Big Idea: Believers salt their politics best by replacing their old impulse for criticizing, complaining and condemning with a new habit of intercession.
Big Idea: Believers salt their politics best by choosing to assist their governing authorities instead of to resist them
Jesus didn’t call everyone to agree on everything, but he did command his followers to be united in the main thing.
Big Idea: Jesus tells us he is the vine who reaches lost people by maximizing the fruitfulness of his disciples.
Big Idea: Jesus tells us that if our troubled hearts want to see, know and be with the Father in heaven, we’ll rest in him alone.
Big Idea: Jesus tells us he is the only way to live again, even after dying.
25 Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in me will live, even after dying. 26 Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die. —John 11:25–26 (NLT)
Big Idea: Jesus is the only door a person enters into the people of God, whom he knows, saves and protects.
Big Idea: Jesus thinks He is the only way for humans to see God in the darkness of sin.
Jesus' words teach that the next chapter of our story begins with "the renewal of all things," by which he means the earth we love in all its beauty, our own selves, and the things that make for a rich life: music, art, food, laughter and all that we hold dear. Everything shall be renewed "when the world is made new."
Jesus' words teach that the next chapter of our story begins with "the renewal of all things," by which he means the earth we love in all its beauty, our own selves, and the things that make for a rich life: music, art, food, laughter and all that we hold dear. Everything shall be renewed "when the world is made new."
Jesus' words in the gospel of Matthew, describe the next chapter of our story and it begins with "the renewal of all things," by which he means the earth we love in all its beauty, our own selves, and the things that make for a rich life: music, art, food, laughter and all that we hold dear. Everything shall be renewed "when the world is made new."
BIG IDEA: Is something under the surface getting in the way of you expressing God’s compassionate forgiveness to the people you despise?
BIG IDEA (1:17-2:10) God changes our lives with His supreme grace by arranging or allowing us to reach rock bottom.
God is willing and able to throw at us anything he desires in order to accomplish our salvation or correction.
BIG IDEA: When you root your trust in Jesus, God transforms you from the inside out – including your home. PROBLEM: When you know Jesus, but live with no change.
BIG IDEA: A Gospel transformed heart trusts and treasures Jesus above everybody and everything.
BIG IDEA: Jesus offers us the only transformation that solves humanity’s sin problem and results in eternal life with him.
Big Idea: Christians should relate to their neighbors as lovers and givers who generously show and share what God has given them.
Big Idea: The way you treat your children has the power to either provoke or prune them.
Big Idea: God designed us to love our parents with obedience and to thank them with honor.
Myth My marriage is primarily for me & my happiness.
Big Idea Our marriage relationship is designed to shine as a bright and attractive reflection of Jesus’ humble self-giving love.
BIG IDEA: Jesus’ followers are filled with joy knowing his ascension completed his earthly mission and signified his enthronement as their heavenly priest and king.
BIG IDEA: In Jesus’ work on the cross, people of all race, religion, and rank are welcomed into restored relationship with God.
BIG IDEA: On his painful path of suffering Jesus shows us how God uses our suffering to shape our desires & strengthen our dependence.
BIG IDEA: The sacrificial death of Jesus was the atonement that was able to fix our main problem.
MAIN IDEA: People can wander from the truth and believers have a God-given responsibility to rescue them and bring them back to the truth.
"My dear brothers and sisters, if someone among you wanders away from the truth and is brought back, you can be sure that whoever brings the sinner back from wandering will save that person from death and bring about the forgiveness of many sins." ~ James 5:19-20 [NLT]
MAIN IDEA: You should depend on the power of God available through prayer to overcome any weaknesses caused by suffering, sickness and sin.
So all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. And the Lord—who is the Spirit—makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image. - 2 Corinthians 3:18 [NLT]
WARNING: There’s a coming judgement for wealthy oppressors and a coming justice for those they’ve oppressed.
MAIN IDEA: If you want to be a friend of the world, you make yourself an enemy of God. So humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up in honor.
CAUTIONS FOR THE CHURCH Faith without good deeds is dead and useless, unable to save you.
God's gift of a new start allows us to approach God. By trusting him, we can be filled overflowing with the hope & joy of being clean & free.
6 ‘And you, O Bethlehem in the land of Judah, are not least among the ruling cities of Judah, for a ruler will come from you who will be the shepherd for my people Israel.’
To meet real needs, the church family depends on the financial support from within the church family.
Gospel people are urged & instructed to prioritize their life differently than non-Christians.
We’re dirty with sin and accused by Satan, but God has removed our shame and replaced it with Jesus’s honor.
God is always present with his people — working to build them up & wanting to renew what He started.
You are not saved by the strength of your faith, but by the object of your faith — God’s strength.
God’s people rest their confident trust in their Heavenly Father despite what is happening around them.
God defeats & destroys evil because he is just, but He defends & deliverers the innocent because He is good.
To glorify his name, God demands that his people demonstrate his compassionate justice and righteousness to the weak, needy and powerless.
Justice = Concrete actions to correct injustice & to create righteousness.
Righteousness = A standard of right, equitable relationships between people, no matter their social differences.
Who are the prophets and what did they do? What do we learn about what our sin is and how God responds?
When we invite the Holy Spirit to live in us everyday, we are able to be taught by Him and live a missionary life as we are led by Him.
God poured out his Holy Spirit to fill his church with the overflowing power they need to go & show Jesus to all the world.
The Holy Spirit is God’s personal invisible presence, who is promised, poured out & personal.
The Holy Spirit is God living inside of you speaking into your thoughts and leading you closer to Him.
God finishes his work of redemption and restores his kingdom by renewing all things.
“‘Surely, I am coming soon.’ Amen. Come, Lord Jesus! The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen.”
For true believers, God promises that our temporary suffering will soon be replaced by an eternal joy.
18 Yet what we suffer now is nothing compared to the glory he will reveal to us later. 19 For all creation is waiting eagerly for that future day when God will reveal who his children really are. 20 Against its will, all creation was subjected to God’s curse. But with eager hope, 21 the creation looks forward to the day when it will join God’s children in glorious freedom from death and decay. ~Romans 8:18-21 NLT
Where does our purpose come from? "For everything, absolutely everything, above and below, visible and invisible, rank after rank after rank of angels—everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him." Colossians 1:16 MSG
What is the Christian Faith and What is the Christian God? Learn the 6 ideas that argue a rational case for the existence of the Creator
BIG IDEA: Until Jesus returns to reign justly, keep praying with perseverance for those who are struggling to persevere.
Jesus will suddenly return to judge every human being - rewarding the believers and rejecting all others.
If you seek and trust in the God who knows and promises to meet all of your needs, you don’t have to worry.
Jesus revealed his Divine power to transform the lives of the sick, suffering and separated.
Jesus came to help and heal those who know they are sick, not to honor those who think they are righteous.
Jesus used his Divine authority to compel his followers with compassion, not to condemn them.
In essence, the good news of the kingdom is that the “outsiders” have been sent a Spirit-anointed messenger of God’s grace.
By trusting his Father in the wilderness, Jesus passed the temptation test and demonstrated that he is fully human yet without sin.
A personal experience with God's merciful rescue causes a joy that expresses itself by a life of worship.
The Gospel of Luke compiles eyewitness accounts that prove that Jesus carries the covenant story of God and Israel to its culmination and announces the good news of God’s kingdom – including the poor and the rich.
Children of God are different because they increasingly look and live more like Jesus — aiming to please and love him through obedience.
Christians are chosen by a God who brings about inside out changes in their lives so they look more like Jesus and different from everyone else.
Christians are chosen by a God who brings about inside-out changes in their lives so they look more like Jesus and different from everyone else.
God has given you something He expects you to generously contribute to your faith family as an expression of your deep love.
To simplify your spiritual life, renew your mind with reading, remembering and reacting to the Bible.
To simplify your spiritual life, filter all spiritual experiences by a single standard — the Bible.
To simplify your spiritual life, think more about the realities of heaven, not the things of earth.
Of all the important things you're doing everyday, there is only one thing worth being concerned about.
What do we need to be rooted in in our life? What is the one thing that we need and how do we go after it?
The reason we're often not at the feet of Jesus the way we should be is because we pursue things that are lesser than Christ. We worship busyness and activity and forget the importance of our need to be with Jesus.
Jesus saved you to send you. As a believer, we have a mission and a purpose to be a disciple maker.
The best way to be a disciple is to be on mission right where you are. It's easy to tell people about what you love.
As Christ’s ambassadors we are to acknowledge that there are no little people and no little places when we see as God sees and we need to be ready to activate kingdom principles wherever we are to see God’s glory in all people and all places.
The reason for intervention is the conviction that somebody is in trouble. The church is called to cautiously show mercy to everyone who is ensnared in distorted.
The church is called to cautiously show mercy to believers who are ensnared in distortion.
Fight corrupt teachers with your discernment.
But you, my dear friends, must remember what the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ predicted. They told you that in the last times there would be scoffers whose purpose in life is to satisfy their ungodly desires. These people are the ones who are creating divisions among you. They follow their natural instincts because they do not have God’s Spirit in them. —JUDE 17-19
God gave you all you need so you could be rich in generosity, so trust in him and not in your money.
Prayer is the primary means by which believers engage in a relationship with their Creator.
Christians would be wise to expect suffering because God purposely uses it to shape their character and show them his.
We can bring our pain and grief to God and trust that he is wise and always knows what he is doing.
True wisdom is the move we make away from self-sufficiency and toward the fear of God. Sometimes bad things happen to good people who are living wisely.
Why do we need hope, what is hope and where do we get it? When we are filled with hopelessness, we are stuck believing nothing will ever change. The kind of hope you can build your life on is the 'Christian Hope', the confidence in what God will do in the future. The Christian faith offers the greatest source of hope.