re relationally broken and only a right relationship with God through Jesus Christ can heal us and renovate our relationships. And what is the chief way that God moves to heal us? Love. In the apostle John’s first letter, he wrote to encourage believers to let the love of God heal and renovate their relationships with Him and with others. We can let the love of God renovate our relationships.
February 5, 2023 | 1 Corinthians 6:12-20 |
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How we view our bodies and how we use our bodies matters to God. How do you view your body? Do you have a love/hate relationship with your body? Do you struggle with your self-image because of your appearance? How much of your identity is connected to your body… its color, gender, height, weight, age, health, etc.? Have you ever wondered how God wants you to view your body? Does He call it evil or good? And what’s its real place in following Jesus? What’s God’s purpose for our bodies?
It just so happens that we’re not the first believers to struggle with questions about the body. The believers in Corinth had some of the same questions and God inspired Paul to respond to them. In the apostle Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, he responded to their questions about the body by challenging them to recognize God’s good and spiritual purpose for the body, so that they might submit their bodies to God for renovation. We can submit our bodies to God for renovation.
January 29, 2023 | Romans 12:1-2 |
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Have you learned to pray as Jesus did? Asking for the Father’s will in your life? Do you struggle with knowing and doing God’s will? Most Christians don’t have trouble knowing it, they have trouble obeying it. Why? Because we have what Willard calls “the splintered will.” This is a will that has been “splintered,” corrupted and turned against itself by choosing to its own way, rather than God’s. The splintered will asks, “How can I get my way?” Rather than, “How can I please God?” Manipulation, deception, seduction, and malice replace transparency, sincerity, and goodwill, as exaltation of self replaces submission and service to God.
But what would it look like for our hearts, our wills, to be in total alignment with God’s heart and will? Is this way of life even possible? In Paul’s letter to the Romans, he appealed to believers to fully submit themselves to God for renovation of the will, transforming it to know and follow God’s will.
January 15, 2023 | Ephesians 4:17-24 |
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What kind of ideas and images inhabit your mind, your thinking? Where did they come from? Do you have a mindset, a worldview, shaped by the Word of God as applied by the grace and Spirit of God? Or is your thinking shaped by the culture you’ve grown up in? The truth is, as believers, we all struggle with being “double-minded,” having competing ideas and images in our thinking. Some from God and some from the world.
God wants to renovate our thinking so that we have the mind of Christ. In the apostle Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, he taught believers to yield their minds, their thinking, to Christ for renewal, for transformation, for renovation. We can yield our minds, our thinking, to Christ for renovation.
January 8, 2023 | Colossians 3:1-17 |
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We all tend to think that if we could renovate our house, or our job, or our marriage, or our …, then we’d be happy, but the truth is that life is not lived from the outside – in, but from the inside – out. We live from our hearts. So what does it mean to let God renovate, to transform our hearts? It means to have the heart of Christ, the character of Christ formed in you.
Are you growing in Christ, becoming more like Him in character and behavior? Do you want to? Do have a desire to grow in Christ, having His life and character fully formed in you?
In the apostle Paul’s letter to the Colossians, he instructed believers that since they had been raised to new life in Christ Jesus, God wanted to renovate their hearts, so that the character of Christ was formed in them. Having received Christ as Lord and Savior, we can actively yield our hearts to God, so that Christ is formed in us.
December 9, 2022 |
Pastor Gary Combs answers various Bible questions that have come to him via the church’s “Ask the Pastor.” This segment addresses questions like, “Will there be Levitical priests offering sacrifices again?” “Were the 12 disciples also members of the 12 tribes?” “Was Belshazzar the son of Nebuchadnezzar?”
July 10, 2022 | Acts 9:31 |
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Over the past three weeks we’ve talked about being a church of people who are mobilized to live transformed lives wherever they live, learn, work, and play, collaborating with other believers to see that every man, woman, and child has repeated opportunities to see, hear, and respond to the Good News of Jesus.
Today, we’re going to be looking at the book of Acts. The book of Acts, or the Acts of the Apostles, is the record of how the first century church obeyed Christ’s command to make disciples and quickly multiplied from Jerusalem, to Judea, Samaria, and throughout the Roman world! In the book of Acts, Luke recorded the how the early believers obeyed Christ’s command to be a multiplying church.
June 26, 2022 | Romans 12:1-13 |
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God wants His people to be more than attenders of church services and programs. For gospel saturation to begin to happen in our city, God’s people must be transformed by the power of His Spirit. Transformation cannot be programmed by any leader, no matter how gifted.
Has your life been transformed by faith in Jesus? Are you becoming more like Jesus in character and behavior? How has your life been changed by faith in Christ? And if it hasn’t changed, don’t you want it to change? Life Transformation happens when we make Jesus King and Lord over our lives! In the 12th chapter of the apostle Paul’s letter to the Romans, he appealed to the believers in Rome to give themselves fully to the Lord that He might transform their lives. We can give ourselves fully to the Lord that He might transform our lives.
June 19, 2022 | 2 Timothy 4:1-5 |
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As the American population has increased to 335 million and counting, the church in America has declined, both in attendance and influence. We’re living in the greatest decline of Christianity in our nation and it’s happening on our watch! Why is the church losing ground in our nation? We could blame it on the devil, or the evil in our culture. We could blame it on Hollywood, social media, or the government. But maybe we should take a look in the mirror instead?
In order to reverse this trend, we need to make 4 shifts in priorities to saturate our communities with the gospel. In today’s sermon, we’re going to consider that first priority shift: “Mobilization over Collection.”