Central Church Grandview: Recent Episodes
Central Church
Central Church is a family that works together to help you love God, love others and share the truth of salvation through knowing Jesus. Pastor Alan Kinder has been at Central Church for 19+ years; he is the Moderator of the Greater Kansas City District Association of Free Will Baptists.
It is not unusual to hear someone ask a simple question, “Oh God, where are You?” Perhaps you’ve asked this same question when struggling with something in your life? There is an answer…
God’s grace is a favorite topic for many theologians, as it should be. It is also something that every human being experiences every day; the problem is that too many only experience God’s grace partially.
Mercy, something that, probably, every human being on the planet desires to experience at some point in their life. The reality is, every human being on the planet experiences God’s mercy, at least partially, every day. With this message we look at how someone can experience the full measure of God’s mercy every day.
If we spend much time at all in reading the Scriptures, one thing we will have to face is God’s justice.
We use the word ‘good’ all the time. We use it so often it is easy to misunderstand what it means, and how it applies to our concept of God. This week we look at God’s goodness, and what it means to us.
Last week we looked at the infinitude of God, His state of being that is tied to the infinite nature of the Almighty. Today, we look at another side of His attributes, His immensity; the measureless nature of our God.
If we are going to understand more about God, we have to start somewhere, and the best place to start is with a challenge; the infinitude of God (Infinitude–the state of being infinite).
Fear is often a motivator. However, it is also too often a paralyzer. When we allow fear to paralyze us, especially irrational fear as it involves our mission, we need to do something quickly. We need to dare to be unafraid!
The unknown can be very intimidating, unless we choose to dare to bey God and proclaim His truth!
Freedom is always an important topic, perhaps especially so as we prepare to celebrate the 247th anniversary of the founding of our nation. Are you free?
It has been said that man makes plans, and God laughs. Making plans is not a bad thing; however, we must always be prepared to dare to obey the unexpected changes that God may impose on our plans!
Being a Dad in today’s society is a tough challenge. It is, perhaps, tougher than ever before in many ways. However, the role of a man in the family (or community) has not changed. Men need to dare to embrace the qualities of Jesus.
The sad reality is that most people who claim to know Jesus as their Savior never share their faith with anyone else. What might happen if we dared to be the disciples that we are meant to be?
Family does matter, and how we value our family reveals a lot about our internal values. We also need to make sure we know who is part of our family.
If there is one consistent thing about being an adult it is this, there never seems to be enough time to accomplish all that we want to accomplish. However, the truth is, there is always time enough to do the things we truly WANT to do. The question is simple, “Are you using your time wisely?”
Truth and honesty, two things just about everyone wants, at least when others are telling us something. They are, however, sometimes less desired when we are the ones doing the talking…No matter how we look at it, truth and honesty are a mandatory value for a disciple of Jesus Christ!
Recently, I saw some statistics about how women view their role as Moms. The majority of Moms consider themselves inadequate and ill-prepared for the challenges of motherhood. Let’s be clear, Moms are heroes, and we need to honor them for all they do!
One of the key ways that people know about who we are, is our speech. The words we use, and how we use them, can be incredibly impactful. The Bible gives us plenty of guidance for how we ought to use our words.
One thing is clear about our spiritual journey, while we certainly have the Spirit of God indwelling us as believers and we have other Christians beside us, we are still meant to take responsibility for our own journey…
If love (as mentioned in the first message in this series) is the foundational value for a Christian, forgiveness is perhaps the most often value that gets tested. We must adopt forgiveness as disciples of Jesus.
We all have them…values. Values are beliefs that we hold to that drive our actions. When our values are in conflict with God, we have a problem. When we have inconsistent values, we are in trouble. This week we begin a new series of messages dealing with values that are consistent with being a disciple of Jesus.
As we conclude our series of messages on faith, we come to the same conclusion as the author of Hebrews did, Jesus is “something better” than any alternatives we might come up with.
True faith is something that remains firm, unwavering, even when facing challenges, or temptations, pr being faced with the prospect of leaving something behind…
Faith is not just a one-time “event” in our spiritual journey. Faith is an every day, every moment, part of our spiritual lives. It is especially important that we are looking in the right direction within our faith journey, and that direction is always forward!
Faith is not just a momentary thing for the life of a disciple of Jesus. Faith must be a defining characteristic of anyone who would follow Jesus. Faith must persevere…
Humans seem inclined to build things. We like building, but if we aren’t careful, we will simply build something we want, and not allow God to tell us what we ought to build.
One of two people to not go through the portal of death is Enoch. When we read about him in Genesis and Hebrews, one thing becomes abundantly clear, he pleased God greatly! We can learn a lot from him…
This week we take a look at how creation ought to provide a solid foundation for our faith. We don’t worship creation, we don’t put our faith IN creation, but we should find our faith increased when we look into creation! We are all created to be a marvel, unique and individual. We all have a purpose, and God has a plan for each one of us!
Here is some good news…Jesus is still in the midst of His church! He has a plan for each local congregation, including Central Church. Our challenge is to listen for His plan and seek to do the first things once again! Rev. Mark Clifton brings a message of hope and vision for the future of Jesus’ church.
As we have seen, faith is the key to the Kingdom of God. Faith has always been the path to a right relationship with God. Since it so vital, we should take some time to look deeper into what faith is, and how it should apply in our lives.
We don’t need more (unfulfilled) New Year’s resolutions. What we need is a goal; something that we can look at every day and work toward.(The video DOES NOT include audio of the sermon. We had some technical issues yesterday, so the only clear audio from the message is in the audio only recording which is included)
Christmas is a special time of year for most people in the Western world. If only most people would actually understand the mission of Christmas…
Last week we saw that those who have placed their faith in Jesus are privileged to be called the children of God. As God’s children, we have an obligation to treat our spiritual siblings in the way God commands us to treat them.
If we have entered into a relationship with God through faith in Jesus, then we have been granted a remarkable status–children of God. However, being a child of God does come with certain obligations.
So many people these days are looking for some new revelation, some new truth. They want to know the future. John told his readers something we need to pay attention to; we already know all we need to know, we know the truth.
The post The Truth first appeared on Central Church.
Every now and then, even the mightiest warrior needs some encouragement. In this week’s message from 1 John, that is what we get!
If we’re going to understand life with Jesus, then we need to understand a prime motivator in the life of Jesus–love.
It is said that anyone who chooses to represent themselves in a court has a fool for a client. If this is true, why would anyone want to try and represent themselves before Almighty God?
Last week we saw how fellowship required us to be willing to be vulnerable, open to sharing with one another. This week we look at another aspect of fellowship, which is the need to be in the light…
What we believe about Jesus is vital to our ability to become the disciples we are meant to be. In this series of messages, we are going to be looking at the real Jesus, and trying to introduce ourselves to Him.
We come to the final message in this series, now we need to learn what the final outcome of all of this means.
How are we supposed to actually employ the fruit of the Spirit in our lives without letting them go off the rails? The key is found in the final entry on the list given to us by Paul in Galatians, self-control.
In this message, we take a look at an attribute, a fruit of the Spirit, that probably is mot the most popular, especially among men–gentleness.
Faithfulness is not a popular element in most of our media-driven society’s offerings. Yes, almost everyone WANTS faithfulness. Thankfully, God does show us what it means to be faithful.
Goodness is difficult to define. Most of us, when asked what we think is good, have a very subjective opinion of what is good. So, we need something objective to base our definition on if we want to know what goodness is.
What a difference we could see in our world, if only we learned how to be truly kind to one another…
The fourth outcome of walking in step with God’s Spirit is patience. It isn’t easy to be patient, but it is essential if we desire to give glory to God.
As our world seemingly becomes increasingly chaotic, we all seek to obtain peace. There is a source and a means for having the peace we crave.
Whenever a unit is going to be under command, marching as a unit, there is always a “first” command given. It is, “Attention!” This week, as we start looking at the fruits of following the Spirit, we see the first command, “Love!”
As recruits into the fighting force of our lord, we have been given our armor (In The Fight) and now we need to learn how to operate together, in unity, on the march to battle.
How determined you are can easily mean the difference between succeeding and failing at any endeavor, including a spiritual battle!
This week we look at a piece of armor we carry, instead of wearing, the shield of faith. Do we trust the Lord?
The next piece of armor, shoes…necessary in order to be prepared to give the gospel of peace to those in need.
The next piece of armor we are going to look at is the breastplate; Paul weaves this armor with the spiritual characteristic of righteousness. How are we to understand this? How are we to respond?
We are in a fight, a wrestling match, against an enemy that outmatches us in so many ways. Thankfully, we are left with some practical means to be winners in this fight.
Jesus, the name above all names…He is our Savior, the One who has revealed God to us, he is our friend. Today, we take a look at another aspect of our relationship to the Son of God, brother.
Jesus is more than just a Savior. While that alone is more than enough, our relationship with Jesus goes beyond simply knowing His as the One who can forgive our sins, it encompasses Jesus being our friend.
Jesus didn’t just make a way for our sins to be forgiven, he made a way for you and me to CONNECT to our Creator.
You can do the work and you can serve everyone you come across, but unless this element is added into your spiritual journey, you still won’t be healthy…
I know, Christianity is all about faith. However, that doesn’t mean we don’t have to do the work…
The salvation that God offers to us is not what we would have designed, but it is exactly what we need.
We are addicted to power; our lives and lifestyles are nearly entirely dependent on power. However, spiritually speaking, we are far too capable of trying to live without the power of the Holy Spirit.
Freedom is a word we hear used quite often in our country. It is also poorly understood, and often abused. Christians, of all people, need to understand what freedom costs, and why we have been set free.
When we try and understand God we have to understand His attributes, one of which is love.
Words have such a powerful impact, especially when they are used in an unfamiliar context. They make us dig deeply to understand.
I think that sometimes Christians get locked into a perception that God only ‘works’ in the church setting. However, it seems pretty apparent that this is NOT the case.
God often uses the unorthodox to accomplish His purposes. Over the next several weeks we will be looking at the unorthodox ways that God uses when dealing with us.
We are approaching Thanksgiving, and for so many people around the world it can seem difficult to be thankful. So here is the top three things you need to do in order to NOT be thankful. (Note: While the topic is serious, this is delivered as a satire; we aren’t meant to be unthankful!!!)
One thing is certain, the end of the story has already been written, and Jesus Christ is the absolute victor! If we are in Christ, we also have the privilege of adopting the posture of the victor.
Fear is something that will kill hope. We are not meant to live in fear, we have even been told that the spirit that we have been given is not a spirit of fear…
In order to keep hope alive in our spirits, we must make sure we feed it properly. Hope can be a perishable commodity, so the proper ingredients are needed to keep it alive.
Some things we just aren’t meant to carry, and if we attempt to do so it can seriously impact our faith, and our hope.