Sermons

July 7, 2024

Series: Meaningful Ministry, Sundays after Pentecost

Amazed and Offended (July 7, 2024)

Topic: Amazed, compassion, Everyone, Feel, forgiveness, Glee, Gospel, Gratitude, Love, Ministry, Offended, Offense, Offensive, Ordinary, Pride, Rejection, Repent, Repentance, Resentment

If ministry involves serving others with love and compassion, you would think that people would respond only with glee and gratitude for the help they received. Sometimes, but not always. If you offer to help a family member who is having trouble paying his bills, he might be offended, wondering if you are implying that he is not a good provider. Likewise, if you try and share the gospel with someone, he might resent the message that he is a sinner in need of salvation. You are trying to minister to this man’s greatest need. Your intentions are loving. Yet he responds with rejection and resentment.

When our ministry efforts are met not with glee and gratitude but rejection and resentment, we are in good company. The prophets, apostles, and even Jesus himself all had those who responded negatively to their ministries. When that happens to us, it doesn’t mean our ministry is no longer meaningful. For if others do not appreciate our efforts to serve them, God still appreciates our efforts to serve him.

Mark 6:1-6

May 19, 2024

Series: Pentecost, Resurrection Reality

Christ Has Not Left Us Alone (May 19, 2024)

Speaker: Pastor Phil Birner

Topic: Alone, Animated, Babylonians, Bones, Breath, Christ, Dead, Ezekiel, Faith, Fragile, Grace, Holy Spirit, Jerusalem, Repent, Saved, sin, Skeleton, Spiritual, Worthless, Worthwhile

Jesus told his disciples that, though he was going to ascend into heaven, he wasn’t going to leave them alone. He was going to send “the Advocate,” a title for the Holy Spirit. But Jesus wasn’t sending the Spirit just to keep us company. Jesus would have the Advocate give us spiritual power so that we might participate in Christ’s saving work. Here is the final resurrection reality. The Spirit gives us the ability to raise the spiritually dead to life.

We see this happen on Pentecost. The festival of Pentecost was held fifty days after the Passover. (Pentecost is Greek for “fifty.”) It was a time to thank God for the harvest. But on that day, through the Church at work, the Holy Spirit gathered another harvest, a harvest of souls. Therefore, Pentecost is the third great festival of the Church, along with the Nativity and the Resurrection. With the Festival of Pentecost, the festival half of the Church Year comes to a close.

Ezekiel 37:1-14

January 21, 2024

Series: From Jordan's Shore to Mountain's Glory, Sundays after Epiphany

Be Reconciled to God (Jan. 21, 2024)

Speaker: Pastor David Ruddat

Topic: Ambassadors, Barrier, Create, Grace, Life, mercy, Message, New, Reconciled, Reconciliation, Relational, Relationship, Repent, sin

From Jordan’s Shore to Mountain’s Glory: Committed to a Lofty Charge. To whom does the work of salvation belong? Simple question. There is only one Savior. Yet He gives our lives a profound meaning and eternal purpose, by sharing His work with us. He calls us not just to be followers, but to be follower-makers. Jesus asks some—pastors, missionaries, teachers—to do this full time. But ultimately Jesus asks all believers to serve as His ambassadors, sharing the Gospel with whomever He brings into our sphere of influence. This lofty charge requires commitment—a willingness to abandon everything else should faithfulness require it. This is the life-changing revelation for this week. Jesus has committed us to a lofty charge: the privilege to play a role in His saving work.

2 Corinthians 5:14-21

January 22, 2023

Series: Sundays after Epiphany