Redemption Hill Church: Recent Episodes
Redemption Hill Church
Telling the story of good news and renewal through worship, community, and work in DC. It's all about Jesus. Sermons from Redemption Hill Church in Washington, DC from Pastor Bill Riedel and other guest preachers.
Last week we saw the power of Jesus on display over nature, evil, sickness, and sin, proving that Jesus is the Son of Man prophesied in Daniel 7. He is sovereign over all things and worth following. This week we will see what it takes to follow Jesus as we continue our series The Upside-Down Kingdom with Matthew 9:9-13. This passage is personal for our author, Matthew, because it is the story of Jesus calling him to follow. Matthew is a tax collector. It is difficult to capture the fulness of what that meant in society at the time; tax collectors were despised. The people Jesus called to follow him were not the people that anyone else would have chosen, and for every one of us, that’s good news.
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When life feels out of control, and the wind and waves of sorrow and suffering are battering us, it is hard to trust that God is sovereign and watching. This week we will continue our series The Upside-Down Kingdom with Matthew 8:18-9:8. In it we will see the sovereign authority and power of Jesus over the natural world, the spiritual world and dark powers, sickness and death itself, and over the weight of sin that drags at our souls. Jesus, the Son of Man, is the One who has the power over all things.
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As Jesus came down from teaching on the mountain, crowds of people followed him. In chapters 8-9 we see the values and kingdom that Jesus proclaimed put into action. In our passage this week we will see the signs of the Kingdom of Heaven. Jesus healed the sick and leprous, welcomed outsiders, and fulfilled the Law and Prophets. This passage will help us to see what all who follow Jesus as their King enjoy and ought to prioritize.
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The passage this week is the final of three binary alternatives that Jesus laid out – two paths, two trees, and now two houses. More accurately, the focus is two foundations. Every one of us is building something in our lives. We have an ultimate telos, or goal, that underlies our work, relationships, and efforts. We spend a lot of our time focusing on how we are building and what we are building. Jesus looks straight past that aspect of life, though, and points us to consider the foundation of our lives. What is it that provides the basis for our lives? How can we know whether we are building on bedrock or on the sand? In a week that has shaken many foundations, we will look to the firm foundation that is available in Jesus Christ alone.
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This Sunday we will continue our series in the Sermon on the Mount with Matthew 7:15-23. It’s the second of three choices that we face as Jesus closed this section of teaching. We left off with a choice between Two Paths, with two gates, roads, crowds and destinations. This Sunday we see Two Trees. It’s a warning to beware of false prophets and those who play around with spirituality and religion, and to watch to see the fruit of someone’s life and ministry because we will only know trees by their fruit. It’s a pretty scary warning to all of us who follow Jesus and who are exploring what it means to follow Jesus. There is also great hope.
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As part of the Ordination Service, we will hear from Pastor Steve Gee, who was invited by Nathan to give the charge. The sermon on will be a charge to Nathan as a pastor, but it will still be a sermon. What I mean by that is that God’s Word will be preached and the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ proclaimed. As Nathan receives his charge, it will also be a charge to us, the church. Pastors aren’t some kind of class above our outside the rest of the members of the church. Pastors are members of the church who have been given the opportunity to serve the church fully with their time and their lives. And so in the charge to Nathan, we also receive God’s Word as his church.
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Jesus closed out this section of teaching with three illustrations, three choices that lie before us. The first is the path of our lives. Jesus is so often talked about as being a great teacher. Passages like this make us face both the inclusivity and exclusivity of his teaching. Everyone is welcome. Anyone can come into the narrow gate to the narrow path that is hard and leads to life. But it is only by Jesus that we can come to salvation and life. Tomorrow we will see the calling of Jesus to every one of us, and what it looks like to walk the path he lays out for us.
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A.W. Tozer said in his book, Knowledge of the Holy, “What comes to mind when we think about God is the most important thing about us.” Matthew 7:7-12 draws our attention to our relationship with God Himself. We will explore what it means to ask, seek, and knock. We will wrestle with the question of why we pray, or whether it is even worth it to pray. We will see that Tozer’s observation is true. What we think about God shapes our perspectives and our lives, and impacts how we understand justice and how we relate to others around us.
When I think about the most well-known Bible verse, I can’t help but wonder if it is “Judge not, lest ye be judged.” It’s kind of a way to say that no one has the right to question anything about us or anything we think, say, or do. It’s a kind of proverbial biblical way to tell others to leave us alone. That happens to be in our passage for this Sunday, Matthew 7:1-6.
On Sunday we will look at the context of these six words and the others around them in the Sermon on the Mount. As Jesus announced the inbreaking of His Upside-Down Kingdom, He pressed into the way we relate to God and others. Is judgment the same as discernment? What is Jesus trying to help us understand?
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We live in a city that is known for its ambition. People in DC from all walks of life have a level of hustle and an uncommon pace. It’s important to step back at times and take stock of our lives. What is your ambition? What is it that drives you? What keeps you up at night, or consumes your thoughts in quiet moments? All of these are symptoms to get at the reality of our hearts.
This Sunday we will get back into our series on the Sermon on the Mount, The Upside-Down Kingdom. Matthew 6:19-34 turns our attention to ambition. As with all things, Jesus turns the common wisdom of our world upside-down.
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This Sunday, we get to hear from a very good friend of mine, Gentry Morris. Gentry is the Lead Pastor at Reston Community Church in Northern Virginia where he serves the RCC family through preaching, teaching, and helping people find deep hope in the gospel of Jesus. Before coming to RCC, Gentry served as a pastor in Washington state and in church planting ministry in Belfast, Northern Ireland. He also has been involved in worship ministry and writing songs for the local church. Gentry plans to preach from Philippians 1:1-11 on finding joy and contentment in our lives, rooted in the gospel, and extending through us in generosity.
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Fasting is having a resurgence in popularity in fitness circles right now, particularly intermittent fasting. In Scripture, we see Jesus warn us to beware of practicing our righteousness before people. The central section of the Sermon on the Mount focuses on Christian Piety and our religious practices: giving to the poor, prayer, and fasting. All of this is the proclamation of the inbreaking of Christ’s Kingdom that he established in the incarnation. It is present, and yet will come in fullness. This is what it means to live as citizens of that greater kingdom. This Sunday, we will be in Matthew 6:16-18 as we focus on fasting and what it looks like to fast in Christ's Kingdom.
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This Sunday, as we continue our summer mini-series in the book of James, we're challenged to think about our own attitude toward the poor. God identifies himself with those who have no value in the eyes of the world (Isaiah 41). He commands Israel to care for the poor and the powerless (Deuteronomy 24), Jesus himself identifies with the poor and marginalized. Love for our neighbor includes compassion for the poor and the work of justice. Do we share God’s special concern for the poor?
But then, James challenges all of us to think about our own attitude toward the rich. Do we envy them? Do we favor them, hoping to become one of them? On the other hand, for some of us, it can be a challenge to care about rich people. Love for our neighbor includes rich people too. At the heart of this week's scripture passage is a question about our attitude toward money and toward God. Does he have our highest allegiance? Do we believe he has the very best for us? Do we trust in his kingdom's abundance or do we fear scarcity?
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This week in the book of James, we will explore the gaps between who we think we are, who we really are and who we are becoming. God is on a mission to heal us from our sin addiction, but detox is painful and new habits don't form overnight. Having been pardoned and adopted, we are learning what it means to live in a close relationship with God. It's going to take some work. God is with us in the work. It's a work of grace accomplished with wisdom and the Word.
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Over the next few weeks, we are going to dive into a 3-part miniseries in the book of James, and what we will discover is the heart of a lead pastor who is concerned about his broken, desperate, and persecution-scattered brothers and sisters who are drifting toward fragmented lives rather than lives that are becoming more and more complete in Christ. He believes deeply in what his half-brother Jesus taught in the Sermon on the Mount, and he cries out in a clear, prophetic voice for their eager participation in God's sanctifying work of grace.
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The center point of the Sermon on the Mount focuses on personal spiritual practices – giving, prayer, and fasting. At the very center of it all is prayer. Prayer can feel mysterious and hard to grab ahold of. It’s hard to know sometimes if God sees us, hears us, or if the promises we read in the Bible could possibly be true. Our prayer life reveals a lot about us as well, and what we actually believe. Jesus taught His disciples how to pray and gave warnings about how not to pray. I’m eager to dig in together this Sunday we see His teaching on prayer in Matthew 6:5-15. Jesus gave us a model prayer that we know as The Lord’s Prayer. This Sunday, I hope to show the importance of what Jesus taught us through His example, and the depth and richness of the prayer He gave us.
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This Sunday we begin a new section of the Sermon on the Mount, the center point of the Sermon. After showing a re-interpretation of 6 different commandments in the Law, Jesus turned toward personal piety and righteousness by speaking to bring clarity to almsgiving, prayer, and fasting. Each of the next few weeks we will spend time working to understand the practices Jesus described, while paying special attention to His repeated warnings that our religious practices be focused on a heavenly reward from our Father God rather than in the recognition and applause of people who see us. This Sunday we will look at the first of those three, almsgiving. teaching about these three religious practices
Revenge. An eye for an eye. Consequences for actions. This Sunday we will continue our series, The Upside-Down Kingdom, with Matthew 5:38-48. The Sermon on the Mount is Jesus’ announcement of the in-breaking of the Kingdom of Heaven. Jesus has already challenged us on anger, lust, infidelity, and truthfulness. In our text this week, Jesus challenges our perspective on personal justice and how we treat those who despise us. We can hear the words, “love your enemies,” and give them a casual nod, or say something like, “we’re called to love but not to like people,” but when we take the calling of Jesus Christ seriously, this might be the most difficult applications of the gospel to our lives. Go read Matthew 5:38-48 before Sunday. Note the response in your own heart and how quickly you might start minimizing or explaining away the actual calling we have.
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So far, Jesus has given reinterpretations of the Law by addressing the heart connections of anger to murder, lust to adultery, and clear teaching on marriage and divorce. In Matthew 5:33-37, Jesus goes on to address truthfulness. The people of Jesus’ time had created all kinds of ways to talk around the truth, subtleties and passive ways to dodge saying what they really meant to say – a lot like we do today. In Jesus’ Kingdom, there is no room for playing with truth. After all, He is the source of all truth and Jesus promised that knowing Him means we know what truth is, and the truth sets us free. We will take time to look at the consequences of manipulating truth, and why it is so important to God that we tell the truth.
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This Sunday we get to hear from Joel Kornegay, one of our elders at RHC. Joel is a chaplain in the Air Force, and we have been blessed to have Joel and Laura at RHC for their time in DC, which is coming to a close at the end of June as they move to their new post. As we so often do at RHC, we will send some of our favorites and best out to bless other churches and invest in other cities. Joel is going to preach from Matthew 19:16-22. It’s a passage that is a great extension of our current series in the Sermon on the Mount as Jesus called a young man to the costly discipleship of His Upside-Down Kingdom.
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Jesus again aims right at our hearts in addressing adultery, lust, marriage, and divorce. We will do what we can to cover a broad range of issues that stem from sexuality, relationships, and our own hearts. God’s Word is clear and His plans for us are for our good. So what does the Bible say?
Last week we saw that Jesus is the fulfillment of the Law and Prophets. Jesus built on that core concept with six exegeses of specific laws regarding murder, adultery, divorce, lying, reciprocal justice, and who our neighbor is that we are to love.
Jesus turned first to murder, showing that the deeper heart concern in the Law is anger and hatred against others. We live in a world of broken relationships and relational pain. It’s hard to know how to navigate disagreements and arguments well, how to work toward reconciliation and restoration, extend forgiveness that might not ever be reciprocated, or deal with the pain of betrayal and abandonment. Our passage on Sunday will help us dig into the heart of relationships and how to move through anger to peace.
This passage is essentially the thesis statement of the whole Sermon. It also brings us face-to-face with one of the most heated theological issues – discerning the relationship between the Old Testament and New Testament. We will take the time to see how Jesus fits into Redemptive History and the part He plays for our good and God’s glory.
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The Sermon on the Mount was the announcement of the in-breaking of the Kingdom of Heaven. Last week, we saw that the Beatitudes show us the characteristics of those who are in Christ’s Kingdom, and the hope that we all have. This week, it continues as Jesus said that all who follow Him are the salt of the earth and the light of the world.
Sunday, April 27, 2025 | Watch the full Sunday Gathering here
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This Sunday we will begin a new series in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus’ first major section of teaching in Matthew’s Gospel (Mt. 5-7): The Upside-Down Kingdom. The Sermon on the Mount is the most well-known teaching Jesus did. It is a striking series of ethical teaching that upends the norms and even religious expectations of His time. It is much more than a new ethic or religious approach, though. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus announced the inbreaking of the His Kingdom. This week we will start with the Beatitudes, the beginning and foundation for the realities of the Upside-Down Kingdom that stands outside of and opposed to the values and kingdoms of our world.
SPOTIFY
As we bring our Dwell series to a close, we explored Acts 4:23-31 together. In the face of the authorities and nations raging against the early Christians, just as they did against Jesus, the disciples show us how to pray in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Sunday, April 6, 2025 | Watch the full Sunday Gathering here.
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As we think about our current moment, in DC and the DMV in March 2025, trusting that God’s Word is living and active, it takes careful consideration of how the gospel speaks and what makes it good news. That careful work is the work of contextualization. In the same way that explaining an iPhone to someone in 1945 might be a challenge, we have an extra-terrestrial message. On Sunday we will take time in Acts 17:16-34 to see how the Apostle Paul approached ministry in Athens. It’s a great example for us because, in many ways, DC is our nation’s “Athens” – a place renowned for the exchange of ideology in the marketplace and, as Acts 17:21 says, “Now all the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there would spend their time in nothing except telling or hearing something new.”
Sunday, March 30, 2025
Watch the full Sunday Gathering here. -------------------------------------------
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Now that we have established a theology of Place and Vocation, both looking at the practical side of living in the DMV, we get to turn our attention to God’s work in transforming hearts and renewing and restoring people by the work of the Spirit calling people to repentance and belief in Jesus Christ. I hope to explore a brief history of revivals, how that language has been used, and what the characteristics are that we can see across church history. We will turn to God’s Word to try to discern and determine what God’s work is in revival and distinguish it carefully from what we are called to. This is the deepest longing of my heart – to see revival in our city. The vision of RHC is that it will be “In DC as it is in Heaven.” We will work from the foundation of Jeremiah 29:11-14 as we see the good plans God has for us, His people, as sojourners and exiles here.
Work is a major aspect of our lives. For most of us, more time is spent working than anywhere else, or very nearly. Continuing with a foundation in Jeremiah 29:4-7 and 1 Thessalonians 4:11-12, we will survey Scripture to try to grasp an understanding of God’s design for work, what makes it difficult, and what it means to work to the glory of God and the common good. DC is always a vocation-focused city and that has intensified in our current moment. So, we will take a look at why work is important, how we can approach it, and whether it’s all worth it in the end.
After spending the past two months in Esther, which proved to be timely encouragement for us as we live as sojourners and exiles, we will begin a new series this Sunday. March brings us to the completion of the two-year discipleship initiative, Dwell: An Enduring & Faithful Presence.
The call to Dwell has had two main components: a call to 100% engagement for those who call RHC home, and a call to help us financially prepare for the future by saving toward a more permanent home for the church. We have seen God move powerfully over the past two years. The intentionality and generosity of our members has been massively encouraging. I believe that God has used this initiative to shape our hearts and to clarify the mission and vision for Redemption Hill.
The shaping impact of the Dwell initiative is not just going to be discarded once we get to April 2025 and the two years are complete. Instead, the call to Dwell: An Enduring & Faithful Presence will become a Core Value of the church, that will continue to shape us as a people looking forward. I’m excited to preach over the next month on how that value will shape us as a church:
Week 1 – Dwell: Theology of Place
Week 2 – Enduring: Theology of Vocation
Week 3 – Faithful: Theology of Revival
Week 4 – Presence: Theology of Contextualization
In the spirit of God’s call to His people in exile to seek the welfare and good of their city in Jeremiah 29, we have been sent by God to DC and the DMV at this time. My faith has been encouraged to see the faith that so many of you are showing right now. We hope to finish our two year commitments strong. We also recognized that some of you are facing job loss and uncertainty right now. While some may not be able to give anything financially, there are other ways to be part of God’s work that are just as valuable. For others who are able to give, or even consider giving more in a time of need, I hope you will prayerfully consider doing so. For all of us, my hope is that the next month will help us clarify what it means that God has put us here “for such a time as this.”
Today we come to the conclusion in our study in the book of Esther. This series was planned months ago and I have to admit that it has been more timely than I could have imagined. God’s Word has a way of doing that – meeting us right where we are, living and active in reaching our hearts. Throughout this series we've seen how God is Sovereignty in the Silence, explored the difference between human justice and God's justice, and been reminded that we can celebrate deliverance even while still in exile.
When we left off the most unlikely of reversals had happened. Haman, who had shamed Mordecai and manipulated the king, using the royal signet ring to issue an edict to kill, to destroy, and to annihilate Mordecai’s people, the Jews throughout the empire; that same Haman had to lead Mordecai through the city proclaiming his honor, and then his plot was exposed and Haman was hanged on the 75-foot-high gallows he had built.
We will pick it up with Esther 8:1-9:16. In this section the reversal theme becomes even greater as we see a second edict issued using the signet ring of the king. The passage raises some important questions about the nature of justice, the differences between human justice and God’s justice, and the ways that we are part of God’s work of bringing justice to our city and our world. There are some difficult questions as well as we see what might look like retribution. Through it all we will see that even in the darkest of circumstance we can trust that true justice will triumph in the end, God’s justice will be brought to bear in its fullness.
The overarching theme of God’s Sovereignty in the Silence continues in powerful ways this week. In that, God’s Word meets us in perfect timing for the week we are walking through. God sees. God knows. God hears us. Even when it seems like God is silent, His sovereign hand is moving in powerful ways.
First, hello. I'm Nathan, the new Associate. Some may wonder what an associate does. I will mainly be responsible for associating with you.
Second, Bill is out this Sunday. Please pray for his safe travels. With his temporary absence, I have the distinct privilege of sharing the Bible message whether you attend the 9am service or the 5pm or both. Our message title, "For the Joy Set Before Him", comes from Hebrews 12:2, but in a shocking twist, we will be looking at Psalm 16. Just come, and I will explain more when you get here.
Third, my family and I are very grateful for the outpouring of generous hospitality we have received. I'm looking forward to getting to know you better and better in the days ahead. It's been a whirlwind for us over the past few months, and I think we may share that sentiment in common. Maybe you too have been living through unsettling circumstances, or perhaps the anxious anticipation of potential unsettling circumstances has been unsettling enough. Either way, I can relate. Psalm 16 has been a tremendous help to me, and I think it will be for you as well.
When we left off, the King had a sleepless night that became a major crux of the entire storyline. He was trying to fall asleep by reading the chronicles of the palace when he remembered Mordecai, who had saved his life. In a delicious twist, Haman was called in to go and get Mordecai, escort him through the city, and proclaim that Mordecai is the one the King delights to honor. Now we see the aftermath. At Esther’s second feast, the depth of Haman’s plot is revealed and justice finally comes.
When we left off, Esther had decided that God had put her in the position she held, Queen over the empire, “for such a time as this.” She took a tremendous risk to approach the King without having been called and had the opportunity to host the King and Haman for a banquet. She showed wisdom in inviting the pair to a second banquet the following day. The entire story and trajectory changed overnight. Literally. The King couldn’t sleep and his restless night led him to a complete change of heart and perspective, without even realizing all of the pieces at play in the grand drama that was unfolding in Susa.
In the darkest moments, when things are most bleak, and we are wrecked with the question of whether God sees, knows, or hears our prayers as we cry out to Him, what is it that we can cling to? In a world where chaos reigns in the halls of power and human life is at stake, how do we make sense of God’s sovereignty? Our passage this Sunday will help us.
We left off last week with Haman and King Ahasuerus toasting their brilliance in anticipation of the orders they had just sent out for the destruction of the Jewish people across the empire, while the city of Susa was thrown into confusion and fear. Those in power were completely out of touch with the implications for their people, or the confusion it would cause. Maybe there is no more timely week for that message for us!
This week the story continues. When the edict went out from the palace, Mordecai fell into mourning. We will take time to see his reaction and responses, the amazing reality that he never lost hope, and the response from Queen Esther as news of the truth reached her. This passage will help us to gain clarity on what it looks like to take action in desperate times, and how to respond and position ourselves to be used by God for good.
The first two chapters of Esther are the prelude to set the scene for us. In chapter 3, the drama begins. We are finally introduced to our main antagonist, Haman, and the lens of the story shifts to the brewing conflict between Haman and Mordecai. This passage raises important questions about what it means to honor governing authorities while not violating our own faith or conscience.
The unlikeliest of characters cropped up in the story as Mordecai introduced Esther. At his urging, Esther realized the importance of wisdom and exercised discretion. Against all odds, Esther is chosen by the King, and a feast was declared in her Persian name. Taxes were cut and returned, gifts were given, but Esther’s heritage remained unknown. Was she being true to herself? To the King? To God?
Over the next two months, our theme will be “Sovereignty in the Silence.” As we read the stories of the Bible, it can be hard to imagine seeing some of the miraculous and majestic moments firsthand. It’s inspiring and awe-inducing, but outside of our regular experience. We’re not likely to cross the Potomac or Anacostia River on Monday and see it part like the Red Sea or Jordan River. It makes it hard, at times, to understand God’s presence and action in life now, when it can feel like He is silent.
Esther is the only book of the Bible that does not mention God. Like, at all. It was written when God’s people were scattered, taken into exile by Assyria, then Babylon, and now under the Medo-Persian Empire, but so many were displaced in what became known as the diaspora. God seemed silent.
As we head into a new year, Esther will help us to see and recognize God’s presence and power, even in the silence. We will see the place we hold in the grand, vast story of this world like a thread in a Persian tapestry. As God’s people in this place, at this time, with these governmental leaders, how to we live faithfully for the glory of God and the good of all people? Esther will help us to find our way.
Tomorrow morning, we will hear from Devin Watson one last time before he makes the transition to Mercy of Christ Fellowship Church. Devin will lead worship at both services on January 5th, so this isn’t goodbye yet! Devin will lead us into a study in 1 Samuel 1 tomorrow. To round out our Advent season, he will bring us into Hannah’s story, waiting for God to move in her life to bring her a son. It’s a great chapter and a dramatic story that will help us to see what it looks like to wait on the Lord and what we can trust God to do.
The fourth Sunday of Advent has us looking straight toward Christmas. Before the light dawns in the darkness, though, we will take one last Sunday to light the candle symbolizing Love. Of all the attributes of God, none is more essential to His nature than love. God is love (1 John 4:8, 16). This Sunday we get to hear from Pastor Jeremy McClain from Mercy of Christ Fellowship Church. Pastor Jeremy planted MCFC out of Anacostia River Church several years ago. MCFC is officially partnered with RHC to reach and reflect DC. I’m excited for him to be with us and to open God’s Word for us.
On this third Sunday of Advent, we will continue our series by looking at Joy. We all might be able to sing Joy to the World, but Christians are not exactly known for their irrepressible joy. We might even feel odd at times for fully embracing joy, as if happiness is a sign of immaturity, or of not taking reality into account in our lives. That is especially true when things are hard, and when we’re stuck waiting. We will take time this Sunday to see the importance of joy in our lives, the witness to the goodness of God and the glory of the gospel that is uniquely captured by joy, and the discipline of a joyful life.
In Luke 2, shepherds were suddenly surrounded by an angelic army, bathed in radiating light and crying out, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!” (Luke 2:14). Peace is a major theme throughout the Bible, and it's central to the angels’ song in declaring the arrival of Jesus, the Christ, born in Bethlehem. Advent gives us the opportunity to see the importance of peace, as we wait for perfect peace.
This Sunday begins with Hope. When we think of hope, especially around the holidays, we often think of something along the lines of wishful thinking. In Scripture, though, there is a different nuance to Hope. Hope is a settled confidence that God is true to His character, His word, and His promises. Hope is rooted in the past as we see the faithfulness of God to His promises and people. That gives us confidence to look head to the promises we have been given with anticipation and expectation.
This weekend is the 21st sermon in the series that we started in April. That’s 21 Sundays of gazing at the transcendence and supremacy of Jesus Christ. I have loved the time we have spent together in God’s Word through this series, and I pray that it has been helpful and beneficial for you as well. On Sunday we conclude with some final greetings and a soaring benediction in Hebrews 13:20-25. It truly wraps up the fullness of the book. I hope to remind us of the important truths we learned along the way as we ask God for a clear vision of the eternal glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The theme of the City of God stretches into this passage. When I have the chance to visit a new city for the first time, I love to learn as much as I can and research to learn about the place – its history, culture, things to do, etc. We can do the same with the City of God. On Sunday we will take time to look at the foundations, culture, location, population, industry, government, and language of God’s city. It’s an important look at how our lives are impacted by the gospel as its citizens, and where our hope lies looking ahead.
We will continue in our series in Hebrews, Jesus is Better, with Hebrews 13:1-6. And so we begin the final chapter of this letter and the final stretch of our series together. The final chapter of Hebrews is intensely practical. This week we will see how the application flows directly out of the two kingdoms from last week. Jesus has a better way than this world can possibly offer. His way is not always easy to discern, and it is, as Jesus described, narrower than the wide roads that surround it. That narrow path will lead us through all that we face in our lives with a greater sense of peace and fulfillment than we can find anywhere else.
This Sunday we will continue in our series in Hebrews, Jesus is Better, with Hebrews 12:18-29. It’s a timely text for us because it will draw our attention to the unshakeable Kingdom of God. The world around us trembles and shakes. At times, the only certainty is instability. This Sunday we will explore the truths that we can cling to in tumultuous times and what it means to be citizens of Christ’s Kingdom who are sojourners and exiles here. My hope is that we will all leave our worship gatherings on Sunday refreshed and reminded of where our hope lies.
The imagery of a race continues, but our author makes a shift from the great cloud of witnesses that have come before us in faith to the members of our local church body here and now. We have a tendency to read the Bible individualistically, and this passage is no exception, but it is often intended to us all, as God’s people together. This Sunday we will look at our calling to run the race together.
In light of the great cloud of witnesses in Hebrews 11, and the call to run the race with our eyes on Jesus, we now turn to the difficult question of suffering – why does God allow us to suffer along the way? None of us likes to be disciplined, and many of us struggle with our own personal discipline. So, it makes sense that we also don’t like the idea of being disciplined by our Father in Heaven. This Sunday we will take an open look at the pain and the privilege of Christian discipline.
Hebrews 12 flows out of the powerful storyline of Hebrews 11 and the “Hall of Faith” and turns toward the application of all that has preceded it in the book of Hebrews. This Sunday we will focus on Hebrews 12:1-3. This life is a race that we run, but we’re not alone in it. We will see where we can look for encouragement and endurance along the way.
Many call Hebrews 11 The Hall of Faith. We will plan to dig into the entire chapter in one go. It gives us a walkthrough the Old Testament to see how people through the ages have exercised their faith in God, His Word, and His promises. This Sunday will give us a great foundation in understanding the nature of faith.
As we continue into the application side of the epistle, we will see the truth of God’s holiness, a warning for us, and a call for how to live.
Devin Watson will preach from Psalm 32. As he brings the Word to us from David’s prayer, we will see the beautiful promise of forgiveness. Repentance and forgiveness are not a one-and-done aspect of following Christ. It’s an everyday reality until we are with Jesus. As we come to understand our own need for forgiveness more deeply, the promise of God to forgive us will become all the more beautiful, and through it we can learn how to walk in the light of forgiveness, both for ourselves and as we extend it to others.
It’s a major shift in the letter because after 9+ chapters of theology, we now turn to application. What does it all mean that Jesus is the true and better Word, Moses, High Priest, Tabernacle, blood, sacrifice, etc.? The gospel is not confined to mere concepts or theological reflection. The good news of Jesus Christ makes an impact in every aspect of our lives, impacting our hearts, our minds, and our lives. On Sunday we will begin to see what that looks like.
We are right in the heart of the letter, and in the meat of what the author has been driving toward throughout. In our passage on Sunday we will see that “Jesus is the Better Sacrifice.” In contrast with the repetitiveness of the old covenant and sacrificial system that required priests to offer sacrifices day after day, week after week, and year after year, Jesus came and died as the sacrifice that cleanses us from sin once and for all. We will take time to explore the deep need that every human being has for forgiveness, the emptiness of the methods we follow to try to ease our own consciences, and the hope that we find in the gospel.
Through the month of August we will help the people of RHC see how they are called to ministry and mission as individuals who are part of a church, and call them all to fight against the draw toward passive spectating.God has placed each one of us where we are and for this time. How do we live as His people? What does it mean to be citizens in Christ’s Kingdom, to be salt and light for the world? We will spend our time digging into a greater understanding of our calling in Jesus.
This Sunday we will continue to root ourselves in Ephesians 4:1-16 as we look at the calling on the church in this world. We live in the tension of the already/not yet nature of Christ’s work and Kingdom. Until Jesus returns, He moves through His people to reach people from every nation, tribe, and tongue. So, we get to be part of that work! It’s not always easy, though. Following Jesus doesn’t give us a free pass to Heaven or a chance to skip over the suffering, struggle, or temptation of the world we live in. Ephesians 4:15-16 give us an idea of the contrast between immaturity and maturity in Christ. It’s a timely passage for us.
Through the month of August we will help the people of RHC see how they are called to ministry and mission as individuals who are part of a church, and call them all to fight against the draw toward passive spectating.This Sunday we will spend time studying the importance of the Church Scattered as a community on mission. We will continue to be rooted in Ephesians 4:11-16 and also spend time in Acts to see the impact as the gospel shaped the community and added to it.
Through the month of August we will help the people of RHC see how they are called to ministry and mission as individuals who are part of a church, and call them all to fight against the draw toward passive spectating.
We will begin our work together in Ephesians 4:11-16 and see how the themes of that passage pull together threads that extend throughout Scripture. It’s important for us to have a good view of how God gifts people, what each of us is called to as followers of Jesus, and how God works by the Spirit to do His work through us.
As we continue to see the supremacy of Christ over all things, we now turn to the blood of the sacrifices. We have already seen that Jesus is the better High Priest and the better Tabernacle. One of the unique duties of the High Priest was to enter into the Most Holy Place in the Tabernacle (later the Temple) once a year on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, to sprinkle the blood of the sacrifice on the mercy seat, atoning for the sin of God’s people. Blood is a central theme for both Judaism and Christianity. We will take a look at why that is, and what it means that the blood of Jesus Christ is a better atonement for us than any other sacrifice can offer.
Ben Bechtel is the Pastor of Preaching at Midtown Community Church in Harrisburg, PA, a church Redemption Hill supports. He and his wife Whitley met in college and live in Midtown with their two daughters, Piper and Georgia, and two Labrador Retrievers. He preached out of Psalm 13 and showed us how David cried out to God in the midst of suffering as an example to us when we are wrestling through the difficulties of life.
Every one of us wonders at times if God sees us, hears us, or is at all present with us. Even in our Bibles there are times that God’s presence and direction are very clear, and other times when He seems to be silent, at least from the perspective of those on earth. As we continue to see how Jesus is the true and greater fulfillment of the Old Covenant, we will turn our attention to the Tabernacle. The Tabernacle was a tent, a mobile worship center for God’s people for generations, from the time they left Mt. Sinai until Solomon built a Temple. The Tabernacle itself points to Jesus and anticipates the need each one of us has to know that God is with us.
We will take a look at the concept of covenant. The Bible’s storyline is made up of a series of covenants that God made with His people. The Law is part of the covenant God made through Moses at Mount Sinai, and the author of Hebrews argued that it has been superseded by the ultimate covenant promise in Jesus Christ. That raises a couple of important issues for us. First, how do we know that we can trust God’s Word and God’s promises? And how do we understand how the Bible fits together? Why do some covenants continue and others stop? Why do Christians eat bacon and shrimp, and wear mixed-fabric clothing, when those are outlawed in the Sinai covenant? Let’s get into it in this sermon!
This Sunday we will take a brief break from Hebrews and hear from one of our Elders, Joel Kornegay. Joel is a military chaplain who is ordained in the EFCA. I’m excited to hear him preach from 2 Timothy 4:1-5. It is a charge to remain steadfastly focused on the clear, authoritative, inerrant Word in the midst of unsound teaching and unhealthy echo chambers that surround us. As we continue to head toward a contentious election season, there will be all kinds of voices trying to manipulate and distract us. Paul’s charge to Timothy is a timely word for us.
We have heard the name Melchizedek over and over during the past few weeks. The preacher in Hebrews even paused to give some warnings in case we weren’t ready to go so deep as the theology was about to get. This week we get to it. We will see what made this mysterious figure Melchizedek so great. He only appears in one place in the whole Bible, Genesis 14. The passage shows us that Jesus is greater than the entire priesthood. He is our ultimate High Priest. Praise God that His priestly role is not based on the Law and religious systems prescribed in Leviticus, but Jesus is a better promise, a better hope, and a better guarantee of God’s covenant promises to us.
After a hard warning at the start of the chapter, the author of Hebrews turns to an example of patience in waiting for God’s promises. While there are plenty of examples throughout Scripture, there may be none better than Abraham. If you were with us at RHC this past fall, this will be familiar because we spent a few months studying Abraham’s life together. We will see how Abraham gives us an example of patience and perseverance in the ups and downs of life.
This Sunday we will take a look at Hebrews 5:11-6:12, which brings us to one of the most frightening warnings in the book of Hebrews, and maybe in the all of the New Testament. We will have the chance to explore what it means to mature in faith and godliness in our pursuit of Christ, and to move beyond the elementary aspects of our faith. We will see a strong warning against complacency or drifting away, and the reminder that our true beliefs will be seen in the fruit of our lives.
Jesus has been identified as a High Priest a few times already in Hebrews. Our text for Sunday digs into that theme more fully. In it we see the continuity and discontinuity Jesus has with the Old Covenant High Priest. It shows continuity, meaning that there are clear ties and parallels; discontinuity, meaning that Jesus breaks the mold as the true and better High Priest. Ultimately, we will see that Jesus alone has made a way for us to come directly to God. He took on weakness and suffering to enter into humanity and human experience in order to serve as our High Priest. So, we can draw near to God at His throne of grace and find mercy in our times of need. Jesus is the only mediator we ever need.
Chapters 3-4 are part of one larger point to show the superiority of Jesus over Moses and the Law. If Hebrews is a sermon, then these two chapters are an exposition of Psalm 95, and an extension of the warning not to harden our hearts and fail to enter into the rest that God has promised us. This week expands the discussion from Moses and the Psalm to include Joshua as well. Joshua was Moses’ successor, and the one who was able to lead the people into the Promised Land after Moses had died. You might remember that in Numbers 14, Joshua was one of two spies (with Caleb) who wanted to trust God and go into the land. 40 years later, he got to lead them in. Even what Joshua provided was not the ultimate rest, though.
On Sunday we will explore the ideas of sabbath and rest. Spiritual practices, including Sabbath, are a hot topic in Christian books and articles right now, and for good reason. We can all feel like there is something we must be missing, longing for a greater experience of God’s presence and power in our lives. Sabbath, in particular, is attractive because very few of us feel adequately rested. I know that our family is careening toward the end of the school year this week and next, and we can definitely use some rest. Let’s look to God’s Word together to gain a greater understanding of sabbath and rest.
We have already seen Jesus’ superiority to the prophets, angels, and the ultimate mediator for all of humanity. As we continue this week we will see the first part of a longer argument through chapters 3-4 that Jesus is the greater Moses, offering the ultimate Sabbath rest. Chapter 3 helps give a strong warning against hardening our hearts like God’s people did in the time of Moses. We will take time to see how the text leads us to the antidote for hard hearts.
On Sunday we will step back into our series in Hebrews with Hebrews 2:5-18. This is a beautiful passage that emphasizes the reality and truth that God came near to us in the incarnation of Jesus. The incarnation is foundational to our faith. Jesus became our brother so that we could be brought into the family of God. I can’t wait to dig into the text with you on Sunday.
This Sunday we’re pausing the study through Hebrews to look at the Shepherd of Psalm 23. It's a passage that Pastor Eric been in for quite a while as he and Alyssa prayerfully prepare for our next season.
This is a passage that most people in and out of the Christian world have some familiarity with. We know the words of the Psalm, but how well do we know the Shepherd of the Psalm? This Sunday we’re going to fix our gaze on Him and see what it looks like to follow the Good Shepherd and experience every blessing & promise that flows from following Jesus the Good Shepherd.
This passage continues where last week left off, that Jesus is superior to the angels. Angels are a fascinating topic to study, and there are all kinds of ideas about who and what they are, why they exist, and what they do. Why would the author of Hebrews have such an extended section about angels? Most importantly, what do we learn about Jesus from this passage?
This Sunday we begin at the beginning, with Hebrews 1:1-4. It is profound that we worship a God who speaks. God has spoken, continued to speak now, and will speak into eternity, and God’s Word has power. We will take a look at the context for the book of Hebrews, the major themes throughout, and we will look into the different ways that God speaks. Ultimately, God has spoken in and through Jesus Christ, the true Word of God.
This Sunday we will bring our series, Ecclesiastes: Life is a Vapor, to a close. As we look into Ecclesiastes 11:7-12:8 gives us the final teachings of Qoheleth that bring a kind of summary to the entire book. 12:9-14 bring back the voice of our narrator. Ecclesiastes closes with an evaluation of Qoheleth’s teaching, a final word on the fullness of human knowledge and wisdom under the sun. The goal of Ecclesiastes is to serve as a goad, poking us and prodding us, making us address uncomfortable truths and go down paths we otherwise might never choose to explore. I hope it has done so for you, and that this final sermon will bring one final push to impress deeper truths into your heart.
This is the penultimate sermon in our series. So, our journey with Qoheleth comes to a close next week. This Sunday we will cover Ecclesiastes 9:18-11:6. It’s an extended section that includes a lot of practical wisdom and proverbs to help us better work, speak, lead, invest, and live life. We will work our way through the Preacher’s advice as we consider what it is to live this life under the sun in a way that sees past the vanity of it and clings to what is more secure.
We celebrated Easter Sunday in the book of Mark this year. Pastor Bill walked us through the historicity, significance, and response of the resurrection and how we are invited to live in the newness of life.
This Sunday we will continue our series with Ecclesiastes 9. This chapter challenges us to consider whose glory we are seeking in our lives. We rely on building our own reputations and listing our accomplishments as the pathways to glory and leaving our mark on this world. Qoheleth has challenging truths to confront us. We will see on Sunday, though, that our pursuit of glory ought not be limited to what we can accomplish before death. We have a greater King to whom we cry, “Hosanna!”
On Sunday we will dig into Ecclesiastes 8:1-15 where we see the Preacher’s roaming path touch on our approach to kings and rulers, teaching on government and power. In this sermon I will work to accomplish the following:
- provide a theological foundation for understanding the varying roles and responsibilities of the Church and the State
- get underneath current partisan narratives and to expose deeper, more lasting realities and foundations for truth
- cast a vision for the place of the church gathered and the calling of individual Christians as the church scattered.
Chapter 7 is a curious one. The first half is a series of proverbs that seem upside down from the reason or wisdom we might typically have – a funeral is better than a party?! The second half of the chapter is widely regarded as the most difficult section to interpret in Ecclesiastes, one of the most difficult books of the Bible to interpret. So, this will be fun! In our exploration of the text we will see that there is a way to find straight thinking in a crooked world.
These two stories show what it looks like to trust in God's promises and God's character when obstacles seem insurmountable, and the way forward is unknown. How do we respond when we come to places in our own lives where we can’t see a way out or a way forward? Do we trust God with our lives and story? Join us as we explore both the faithfulness and power of God who works on behalf of His people to accomplish His good purposes, and the role of faith in the response of obedience for God's people as we walk through life. In all things, we'll find our hope and our peace in Jesus.
This Sunday is Commitment Sunday for the Dwell Midpoint Refresh. I hope you have been prayerfully considering what God asking you to commit to in the year ahead. We’re all in this together and I’m excited to see what God has for us as we all commit to join Him in His good work as we Dwell: An Enduring & Faithful Presence.
Over the past two months, we have asked you to prayerfully consider two kinds of commitment:
Church Engagement – our goal is to have 100% of the church engaged in some way. We provided a self-assessment to ask you to use as a tool to evaluate what God might be asking you to step into with Redemption Hill in the coming year.
Financial – When a church is our home, we commit to invest our time and talent in engagement as well as our treasure, investing into God’s work in and through us. We would love for all who call RHC home to make a commitment this Sunday, whether you are adjusting your previous commitment, continuing at your current rate of giving and commit to finish strong, or God may be leading you to increase your commitment.
This Sunday’s sermon will be based in Ephesians 2:17-22 as we explore together what makes a church a church. We will look through the New Testament to learn what a church is, and what a church does. Even if you’re brand new to Redemption Hill and not quite ready to make a commitment to this church, I think this Sunday will encourage you with a recasting of the beautiful vision for what God’s people can are and can be in the church and what we look to as foundational to our understanding of church at RHC.
This chapter starts the third major section and a shifting focus to life under the sun in light of God’s sovereignty over all things. Our time in chapter 6 will be specifically spent looking into the issue of money, how we use it and how it uses us. Why is it so often the case that when we get exactly what we want, the joy from it fades quickly? We will see on Sunday that there is hope for true joy in our lives, and that freedom is when we can say, “I don’t care too much for money, cuz money can’t buy me love.”
This Sunday we resume our study in Ecclesiastes together. Among the topics raised in Ecclesiastes 5, we will focus our attention on the cautions about how we approach God. The Preacher, Qoheleth, warns us to guard our steps before God. Sunday will provide us the opportunity to explore true and false religiosity. Why is it that our approach to God and our spiritual lives can feel like a drag? Many of us have had moments of the overwhelming sense of God’s presence and power at some point in our lives, why doesn’t that stick around perpetually? What will it take for a church to be filled with joy and be a life-giving pursuit as we work together for the glory of God and the good of all people? We will work to answer those questions and more as we gather together on Sunday.
One year ago, we started a journey together to pursue God’s call to us as a church to Dwell as An Enduring & Faithful Presence in DC. The Dwell initiative is really an extension of what we have always wanted to be about – joining God in His good work in our city and throughout the DMV. We are in the midst of a Midpoint Refresh of that journey. Here's what we covered on Sunday:
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The chance to gather, sing, pray, hear God’s Word, and share in the Lord’s Supper.
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A sermon rooted in 1 Peter 2:4-12. We will see the calling of all Christians as sojourners and exiles, worshiping together as God’s people and living lives in community that make an impact wherever we are.
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Clarity on the vision for our church in the days ahead.
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A better understanding of the Dwell Initiative. What do we mean by 100% Engagement? Why did we set the financial goals we did?
This Sunday we continue our series with Ecclesiastes 4:4-16. This chapter raises the problem of loneliness and the importance of companionship. We are in the midst of a loneliness epidemic in our nation. The Surgeon General has issued warnings, HHS is doing studies, and it’s all being reported across news outlets. Loneliness is crushing and can become legitimately life-threatening.
As we have seen so far, Ecclesiastes won’t allow us to look away from the truth of human existence and experience. Qoheleth, the author, will continue to poke at us an make us uncomfortable. On Sunday we will address loneliness. We need to take a realistic look at our world and our own lives, and then look for signs and pathways of hope. God’s Word can guide us there.
This Sunday we continue our series with Ecclesiastes 3:1-22. This chapter starts the second section of the book of Ecclesiastes. Section 1 focuses on life under the sun, pursuing the fullness of the end of human wisdom and experience, and that it all is a vapor, a mist, a chasing after the wind. The next few chapters shift to focus on God’s design for the world as He created it.
Chapter 3 might be the most well-known passage in the whole of Ecclesiastes. All because The Birds recorded their song Turn! Turn! Turn! in 1965. You’re welcome for having that stuck in your head throughout the weekend now. There is a season for everything, and our lives will turn through season after season, eventually bringing us in the full cycle and reminder that we are dust, and to dust we will return. As we immerse ourselves in God’s Word on Sunday, we will work to find the secret of joy and purpose in every season of our lives, and in the midst of every circumstance under heaven.
This Sunday we continue in our series with Ecclesiastes 2:1-26. Last week we were introduced to Qoheleth, the Preacher, and an overview of the book that highlights his teaching concerning the extent of human experience and wisdom under the sun. This week we will see him explore specific pursuits, assessing the ultimate value and end-goals of pleasure, wisdom, and work. Our teacher has had a full life and limitless resources and opportunities to push to the fullest end of each pursuit, trying to find meaning and purpose. We will follow him down those paths to see where they end. By the end of the chapter we have already come to the end of section 1 of the book, and verses 24-26 give us the conclusion of the matter. It is possible to find joy and purpose even in the midst of the vaporous reality of our lives.
I love the book of Ecclesiastes. Reading through it feels like it could have been written directly to DC in 2024. With the uncertainty of the year ahead, anxiety that many are already carrying into another election year, and the difficulty of navigating life in general, we all long for something solid to stand on, something that is unmoving that we can trust. Ecclesiastes helps us by exposing the fullest measure of every pursuit under the sun. This Sunday we begin with Ecclesiastes 1:1-18.The sermon title is Everything is Meaningless. If you read chapter 1 you will catch why that’s the title! I’ll take some time to introduce the book, talk about who the Preacher might be, and then we will jump right into what amounts to be a summary of the Preacher’s teaching. The Preacher shows us that all things under the sun, in the end, are a vapor, a mist, a chasing after the wind. In the end we will also see what is fixed like nails for us to hold onto in the end.
As we close our series, Abraham: Journey of Faith, we come to Genesis 25:1-11, Abraham’s death. Like Sarah’s death, it feels kind of sudden after so much story and time together. There are some interesting details in the passage that we will look into. Most of our time, though, will be spent looking at Abraham’s life. We will look at his importance and place in Redemptive History, God’s plan for redeeming humanity and renewing and restoring all things. And we will see how Abraham points us to Advent, the longing, waiting, and anticipation of what God would ultimately accomplish in the coming of Christ.
This is a long chapter, but we’re going to cover it in one go. I encourage you to take the time to read it between now and Sunday so you can come in with some familiarity. After Sarah’s death, Abraham realized that it was time to find a wife for his son, Isaac. He sent his servant on a journey that led to an intriguing encounter at a well with a young girl name Rebekah.
The chapter shows us something of God’s care and will for us. In Abraham’s Journey of Faith there have been a lot of ups and downs. He finally came to the point of complete surrender and God was faithful to provide exactly what was needed. Everyone else in the story shows steps of faith as well, showing us the beauty and freedom we can have in self-surrender.
This chapter details the legal negotiations and contract for a piece of land containing a cave in Hebron. At first reading it might feel boring to most. With a closer look, though, we can come to realize that this is the first piece of the land God promised to Abraham that was secured as Abraham’s own, and at a high price. Our focus on Sunday, though, will be Sarah. The reason Abraham bought the land with the cave was to bury his wife, the Matriarch of the Promise, after her death. On Sunday we will take a look at Sarah’s life as a whole, and lessons we can learn from her, in a kind of Eulogy for Sarah.
On Sunday, Pastor Eric walked us through Titus 1:5-9 and walked us through the ecclesiastical need for shepherds in the church, the distinctives of qualified, godly shepherds, the source of empowerment for every godly leader, and the response as God’s people.
This Sunday we continued our series, Abraham: Journey of Faith with what might be the most famous story in Abraham’s entire life. In the ultimate test of faith, God called Abraham to offer up his son, Isaac in Genesis 22. At this point Ishmael had been cast out. After 25 years of waiting, God finally brought the promise of offspring to fulfillment in Sarah bearing Isaac. That one boy carried the fullness of God’s promises to Abraham – that his name would be great, that his offspring would outnumber the stars in the sky, that all the families of the earth would be blessed through him. Now the same God who made those promises was demanding that Isaac be given as an offering.
This story is gripping and powerful. It presents a devastating ethical conundrum. As we read through and study the text, we will work to enter into the tension and anguish of the story. It’s only when we are able to experience the tension and anguish of questioning God’s goodness in the midst of His justice, that we can experience the explosiveness of His grace.
After 25 years of waiting, longing, and anticipation, Abraham and Sarah finally see God’s promise of a baby fulfilled. Genesis 21 is filled with laughter and feasting and joy, and then the difficulty of family conflict and relational turmoil. In all of this, we see God’s sovereignty on display. At the very end of the chapter we read a new name for God, El Elyon, the Everlasting God. We will see that this characteristic is crucial to make sense of the three major stories – Isaac, Ishmael, and Abimelech – weaving them together under God’s sovereignty and work.
This Sunday we return to our series, Abraham: Journey of Faith with a fascinating story about Abraham and Abimelech. It is possible for us to live our lives day to day without any real sense or awareness of God’s active work in our lives and in the world around us. The more busy and focused we become on what is happening immediately in front of us, the more tempting it can be to forget that there really is someone working at all times, in all circumstances, and in the lives of every person; that God is sovereign, knowing, present, and active. Genesis 20 is a good example of human efforts that are exposed as failures on every side, and God’s faithfulness in the midst of it.
Our study brings us to a devastating moment that the rest of Scripture points back to – the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. We will face big questions of God’s righteous judgment, human responsibility, divine intervention and salvation, the power of prayer, and the fickleness of the human heart. Sodom and Gomorrah’s wickedness was well known at the time of Abraham, and the names of those cities became euphemisms for depravity. In the midst of the chaos and destruction, we will see God working, remembering His promises, and saving people even in spite of their reluctance. In the darkness there is the light of hope.
Pastor Eric preached from Acts 16 on Sunday. This chapter tells the story of how the Philippian church was born, and it all starts with God saying ’NO’. As the story unfolds, take note of all the good that comes from God saying no. We will take this scripture in sections, pausing long enough in each section to see God at work & let it stir us to worship.
It is so easy to feel like God doesn’t hear us when we pray. There are times that we wonder if our prayer even means anything, whether what we do, say, pray, or pursue don’t matter. If God is the sovereign Creator of all things, why would we matter anyway? This Sunday we are going to dig into Genesis 18 where we will see Abraham and Sarah both interact directly with God. We’ll see Sarah in a quiet moment, thinking she is unseen, unimportant, and unheard, and we’ll even see Abraham… negotiate? … argue with God? Over and over our time with Abraham in this Journey of Faith helps us to see who God is, through every hill and valley along our path.
This is another critical moment in Abraham’s life and in the storyline of Scripture. God came to Abram again, and this time changed his name to Abraham. Every time God has come to Abraham so far, the promise was clarified and made more specific. Chapter 17 is no exception. We will see a name change, a call to circumcision as a mark of the covenant (!?!?), and a man who laughed at God – we will look together and see the Absurdity of Grace.
Decisions are part of the human experience. Making plans & deciding the path we want to take is all part of what it means to be alive. It can be fun, but it can also be debilitating depending on where you’re at in life. Sometimes it feels like we’re always being presented with big, life-altering decisions. And with those decisions come questions like: What do I do? What’s God’s will for my life? We don’t want to get it wrong and then be set on the wrong path forever… we just want to know, how can I make good decisions?
In this sermon, Pastor Eric will walk us through Proverbs 16 as we pursue Jesus. There we find a clear theme of wisdom for our plans & ways (our decisions) that is woven throughout.
We have already seen ups and downs in Abram and Sarai’s journey. We have seen Abram follow God’s calling and promises with bold faith and obedience. We have also seen him run in fearful faithlessness. We have seen Abram at his peak as he led a campaign to rescue his nephew and the people of the cities of the Jordan River Valley, and as he refused to leverage his victories for political gain but received a blessing from Melchizedek. Last week we saw Abram receive God’s promises again, but this time as a covenant – in a mysterious passage that shows that God’s promises to Abram are not contingent in the least on Abram, but only on God to come through.
Just when everything looked like it was headed in the right direction, chaos descended. Abram, who had “believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness,” turned back again to his own solutions and plans. He and Sarai took God’s promises into their own hands, with the best of their ideas for how to bring them to fulfillment. The best of their efforts, though, were not what God had called them to. In truth, they showed a lack of faith, a lack of trust in God’s ability to do the seemingly impossible. Genesis 16 is a dramatic, made-for-Netflix story that reveals impatient hearts that reflect our own more closely than we would like to admit. And still there is hope in the midst of chaos.
Back in chapter 12 God called Abram with the promise that He would make Abram a great nation and bless all people on Earth through him. We’ve traced some ups and downs that bring us to this point. While God made some promises to Abram along the way, this chapter formalizes a covenant between God and Abram. What may seem a little bizarre to us – cutting some animals in half and laying them out on the ground – follows the pattern of covenant ceremonies in the Ancient Near East.
Genesis 15 is a key point in the entire storyline of the Bible, God’s plan of redemption for all people. We will explore exactly what a covenant is, and why the specifics of this chapter are important to help us understand God’s character. We will also see our place in the story, and the importance this covenant has for all who follow Christ.
This Sunday we continue our series, Abraham: Journey of Faith, with Genesis 14. This chapter shows Abram at his best. It’s a dramatic chapter that would make for a great movie or miniseries - a riveting plot, villains, a crisis and a hero, strategy, battles, a surprise twist, and character development. We see the man of faith act in great faith both in the risks he took and in the opportunities he passed up. By the end we are also introduced to one of the most mysterious figures in all of Scripture: Melchizedek, the King of Salem. This Sunday we will see a profound example of the ways that the whole Bible holds together with strong threads of a narrative tapestry.
This Sunday we were in Genesis 2-3 looking at vocation and how we view each other. My hope, as we walk together through Scripture today, is that God will soften every one of our wills to reimagine why we do what we do for work, and open our eyes to see ourselves & others as individuals who possess an inherent dignity & value not because of what we DO but because of who we are as people made in the image of God.
When we started last week, his name was Abram. God came to Abram and called him to go to a place that God would show him, promising to make his name great and to bless all the families of the earth through Abram. In an incredible step of faith, Abram followed God’s call! Sadly, he also was overcome by fear in short order as a famine hit the land. And so we saw the factors that lead us to stretches when our faith fails. Praise God that His promises aren’t reliant on us!
This week we continue with Genesis 13. Abram showed faith again, this time in repentance, as he retraced his steps to go out of Egypt and eventually, he came to Bethel. Bethel is where Abram had set up an altar to worship God. His trust in God was renewed and led him right back to old pathways he had left behind. His nephew Lot, on the other hand, had ambition that drove him. We will see the beauty of repentance and the dangers of ambition as we hear from God’s Word together.
In the coming weeks we will embark on a journey into Genesis 12-25 and trace Abraham’s life. Abraham is the Patriarch for the world’s three major religions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Abraham is called the “man of faith” because he believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness. Abraham believed the promises of God enough to leave his place and people to go to the place God promised to show him. It wasn’t easy, though. Throughout Abraham’s journey we see times marked by fear and failure, long-suffering anticipation and sorrow, and times when he tried to make God’s plan happen in his own strength. For all who follow Christ, Abraham’s story is our story. Abraham is a key figure in Redemptive History, the one God called to be the father of nations, and through whom all people would be blessed. Scripture often calls him “the man of faith,” and he is the father for all who believe (Gal. 3:7-9). And so, Father Abraham is our shared ancestor we are sons and daughters of the man of faith. On Sunday we begin with Genesis 11:27-12:20. As our story begins, we meet Abram and Sarai (their names get tweaked later on). In a major step of faith, Abram and Sarai heard God’s call to leave all they had and all they knew to go to a place that God would show them, with the promise that God would do great things through them. Their faith in following God’s initial call didn’t hold up perfectly, though. When famine hit, Abram spiraled into a series of bigger and bigger mistakes. Right at the top of this Journey of Faith, we are confronted with the competing tension of faith and fear. Like Abram and Sarai, we have heard God’s promises, but reality can make it hard to believe.
This Sunday we will close out our series on the Virtues of Ephesians 4:1-3. Each of five Virtues listed in this passage show us what it means to walk in a manner that is worthy of our calling in Christ, and to maintain the “unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace.” Now that we have explored Humility, Gentleness, Patience, and Forbearance, we will close it out with Love.Love is what binds all the virtues together. Without it, nothing we do, none of our talents or gifts, and our greatest accomplishments amount to nothing. This is the one virtue that we are told is essential to the character of God – God is Love. The idea that God is love and that we need to love people around us isn’t hotly disputed in our world. In fact, most people who can conceive of the idea of God are very comfortable with God’s love – at least as they understand it. The problem is that the way we think about Love tends to be sappy and sentimental, and completely apart from the biblical framework. This Sunday we will see what Love is and is not, what it means that God is Love, what we’re called to, and how God has shown us His Love.
This Sunday we will continue our series on the Virtues of Ephesians 4:1-3. Each of five Virtues listed in this passage show us what it means to walk in a manner that is worthy of our calling in Christ, and to maintain the “unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace.” Now that we have explored Humility, Gentleness, and Patience we turn our attention to Forbearance.While Humility shows itself in relationships with others through Gentleness, Patience shows itself in relationships with others through Forbearance. We saw last week that Patience is used throughout Scripture to indicate long-suffering endurance. One of the most immediate and practical places we have to practice it is with other people. No matter who you are, proximity with others brings friction at times. In fact, it’s typically the people we are closest to, who we love most, that we struggle most with as well. At the core of what it takes to bear with each other in love is the need to forgive. In a world that has come to question the legitimacy and value of forgiveness, it is the call of every follower of Christ to forgive. This week will dig into what it means to practice Forbearance and look at practical pathways into it.
This Sunday we will continue our series on the Virtues of Ephesians 4:1-3. Each of five Virtues listed in this passage show us what it means to walk in a manner that is worthy of our calling in Christ, and to maintain the “unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace.” Now that we have explored Humility, and Gentleness, we turn our attention to Patience.
We live in an impatient place. For some of us the hustle and pace of life in DC is invigorating, while for others it is exhausting. No one would accuse this place of being patient, though. What is true patience, though? It has to be more than just moving slowly. Patience, like humility, is an internal posture and characteristic that will shape the way we see and interact with the world, with others, and ultimately with God.
This Sunday we will continue our series on the Virtues of Ephesians 4:1-3. Each of five Virtues listed in this passage show us what it means to walk in a manner that is worthy of our calling in Christ, and to maintain the “unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace.” Last week we spent time exploring Humility, and the importance of lowliness in our hearts. This week we continue with a study on Gentleness.
Gentleness is sometimes translated in our Bibles as Meekness. While the language of humility was offensive to the Greco-Roman world, and not once used in a positive light, the virtue of gentleness and meekness was very positively considered. It presents a “golden mean” in dealing with emotion – not too angry, but also not never angry. To recognizing someone or something’s gentleness, we also must see their power. Meekness has been defined by many as power under restraint. As we explore the Biblical perspective on Gentleness, we will see it come up in the lives of some of the leaders in Scripture. Ultimately, we will see the beautiful Gentleness and meekness of Jesus, and what it means for us.
This week we begin with a look at Humility, which is also sometimes translated as Lowliness. It’s been said that humility is shy, because as soon as it is brought up, it’s nowhere to be found. Humility was not a positive attribute in the Roman world that Paul wrote into. In fact, it was despised. The idea that people would choose a posture that would honor others above their position, station, or rank was ridiculous. While our culture looks for at least a veneer of humility, pride still reigns in human hearts. This Sunday we will explore what humility is. If it’s not mere self-deprecation or sadness, then how do we define it, and why is it so important?
This Sunday we have a treat. Pastor Andrew Elder from Village Church South Belfast is in DC and will preach God’s Word for us on Sunday. Redemption Hill has been involved in church planting in Belfast since 2012, with both Village East and Village South. You won’t want to miss Andrew’s Northern Irish accent. Even more so, you won’t want to miss what he has to share with us from the Word of God.
Pastor Andrew will preach from Luke 10:25-37, “The Good Samaritan.” Often this most famous parable is taken out of its context, but when we read the whole passage we find that it is a conversation about eternal life. As Jesus responds to the teacher of the law who is trying to trap him, we see him challenging legalism and exposing the sin of self-justification. The standard of neighbour-love is one we all fall short of, but we have a TRUE Good Samaritan in Jesus, who comes to us, bind up our wounds, carries us to the place of safety and pays our bill in full. Only when we have received the grace of our Good Samaritan can we respond in the right way to his call to action - go and do likewise.
We round out our pstudy in psome pselected Psalms of Ascent (see what I did there?) with Psalm 126. This is a psalm that is perfect When We’re Wanting God to Do Great Things. In light of God’s past miraculous, mighty acts for His people, this song stirs praise-filled acknowledgment of God’s great deeds and a provokes the prayers that God will do them again. “Do it again, God” has been the softly muttered prayer by generations of God’s people. This Sunday we join with the pilgrims ascending the steps as we affirm “God has done great things for us”, as we revel in God’s past faithfulness & promises, and as we implore Him to do it again.
The song of Psalm 124 begins with a question: “What if the LORD had not been on our side?”
“What ifs” are a part of our daily realities whether we consciously entertain them or not. More often than not, the what-ifs we entertain are negative: What if I lose my job? What if I didn’t lock the door before leaving for vacation? What if I take this step of faith and God doesn’t provide? What if, what if, what if.
Psalm 124 is written to those who are wrestling with what-ifs. It’s written by King David who has come through to the other side of his what-ifs and now turns to comfort, encourage, and exhort others of God’s goodness, presence, and deliverance in the midst of theirs. Join us as we read Psalm 124 and fix our eyes on Jesus in the midst of our what-ifs.
On Sunday we will begin a short series through some of the Psalms of Ascent. This collection of Psalms (120-134) was sung by God’s people as they made pilgrimages to Jerusalem, on the road up to the city, as well as the journey into the Temple to worship. On Sunday morning we will hear Psalm 120, the opening Psalm of Ascent. Psalm 120 helps us to learn how to pray when we are wrestling with being in places and circumstances that we don’t want to be in. Take some time to read the Psalm as you prepare your heart for worship.
This Sunday we close our series with Jonah 4. We left off at the most unlikely of responses – the people of Nineveh, even the King himself, repented, turned from their wickedness and violence, and pleaded with God to relent. God did relent. He didn’t bring disaster on Nineveh, showing His mercy and kindness to them all. Any prophet would be thrilled to see a whole capital city turn to God in repentance, right? Well, no prophet except for Jonah.
The final chapter of this short story frames the rest of the story for us. Now we see Jonah’s heart and motivations on full display. Now God addresses Jonah directly. And as God’s voice closes the story, we will see the only book in the entire Bible that ends with a question. It’s a question that ought to hit us, cutting deep into our hearts.
God’s Word came to Jonah a second time. Just like the first time, God told Jonah to arise, go to Nineveh, and call out. Would Jonah obey with a second chance given? How will the Ninevites respond to him? As we explore the story this Sunday we will see what it looks like to truly hear and respond to God’s Word.
This is probably the part of the story that jumps to mind first when we hear Jonah’s name. When we left off last Sunday, Jonah ran from God and ended up being thrown into the sea. In Jonah 1:17-2:10 our man is swallowed by a great fish. As Jonah continued his descent to the roots of the mountains he prayed. We learn a lot about Jonah through his prayer. Read it carefully, all may not be what it seems to be.
This week we begin with Jonah 1:1-16. This story wastes no time before jumping right into it. In this passage we will see three commands that came to Jonah from God: get up, go to Nineveh, and call out. Jonah didn’t really want to go to Nineveh because he didn’t like the people in Nineveh. So, he took off in the other direction and tried to outrun God. For real. On Sunday we will work to get underneath the story to understand what it has to teach us about who God is. I think we’ll all see that we have more Jonah in our own hearts than we want to admit.
At the end of last Sunday's sermon, we explored some of the implications of Jesus' resurrection. One of which, was that because Jesus is risen, we can walk in newness of life. "Newness of life" speaks of a living with new allegiance as a people made new by God's grace in Christ. This new allegiance is not to self or sin, but to the word & ways of Jesus, and the ongoing ministry of the Holy Spirit in our lives.
The expectation of God, of Scripture, is that we would move on to spiritual maturity in our walks of faith. Not content with a steady diet of milk-only, but learning to eat solid food: what Scripture refers to as meat. If milk is the basic teachings of Scripture, then meat is the more complete, deeper doctrines of Scripture.
As people who have been made new because of Christ's death & resurrection, we should be actively pursuing spiritual maturity. This is God's good design for His people. Join us in Hebrews 5-6 as we learn how we live into the fullness of life that God has given us in Jesus.
In Christ, every Sunday is Easter Sunday. He is still risen! This week, we'll be in chapter 24 of Luke's gospel looking at the resurrection story. It's a narrative woven around 3 women, 2 angels, and 1 question. The question asked is one that has reverberated for centuries since it was first uttered: Why do you seek the living among the dead? This is a question that remains relevant for our time, our culture, our very lives. Where are we seeking to find life, fulfillment, value? How are those pursuits really going?
The hope for every soul is found in the words immediately following that question: "He is not here. He is risen." The resurrection of Jesus puts our pursuits into proper perspective. Join us Sunday as we learn to identify where we might be seeking life among death and how to get our eyes onto Jesus, in whom true life is found.
This Sunday we finish the Gospel of John with chapter 21. This chapter brings the third time that Jesus appeared to His disciples. This time, though, they were up in Galilee and had gone out fishing. In the gray twilight of dawn, as they were coming in to the shore, Jesus came. As the scene unfolded, Jesus helped gave them a miraculous catch of fish, but also had a small charcoal fire with fish laid out on it for breakfast as they came in. After breakfast, Jesus turned to Peter and lovingly brought him close, restoring him in his calling and closeness.
We will continue in John this Sunday with John 20:19-31. This passage picks up on Sunday evening, the same day that Jesus called Mary by name and sent her to tell the disciples that she had seen Him. Poor Thomas wasn’t with the disciples when Jesus came to them that Easter evening. We have no idea where he was. He could have been out on a walk, or getting a bite to eat. All we do know is that he wasn’t there. When the other 10 disciples told him that they had seen Jesus, he said that he wouldn’t believe it until he had the same chance they had to see him. Thomas wanted to see and touch Jesus, the places where the nails had gone through His hands.
This passage has given Thomas the nickname “Doubting Thomas.” I don’t think that’s quite fair, but there’s no changing it at this point. If nothing else, this passage shows us that there is no shame in having doubts. It’s not dangerous or wrong to ask questions. Christianity is not a leap of blind faith. It is a belief in real events that have been attested to by eye witnesses. This Sunday is for the skeptic, for those who want clear facts and realities in order to believe. After all, as an old professor of mine would say, “The heart cannot rejoice in that which the mind rejects as false.”
Palm Sunday is the day that commemorates the coronation of King Jesus. It’s a story recorded in all four gospels where Jesus rides into the city of Jerusalem as symbolic annunciation that He is Israel’s Promised and Rightful King, the Son of David, the Anointed Redeemer of Humanity.
In addition to the prophecy-fulfilling announcement of His kingship, Jesus’ arrival establishes the unambiguous ethos of His kingdom; a kingdom of righteousness, justice, healing and peace.
Pastor Eric will walk us through Matthew 21:1-17 and walk through the variety of responses from everyone He encounters in this story. The account is written by Matthew’ in such a way that will elicit a response from every reader who encounters King Jesus for themselves.
This Sunday we step back into the Gospel of John with John 18:28-19:16. After Jesus was arrested in the dark of night, betrayed by Jesus and abandoned by Peter, He was eventually sent from the High Priest’s house to Pontius Pilate. Pilate was the Roman governor responsible for maintaining order in Jerusalem and the surrounding area. And so Jesus was pulled before the governing power of the city. The one whose followers and friends had identified as the Messiah, the Christ, the one in the line of David whom God had promised and had finally come to deliver God’s people, now stood trial.
This passage shows us the clash of two kingdoms with stark clarity. Throughout it we can see that the glory of Jesus is not the same as the glory of humanity, that the kingdom of Jesus is not the kingdom of this world, and that the call of citizens in one kingdom do not have the same values or ends as the other.
The hour has finally come. Jesus and His disciples crossed the Kidron Valley from Jerusalem to the Mount of Olives. They settled into a familiar place, a garden called Gethsemane. Among the olive trees on the hillside, in the dark of night, a group of guards and soldiers arrived, led by the one Jesus had dismissed from dinner, Judas Iscariot. They came to arrest Jesus.
There are only a few details that all four Gospels contain. One of the most prominent is Peter’s actions that night. Peter first tried to defend Jesus, taking a swing at the High Priest’s servant, who John identified as Malchus. And what unfolded next as Jesus was put on trial in the dead of night, was exactly what Jesus told Peter would happen. A nearby rooster crowed in just as Peter denied Jesus for the third time in rapid succession. This is Peter! This is the rock on whom Jesus said He would build His Church. How could he possibly deny even knowing Jesus? This week is an important look at what gets us off track in our own lives as we follow Jesus and, ultimately, provides hope for the times we fail, too.
We land in John 17, also known as the High Priestly Prayer, as the drumbeat of the cross is getting louder. All of Scripture has been leading up to this hour—and all of Scripture after this, points back to this time. Jesus is preparing Himself for what’s ahead. The Garden of Gethsemane, the betrayal, the humiliation, the violence, unimaginable pain, and death.
But first, Jesus goes to His Father and prays for Himself—and us. Soak that in. Jesus, who is about to be crucified, takes his last moments to pray for us, His followers.
This week we get back into it with John 16:1-15. This chapter brings us directly into the night that Jesus was arrested and betrayed. After sharing a Passover meal with His disciples, and dismissing Judas Iscariot, Jesus took time to teach and care for His friends. This “Farewell Discourse” captures Jesus love, care, and hope for His followers. In our passage for Sunday, Jesus talked explicitly about the Holy Spirit, the One He would send as a Helper for the disciples.
The Holy Spirit can feel mysterious and confusing to many of us. For Jesus, the Spirit is the greatest gift that he could possibly send. It is the Holy Spirit who exposes our need for a Savior, who opens our hearts, minds, and ears, and who indwells us with the presence and power of God. This Sunday we will take time to consider the work of the Holy Spirit in our world and in our lives.
This Sunday we closed out the Dwell series by studying Exodus 31:1-5. This series has worked to set our hearts and focus as a church on God’s call to us to Dwell in our city as An Enduring & Faithful Presence, investing our lives into the good of the city, trusting that in its good, we will find our own as well. We have looked particularly at investing ourselves financially into God’s work through the church. This week we will expand that view to see how God specifically gifts and calls us as individuals, equipping us with what we need to be part of His work for the sake of God’s glory.
This Sunday will continue with 2 Corinthians 9:11-15. As we continue to look at our call to Dwell as An Enduring and Faithful Presence, we have heard the call to give ourselves first to the Lord, and focused on the shaping influence of God’s grace on our own hearts as we think about resources that God has given us and how to best steward and invest them. This Sunday we continue with a call to Give to God’s Glory. Our giving has to flow from God’s work in our hearts and we can see the impact of our giving in the work God is doing. We get to join God in His work as we respond to grace and in that we get to see an increase of thanksgiving, worship, and prayer in others. So, this week we will look at the impact of giving to God’s glory.
As we continue to look at our call to Dwell as An Enduring and Faithful Presence, we have heard the call to give ourselves first to the Lord, and seen what it looks like to give God’s way. This Sunday we continue with a call to give in abundance. The call in Scripture is not an exaction or some kind of church tax. God calls us to give out of what we have and to do so generously. A lot of our posture toward generosity – in time, talents, and treasure – comes down to our own mentality. On Sunday we will see the difference in outcomes if we operate from a scarcity mentality or from an abundance mentality.
This Sunday we will continue with 2 Corinthians 8:10-24. Chapter 8 begins with the all-of-life calling that we give ourselves first to the Lord. In this passage, Paul gave directions to the church in Corinth about how to handle money, and how money would be handled as Titus came to take the collection for the church in Jerusalem. It gives us important guidance on how we ought to Give God’s Way.
This Sunday we head to 2 Corinthians 8:1-9. Chapters 8-9 are the most extended teaching we have in the entire New Testament on handling money and, more specifically, on giving to God’s work. Money is an uncomfortable topic for many, maybe even you! I get it. There are all kinds of reasons it can be uncomfortable, but money is an important topic. Often, the desires of our hearts can be seen most clearly in our bank accounts. If the earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, then it is important to understand what it looks like to steward all of God’s gifts well. Our passage on Sunday gives us a rooted and gospel-rich look how we ought to understand money.
Throughout Scripture, we see that God’s presence dwells with His people. Like Moses at Mount Sinai, we don’t want to go anywhere if God’s presence isn’t with us (Exo. 33:12-16). We also want to follow the call to dwell in our city, building houses, planting gardens, and investing into the good of the city (Jer. 29:4-7). In our own lives, we experience God’s presence in the Spirit, through Christ.
Our deep desire is that we would Dwell more deeply in God’s presence both individually and as a people and that Redemption Hill will have An Enduring & Faithful Presence here in DC. We hope to find a place that RHC can call home, where we can establish a lasting presence that will be a hub for ministry and a rooted commitment to the good of our city.
On Sunday we begin the journey together by exploring these themes across the pages and storyline of Scripture.
This week we end our Advent journey in the book of Isaiah. So far, we have looked at hope, peace, and joy made available to us in Christ. This week, we look at God’s great love for us. Join us as we talk about how God’s “breaking in on us” always happens in the middle of our stories.
So far this Advent season, we have looked at how the Lord speaks through the prophet Isaiah to bring hope and peace to a people who desperately need it. This Sunday, we will turn to God’s Word to learn about joy. We will look at how God’s people receive his blessings, justice, and presence in the midst of a hard season and will learn about a God who turns deserts into gardens.
Advent is a season of longing. We long for God’s rule and reign to break into the darkness of the world around us, and in us. Last week we looked at the true meaning of Advent hope. This week we look at the words of God, as spoken through the prophet Isaiah, regarding the coming King. These words are, at their heart, words of peace. We will be in Isaiah 11:1-10 looking at The Coming King and His peace.
This Sunday we begin our Advent Series with sermons from the book of the Prophet Isaiah. The Prophet’s words are a much needed reminder of God’s promises made to His people. In a world full of dark and evil acts, we can look ahead to the day when the return of the King will make peace between the nations and push back the darkness with the light of His life.
As Jesus continued His final teaching to His disciples, called the Farewell Discourse, He had just finished a powerful metaphor of the Vine and the Branches, and He called His disciples His friends. Now, in John 15:18-16:4, Jesus makes it clear that following Him is not going to be easy. In fact, after His departure from them, the disciples’ lives are going to be much more difficult. He warns them with the explicit purpose that they won’t fall away. This is a good and timely passage for us. Deconstruction is a major issue right now. If you feel weak, or you’re wrestling with doubts and fear, my hope is that God will speak to your heart directly as we spend time together on Sunday.
This Sunday we will continue in our series in John’s Gospel with John 15:1-17. In it we will see the way that Jesus used a powerful and memorable metaphor of the Vine and the Branches. We have a tendency to root ourselves into all kinds of sources of life and encouragement, but Jesus is the true vine. We will explore together what it means to remain or abide in Him.
As the Farewell Discourse continued, Jesus told His disciples that when He left them, they would do even greater works than He had done. That’s a big task! Don’t forget all that they had seen Jesus do. The call to do the Father’s works isn’t left to the disciples to figure out and do on their own, though. Jesus promised that they would have the power and help of the Holy Spirit within them. We will take time on Sunday to see the beautiful calling we have to step into the life and work of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
After calling His disciples, from the very beginning, to follow Him, Jesus now tells them that He is going to a place they cannot follow. Peter, Thomas, and Philip are all confused. Their questions and pushback are helpful for us as we try to understand what it means to follow Jesus.
This Sunday we begin what is called “The Farewell Discourse” in John. After Jesus washed the disciples’ feet and Judas left the room to go and betray Jesus. These are the final teaching Jesus gave His disciples on his final night with them. These passages contain some of the most important teachings of Jesus, and John recorded it for us. This section has been loved and held by Christians across every context and culture for the last two millennia. I am so excited to begin it together as we look this Sunday at: The Mark of the Christian: Love.
After Jesus identified Himself as the Light of the World, who will draw all people to Himself, we see the One who created and sustains all things get down to His knees to wash His own disciples’ feet. All the way through John’s Gospel we have seen different aspects of who Jesus is, like facets of a prism. This passage shows the glory, beauty, and brilliance of Jesus as both Lord of all and Servant of all.
Chapter 13 takes a turn to the passion of Jesus, taking us into the upper room on Thursday evening as Jesus and the disciples celebrated Passover together. Before we turn to that part of the Gospel, though, we see Jesus cry out. These few verses seem to give a summary of all that has come up to this point in John's Gospel. The world we live in is dark. It is confusing, impossible to navigate, and we stumble our way through most of our lives. Jesus is the hope we have to bring light to the darkness, clarity to the murkiness, and hope to the hopelessness.
This Sunday we continue our series with John 12:27-43. This passage will help us take a long look at glory. There is a stark difference in the glory of humanity and the glory of God. We will explore our own tendencies and desires, and what kind of glory our lives reflect. We will also see that the glory of Jesus is in the cross, which turns the world upside down.
This Sunday we continue our series with John 12:12-26. The Triumphal Entry is typically held for Palm Sunday in the spring time. Does that mean we hit the wrong equinox? No! The rest of the Gospel of John focuses on the last week Jesus spent in Jerusalem leading to His death and resurrection. John was there for it all. He was the only one of the disciples that was present all the way through the crucifixion. This last week had clearly left a major impression on him, and we will see details that none of the other Gospels include. That all beings with the Triumphal Entry.
Jesus came into Jerusalem on a donkey, not exactly what you hope for in a conquering king to inspire the nation. That would be like your favorite F1 driver showing up in an old Ford Taurus. As with everything else, though, Jesus was intentional about it all. As we study this passage together, we will follow the request of the Greeks who were present, “We want to see Jesus.” We will take a look about what we see about Jesus, who He is, and how that matters for us.
We are so excited to get back into the Gospel of John together this Sunday. We left off at the very beginning of May in chapter 11. Many see chapter 12 as a turning point in John’s portrait of Jesus.
This Sunday we will dig into John 12:1-11. Jesus had just raised his friend Lazarus after he had been dead for four days. We will take a look together at the reactions of the people around Jesus in the aftermath of that incredible miracle. People’s hearts are exposed in the presence of Jesus. In some we see examples of loving devotion, while others show their own selfishness.
This Sunday, Pastor Rich will preach from Psalm 11:7. There is no doubt that God want us to see him. It is part of who He is. He wants to be known and He wants us to recognize that we are known by Him. This is why he looks for those who rightly worship Him. Yet, we often find reasons to disqualify ourselves from being seen by God. This sermon will help us identify the barriers in our lives that keep us from intimacy with God. This sermon will help us realize that seeing God’s face requires seeking and growing in intimacy with Him. Ultimately, this sermon will help us see that in Christ, we can indeed stand before God, with unveiled faces, knowing that we are seen and loved for who we are.
Last Sunday, Pastor Bill talked about his hopes for the church as we look ahead. Our church is heading into a new season together. Now that we are over a decade into this work, Redemption Hill is not a church plant, we are a church. Even more, Redemption Hill has had the privilege of investing into other church plants and planting efforts. Coming through a few difficult and tumultuous years together has shaped everyone of us, and our church as well. On Sunday we returned to a text that has been very familiar through the planting and establishment of Redemption Hill Church, Jeremiah 29:4-14. We saw what God's people are called to in whatever place they find themselves.
This Sunday we will continue our Roots & Fruit series as we look at what it means to do the Lord's work in the Lord's way. We talk a lot about church as a family and a community. There is more to being a church, though. We are called by God to be His people, carrying the light of the gospel of Jesus Christ into this world, empowered and led by the Spirit to good witness and work. Way too often, though, serving in a church can start to lose its lustre and feel like a grind, or we feel the draw to sit back and enjoy without much personal cost. Jesus is building His Church, and we get to join Him. Let's make sure we do it His way.
Jon Parks is a Pastor of Village Church East Belfast. Pastor Jon was involved from the very beginning of the plant, though not as its pastor. His brother Lucas was the planting pastor. Over time, though, God called Jon into pastoral ministry and the church affirmed his gifts and qualification for that ministry role. In summer 2020, Lucas moved away from Belfast and took a new role in a different church. Pastor Jon has continued as a key leader and pastor for Village. Redemption Hill has supported the work in Belfast for over a decade through financial support and many other ways that we have partnered together.
It is difficult not to be consumed by ideologies and perspectives that surround us, allowing other thoughts to take precedence over the gospel in our lives. DC is our culture’s Athens, where people “spend their time in nothing except telling or hearing something new” (Acts 17:21). 90 minutes of church per Sunday, on its own, is not going to reshape our lives. And yet, the church is essential to shaping our spiritual lives and perspectives.
Pastor Jon will help us see the importance of prioritizing our local church. He will highlight the difference between empty moralism and gospel transformation, setting a vision for the importance of our local church in helping us to keep Christ at the center as we stumble toward maturity together. In some ways, this sermon will serve as a capstone for all that precedes it in this series, emphasizing the rhythms of worship, community, and mission that are all centered on, shaped by, and driven by the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Redemption Hill is committed to intentionally equip members of the church, empowered by the Holy Spirit, to do the work of ministry. Redemption Hill equips and resources members to pursue their passions and gifts as they join Jesus on His mission in our city. Ministry at Redemption Hill is deeply contextualized and reliant on the Holy Spirit to wake up sleepy Christians, save nominal Christians, and reach lost people with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
In this sermon, Pastor Eric will emphasize the priesthood of all believers from Ephesians 4:11-16. Read over the passage this weekend and pray for Eric as he continues to prepare to preach.
Acts 2:41-47 shows the impact of God’s people coming together in community. The impact is felt internally as members of the body are cared for and encouraged in tangible and intangible ways (Gal. 6:1-5). It is also felt outwardly as our city experiences God’s love and grace through His people, the church (Acts 2:42, 5:14, 11:24). Redemption Hill Church is a community of people who gather together to worship Jesus, live life together, support each other, and spill into our city for the sake of the gospel and the glory of God.
It is the privilege and calling of the church to make disciples and teach people what it is to follow Jesus. This will happen best in the context of relationships and authentic community, as mature followers of Jesus come alongside those who are younger in their faith, and as members come alongside those who are hurting or in need (2 Tim. 3:10-16). It is the responsibility and calling of Redemption Hill Church’s leaders to foster a culture of discipleship by teaching and equipping God’s people to be His Church (Eph. 4:12-16). As part of training people to be disciples of Jesus, the church must be active in discipline (1 Cor. 5-6).
In this Sunday's sermon, Pastor Eric will emphasize the essentials of biblical community, particularly focusing on the ways this is beautifully reflected in Redemption Hill Church, while also calling us to even greater expressions of it.
Dr. Doug Logan is the President of Grimké Seminary in Richmond, VA, and the Dean of Grimké Urban. He is also the Associate Director of Acts 29, and currently serves as the Pastor of Church Planting at Remnant Church. Pastor Doug has been a longtime friend of Redemption Hill Church, and we are glad to welcome him back to preach this Sunday, as he casts a vision for Seeing the Beauty of the City.
DC has a unique history and culture. As we come to understand this context more fully, it will shape our church and ministry. We always need to have an eye toward ongoing growth in our understanding of the context into which God has placed us. Dr. Doug Logan will preach from Acts 18:9-10 to help us understand the importance of context and seeing the good and beautiful aspects of our city for the sake of our witness and work here
We were honored to have Pastor Michael Martin join us last Sunday. He planted Learning To Live Fellowship, (LTLF) in Inglewood, California and served on the pastoral team at Oceanside Christian Fellowship (OCF) in El Segundo, CA. He now serves at Senior Pastor at Stillmeadow Church in Baltimore. Michael has had significant involvement in the work of church health and church diversity both while serving locally as a resource and nationally in denominational work with our denomination, the EFCA. As a recording artist, Pastor Michael has been fortunate to have music he has written heard in a variety of venues in Christian and secular formats. He considers music an amazing means of speaking truth and joy into any life. His current project is JOY lifeStories vol. 2 He is proud of the fact that Gail, his wife of over 35 years, still seems to like him. They have a daughter, son, son-in-law and 3 grandsons. Raised in a large, loving, extended family in Flint, Michigan; his upbringing in the church has shaped many of his values and commitments today. We long for true revival – that the Spirit of God will move in power and use the Church as witnesses to the resurrection and hope of Jesus Christ. Redemption Hill will speak the gospel as the words of life and hope that it is, calling all people to turn to Jesus in belief and repentance, praying that God will turn people’s hearts and ignite their passions for His glory. Pastor Michael Martin preached out of the book of Philemon, working to ignite a passion to reach people in our own city. We can entrust ourselves and our safety fully to God, knowing that He has many in this city who are His own. This sermon will help people work out some of the fears or hesitancy they have when it comes to evangelism and help them see their place in God’s work of saving people.
At Redemption Hill Church, we are confessionally bound to lives and ministries of compassion and justice. Statement 8 of our Statement of Faith says: God’s gospel compels us to Christ-like living and witness in the world We believe that God's justifying grace must not be separated from His sanctifying power and purpose. God commands us to love Him supremely and others sacrificially, and to live out our faith with care for one another, compassion toward the poor and justice for the oppressed. With God’s Word, the Spirit’s power, and fervent prayer in Christ’s name, we are to combat the spiritual forces of evil. In obedience to Christ’s commission, we are to make disciples among all people, always bearing witness to the gospel in word and deed. This Sunday, Pastor Rich preached through Statement 8 and cast a vision for Redemption Hill Church’s opportunity to be part of kingdom work in our city, individually and as a church. There was a particular focus on ministry of justice and mercy, highlighting CGs and work that is already happening in our church, as well as showing attainable on-ramps for others to start to get involved.
This Sunday, Pastor Rich will preach from Psalm 116. This is a song of thanksgiving for deliverance and a beautiful example of how our personal witness naturally leads to public praise. This sermon will help serve as a powerful reminder of how, even in the toughest of seasons, we can find the strength to give God all the glory.
Redemption Hill is a family that graciously welcomes people into loving community. At its core, the gospel is a celebration that welcomes all people into the family of God through Jesus Christ. Redemption Hill is a family that is generous, thoughtful, and warm, welcoming people into community and celebrating God’s grace together.
Pastor Eric will walk us through Luke 5:27-32 and will show the difference between a scarcity mindset in our lives and church and a generosity mindset. It will also explore the nature of true hospitality, which is welcoming strangers into community, not simply putting on good meals. We are called to follow Jesus’ model in our own lives, welcoming “tax-collectors and sinners” rather than staying in holy huddles.
Though not of this world, God's people are to be missionaries into it. The purpose of teaching, equipping, and training people is that they would then go out and reach deeply into the surrounding culture and their own spheres of influence, desperate to share the love of Jesus with everyone who crosses their paths.
In this sermon, Pastor Rich will help the church see how all of life is a witness to the gospel, and the good work that the church does will open the way for us to tell people the good news. This sermon will cast a renewed vision for our calling at Redemption Hill to Reach DC and Reflect DC.
This Sunday Pastor Cedrick Brown, the founding pastor of Commitment Community Church in Lindenwold, NJ, will be preaching for us. He also serves as Co-Superintendent of EFCA East, our district in the EFCA. Cedrick was born and raised in Compton, CA. He played football, including as a pro on the Philadelphia Eagles. He has been married to Lisa for over 30 years and they have three adult children. Discipleship is more than mere information transfer; it is walking with Jesus. Luke 9:23-27 tells us that it is taking up our cross daily to follow Christ. Pastor Cedrick will teach from this passage on the costliness of discipleship – what it means to have a cross to bear as we follow Jesus. He will also preach the impact of following Jesus as a community rather than on our own, showing that we are not made to pursue Jesus in isolation.
This Sunday brings our next guest preaching, Pastor Andrew Elder. Andrew serves as Pastor of Village Church South Belfast, which was planted out of Village Church East Belfast. Redemption Hill has been a partner in the work in Belfast for more than a decade, from the very beginning of our church and theirs. Pastor Andrew has a tender heart for people and passion to reach the lost.
His sermon out of Matthew 28:16-20 will focus on the value and impact of multiplication of ministry. Beginning with Community Groups, it will address the fears and pain points of multiplying, but also the impact and vision to make it happen. It will also explore the importance of church multiplication, highlighting our long-term investment into church planting in resources, coaching, training, and help.
This Sunday we welcome the first of guest preachers this summer. Dr. Alejandro (Alex) Mandes is the Executive Director of the All People Initiative for our denomination, the EFCA. Alex has been instrumental in starting GATEWAY Theological Institute, which creates pathways to Credentialing through theological education for those who cannot go to a traditional seminary. This was originally started for immigrant pastors, and has expanded greatly. He also has been instrumental in supporting Immigrant Hope, a ministry of the EFCA that works with undocumented immigrants to help with legal and other support.
Alex created a two-part sermon series covering the major themes of his book, Embracing the New Samaria. His first sermon will explain that God's purpose in all-time includes embracing those different than ourselves.
This Sunday, Pastor Rich will show the importance of keeping the gospel of Jesus Christ at the center of our worship in our church and in our lives. Using Hebrews 10:19-25, he will cast a vision for the importance of the church gathering together each week and the shaping effect it has on our lives and on our souls.
This Sunday I will introduce the series, preaching on the theme of Roots & Fruit that can be traced as a thread through the entire biblical storyline. I will also introduce the preachers we can look forward to hearing this summer. I will start with 1 Corinthians 3:5-9 and we will touch down in a number of passages along the way.
It’s bittersweet for me to say that this is my last Sunday with our church before I head out on a sabbatical. I have been overwhelmed by the kindness of our church in pursuing this opportunity and the grant that we received to make it possible. It is a great opportunity for me and my whole family to be refreshed and to make memories to last a lifetime as we get extra time together. After the past few years, the timing could not be better. I hope to return in August rested, with renewed energy and vision for the days ahead. We will be with our Redemption Hill Church family in spirit throughout, and by the time August rolls around, I’m sure we will be eager to get back with you all. - Pastor Bill
This will be our third week in the story about Lazarus. In the first, we saw Jesus interact with Martha, and claim to be the resurrection and the life. In the second, we saw Jesus interact with Mary, and Jesus wept. This week we will see the power of life conquer the grave, as Lazarus is raised from the dead. As Lazarus emerged from the tomb, Jesus called the others there, “Unbind him, and let him go.” From this point in John’s Gospel, the story takes a direct line to the cross.
Last week we introduced the story of Lazarus’ death. Jesus met Martha along the road and asked her if she believed it when He said, “I am the resurrection and the life.” This week we are going to zero in on one key verse, the shortest verse in your Bible – Jesus wept. What a profound statement! This shows something of Jesus’ humanity, anger, sorrow, compassion, and care for His friend Lazarus and the others who mourned his death. We are going to explore the reasons that Jesus wept, what He was weeping over, and what it means for us as we encounter our own suffering.
Some close friends of Jesus lost their brother, Lazarus, who had died. By the time Jesus got to them, Lazarus had been in the tomb for four days. Martha went out to meet Jesus, and she was confident that if Jesus had been there, Lazarus could have been healed, but now it seemed to late. Jesus reassures us all that He is the resurrection and the life. This Sunday we get to dig into this passage and see that in the midst of our own sorrow and uncertainty, Jesus can bring our future hopes into present reality.
Jesus continues the imagery of shepherding and sheep. The people who heard Him teach still could not grasp the things He said with clarity and precision. This passage exposes the difficult reality that the same group of people, with the same background, culture, and lens for the world, still can land in opposite places when it comes to Jesus. Some people will never believe because they have misplaced expectations and misguided interpretations. If we are sheep that belong to Jesus, though, we will hear and follow His voice.
Jesus used three metaphors to continue to tell the people in Jerusalem who He is and what He came to do. All three in this passage center around shepherding and sheep. Most of us didn’t grow up around sheep, and probably don’t know the first thing about shepherding life and work. Even still, the passage is very clear on teasing this out for us as we look to Jesus. Understanding the shepherding motif is important because it pops up throughout the New Testament as we consider a life following Jesus and a life in the Church, the flock of the Good Shepherd.
As Jesus called His first disciples, He called them to leave everything to follow Him. He gave a glimpse of the reality of Christian discipleship. Pastor Eric will help us to see that Jesus calls us not just to an individual pursuit, but to join Him in transcendent Kingdom work.
This shows us the 6th of 7 signs of Jesus through John’s Gospel. While leaving the Feast of Tabernacles, Jesus and His disciples came across a man who had been blind from birth. That led to some theological debates and assumptions, trying to decide and determine the cause-effect relationship of sin to his blindness. As He does throughout the Gospels, Jesus confronted the assumptions, did the unexpected, brought healing and light, and caused some good trouble with the religious leaders of the time.
This brings the time Jesus spent at the Feast of Tabernacles to a close. After making some fiery statements to people in the Temple courts, that their father was the Devil, the conversation got increasingly heated. By the end of it, people were picking up rocks and getting ready to throw them at Jesus. This week we will explore what made them so angry and try to look at our own hearts. I am excited to walk through this passage together. It is so rich, and it ties some sweeping themes that carry through the whole Bible together, showing how it all points to Jesus.
Jesus continued His conversation with the people in the Temple courts, where He had said, “I am the Light of the World.” This passage raises a tough rebuke from Jesus. As the people claimed that Abraham was their Father, Jesus challenged them that their lives didn’t reflect that lineage. In this passage Jesus expanded His teaching on walking in darkness or having the light to show that our lives will inevitably reflect our spiritual realities and the lineage we find ourselves in spiritually.
This passage will serve as a diagnostic for our lives. Jesus shows the stark difference between walking in darkness and having the light. It is a passage that is both challenging and encouraging. The whole section is framed by Jesus’ statement, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”
The book of Ephesians is a small book that is packed from beginning to end with the gospel. This small gospel-packed book is also insanely practical in shape and structure. There is a rhythm to the apostle Paul’s writing here that once noticed, cannot be avoided. The first half of the book is loaded with gospel truth, explanation, and doctrine. The second half of this book seems to be concerned with gospel living, application, and duty. Christian truth and Christian living. Not just one or the other, but both, one naturally flowing from out the other. This week, Pastor Rich walked us through Ephesians 3:20-21 and cast a biblical vision for praise as we declared God Is Able.
This Sunday we come to a very interesting passage in John’s Gospel. It is a beloved story that may be one of the most well known stories of Jesus’ life and ministry, both within and outside of the church. Part of what makes this section interesting is that your Bible will almost certainly have brackets around John 7:53-8:11. The note in the ESV says, “[The earliest manuscripts do not include 7:53-8:11.]” That reality brings up a lot of debate about whether this passage should be considered Scripture, or preached at all. I hope to talk briefly about how our Bibles have been put together and whether they are trustworthy, and then to peach through this passage, showing that the character of Jesus that is shown in this story is easily connected to other passages we have studied in John so far. In a shorter version of all of that, we will see that Jesus has mercy on sinners.
We are going to cover the whole chapter. So, I encourage you to spend some time to read it before Sunday so you can get a sense of it. This is a bigger section than we typically take on. The scene shifts to the Feast of Booths in Jerusalem. Jesus refused to go up to Jerusalem with His family, but did show up in Jerusalem and he was, once again, confronted by authorities who wanted to arrest and kill Him. One of the words that comes up over and over again in this passage is seek. That will be our focus this Sunday – the things that we turn to so that our parched souls can drink deeply, though they come up short again and again. We will see that we are offered living water that will actually satisfy the longings within.
This is the second half of the Bread of Life Discourse. Last week we saw Jesus start statements with “Truly, truly,” three times. It helped us explore really hard questions about our own hearts. This week Jesus takes the metaphor a step further. Where He claimed to be the bread of life, now he makes an explicit call to eat His flesh and drink His blood. The people who heard Him were understandably offended and grossed out. The crowds that had gathered at the feeding of 5,000 suddenly started to thin out. Some of Jesus’ own disciples left Him. He asked the even asked the 12 if they would leave, too. This passage will help us to see who Jesus is more clearly and challenge us on our own responses to His hard teachings.
This begins a long section that theologians call The Bread of Life Discourse. We will take the broader passage in two pieces, finishing it up next week. We see Jesus and the disciples back home in Capernaum, but the crowds who had eaten the bread the day before followed them to find Jesus. In the pattern of what we have seen already, the people were so caught up in looking for signs that they missed the significance. This week we see Jesus claim that He is the bread of life. It gives us the chance to press into the questions of what we seek, work for, and hope in.
This is another familiar story. After miraculously feeding 5,000 people, Jesus withdrew to a high place to pray. His disciples headed out to cross the Sea of Galilee. That night they were caught in a terrible storm and were rowing hard to try to make it to shore safe and alive. What happened next was something beyond what they ever could have expected. Jesus came to them, walking on the water. In the midst of a storm, with wind and waves battering the boat, Jesus came to them. When he joined them in the boat, everything was calm and they came to land. This is a good Sunday for all of us, because it shows us that there is hope whatever storms we face.
This is a familiar story, and the only miracle that occurs in all four Gospels. This week we see Jesus return to Galilee from Jerusalem. As a crowd surrounded Him, he asked the disciples how they could feed all the people. The best anyone could produce was a boy’s lunch of barley loaves and small fish. Jesus was able to feed 5,000 men, potentially 10-20,000 people in total, with leftovers in abundance. There is a lot for us to draw out of this well known story.
This passage continues the discussion between Jesus and the religious leaders who wanted to kill Him after He healed a man on the sabbath. Jesus started by making dramatic claims to His own authority and equality with God (5:19-30). In our passage for this week, He continues by taking a courtroom approach and calling on witnesses to who He is, establishing the validity of His claims. This is a great passage to show us that Jesus didn’t stand on His own claims, even as the incarnate Word of God, but still pointed to witnesses and evidence to His own divinity.
This week, we will be looking at the birth of Christ from the opening 2 chapters of Luke’s gospel. In what serves as the prologue of the book, Luke tells his motivation for writing this gospel, so that his recipient, a man named Theophilus, can have “certainty” (Luke 1:4) about the things concerning Jesus. It is this idea of having certainty amidst uncertainty that shapes Luke’s account of Christ’s birth. In his well-researched version of the incarnation, Luke does something that is distinct among the gospel writers: he intentionally interweaves the narratives of the birth of Jesus and John the Baptizer.
In framing it this way, not only does he provide greater detail to such a familiar story, Luke also projects his authorial focus onto other figures of the Christmas story, using their lives to paint the picture of certainty and uncertainty. Ultimately, leading each of his readers to answer the one big question being asked of them: What will you do with your uncertainty? This will be a great text to find peace for our souls that battle with uncertainties, and hope in a God who does not discard us in our uncertainty.
Throughout the remaining weeks of December, we’ll be pausing our study in John’s gospel to celebrate the Advent of Christ. Advent allows us to cultivate space in our lives for joyful remembrance and anticipation of Jesus Christ together. We remember His first coming in the incarnation, and we anticipate His second coming to establish His kingdom.
This week, we will be in Matthew 1:18-23, taking a look at the well-known Christmas story but focusing our attention entirely on the descriptive name given to Christ, “Immanuel” which means, “God With Us”. In our study of this name we’ll explore four things: God meets our greatest needs in the person of Jesus. God is the initiator of this great action. The word “with” is crucial in conveying how God intends to relate to us. And lastly, there are excellent implications that Jesus’ “withness” carries for every one of our lives.
After Jesus healed the crippled man, he faced major backlash from religious leaders in Jerusalem for healing on the Sabbath. The response Jesus had was not to back down or cower to the pressure. Instead, He doubled down, telling them his real source of authority. This is a great text for us on this second Sunday of Advent, Love Sunday, the Sunday of preparation as we long for God’s presence. We will see the stark claims of Jesus to have God’s presence and authority as the Son of God.
We have seen Jesus in individual conversations with Nicodemus and the Samaritan Woman. Now John turns our attention to an interaction He had with a Gentile official. There are some incredible contrasts in this passage between those who were looking for signs from Jesus yet didn’t believe and this man, who believed in Jesus along with his whole household. As we spend time in this passage, we are going to explore the nature of true faith, saving faith.
This passage is beautiful, challenging, uplifting, and powerful. This week we head into John 4 and we will see Jesus with a Samaritan woman at a well. I had initially thought about breaking the passage into multiple sermons, but in the study time with the staff team we all became convinced that we would lose some of the power of the story by doing that. So, we are going to cover John 4:1-42. As we walk through this story we will pay attention to the major characters in the story and how each speaks to us today – the Samaritan woman, the crowd, the disciples, and Jesus.
This passage brings John the Baptist back into the storyline. We will see the jealousy of John’s disciples as they see Jesus’ ministry growing. This gets at some core issue of identity, purpose, and significance – issues that every one of us wrestles with. John’s perspective is unique, puzzling, and refreshing. It will help us find our own place in this world.
This is a chapter highlighting the reality of our sin nature, as well as the faithfulness of God to protect His promises and show mercy to sinners. The narrative follows Abraham after the events of Sodom and Gomorrah. He’s wandered from a place of fellowship with God and has found himself in a regrettably familiar situation. In a tragic lapse of faith his actions endanger his wife, compromise his witness as a man of God, and threaten to potentially thwart God’s promise of a Messiah. Yet in spite of Abe’s unfaithfulness, God’s unrivaled faithfulness holds firm. His promises remain un-thwarted. His mercy is shown to sinners. And the hope of the gospel is alive.
As we continue to get to know who Jesus is, John turns our attention from the wedding in Cana and the clearing of the Temple courts to a series of conversations – with a Jewish teacher, a Samaritan woman, and a Gentile official. The Jewish teacher was a man named Nicodemus and he came to Jesus at night to try to learn more about who Jesus was. This leads to perhaps the most well-known conversation in all of the Gospels, and certainly the most famous verse in John’s Gospel, John 3:16. We will see this week what it means to be “born again” and the hope we have in Jesus.
This Sunday we continue our series with John 2:13-25. Last week we saw Jesus turn water into wine and lead the wedding celebration. This week we see another side of Jesus as he clears the Temple. We will take something I’ve to try to understand why Jesus was so angry, as well as why John puts these two stories together.
After promising that his disciples that they would see far more than they expected, Jesus took them all to a wedding. At that wedding in Cana, the unthinkable happened – the hosts ran out of wine. John recounts the first miracle Jesus ever performed, calling it a sign and telling us that it manifested Jesus’ glory. This is a fun story that shows us glimpses of what Jesus’ Kingdom is like.
The narrative of John’s Gospel continues as we get introduced to some of the men who would become Jesus’ disciples – Andrew, Simon (called Peter), Philip, and Nathanael (called Bartholomew). From the John the Baptist’s identification that Jesus is “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,” there began a string of people who followed Jesus, told others about Jesus, and brought others to see Jesus for themselves. This pattern has continued now for thousands of years. We will see what it means to follow Jesus and look into why anyone would do it.
This Sunday we continue our series with John 1:19-34. All four Gospels show that the start of Jesus’ public ministry was rooted in the ministry of His cousin, John. This is a different John than our author. John’s ministry was to baptize people in order to prepare a righteous remnant of faithful to usher in the coming of Messiah. John wasn’t the only one in his time with that goal, but he was the one that God had appointed for the job. We will see the importance and emphases of John’s ministry, and what they mean for us.
While the first five verses set the tone of the transcendence of the Word, the Creator and source of all light and life, the verses that follow bring the shocking truth of God’s immanence, His presence with us as that same Word took on flesh and became human. The Incarnation of Jesus is one of the most powerful and mysterious truths we are confronted with in the Gospel and it has profound implications for us.
This Sunday we begin at The Beginning. You get the feeling reading the start of John’s Gospel that he may have seen and read the other three and thought, let’s go back just a little farther on the timeline. What we have is one of the most packed, poetic, and beautiful sections of the entire New Testament. It is a powerful passage that begins to introduce us to Jesus.
This Sunday we are in between two sermon series. It’s not often that I get a one-off chance to preach on a topic, so I’m pretty excited for it. We will take some time this Sunday to talk about Deconstruction. It feels overwhelming to see and hear the stories of people deconstructing their faith and, so often, walking away from any belief in Jesus or connection to any church. There are lots of good reasons and good questions that are raised along the way. I hope to help us all see that we ought to lean into the hard questions, but also to give us a grid for how to deconstruct the ways people and institutions have fallen short, while still being able to cling to the hope we have in Jesus.
This Sunday we will jump back into our series in Titus with all of Titus 3. Remember that Titus is a great, concise look at what the church is. We have already seen that the church is Hope for Eternity, God’s Family, and commissioned as God’s people Declaring the Gospel. This third chapter pushes the reality of the gospel into our lives and shows us that the Church is God’s people, Empowered for Good Work. Too often our spirituality can become compartmentalized as something separate and different from the rest of real life. This couldn’t be further from the vision set out for us in Scripture. Following Jesus changes everything, our relationships with other Christians, with people who are not Christians, and our lives become the salt and light that shows others the beauty of Jesus.
On Sunday, we had the privilege of welcoming some guests as we celebrated and gathered for worship together. Dr. Bill Kynes, our sending pastor, prayed for Redemption Hill, we heard from Dr. Ray Ortlund, Jr. as he preached from Romans 8, and Phil Maucieri joined us to help as our band leads us all in singing.
We have already seen that the church is Hope for Eternity, and God’s Family. The second chapter closes out with a power-packed explosion of the beauty of the gospel. The good news shapes how we see ourselves and how we fit into the world we live in, showing us our past, present, and future.
This passage shows us a beautiful portrait of the God’s Family. Everybody has a part to play in church life. The eternal hope we have in Jesus that we saw in last week’s passage is not just individual but joins us together and shapes a community that shows off God’s grace and goodness. This passage is particularly important for us at Redemption Hill because we have a Titus 2 Team. We will take time this week to talk about how the gospel shapes God’s family in the church, the vital importance we all play.
I’m back in the pulpit this week as we begin a new short series in the book of Titus. August marks TEN YEARS of ministry for Redemption Hill Church. It’s hard for me to believe that it has been that long, and it’s amazing to look back at all that God has done over the past decade. Through the month of August we will work together to be reminded of what a church is, who we are, and whose we are. In the same way that NFL Teams head into training camps to re-emphasize the fundamentals each year, this will give us the chance to be reminded of the fundamental aspects of who we are and what we are called to. This week starts with Titus 1:1-2:1.
As we come to the last chapter of Micah, we’ll see God’s mercy in full display for us. Chapter seven will show us Micah’s perspective in the middle of his sinful and chaotic nation as the Prophet of God. This position leaves him alone and with the only option to run to God for refuge. Micah will ultimately prophecy of the future restoration of God’s people and remind us all of God’s grace and faithfulness towards sinners. I would strongly encourage you to spend time reading this last chapter before Sunday, and especially pay attention to the last three verses of Micah, as they are one of the most beautiful descriptions of God’s character in the entire Bible.
This week we’ll spend some time in God’s courtroom where Israel will be on trial for their rebellion against God himself. We’ll learn what God requires from his people and the verdict for God’s people transgressions. Ultimately Micah will provide for us a shadow of God’s justice that is ultimately found and accomplished in Jesus Christ as our lawyer and savior. I’d encourage to read Micah 6 as you prepare your heart for the Holy Spirit to speak to us.
This week the book of Micah takes a radical turn, and God brings a message of hope to His rebellious people who fell into idolatry, oppression, and abuse. In this week’s text we find one of the most impressive and detailed prophecies of the birth of the Messiah, and one that brought hope to Israel and Judah. We will be reminded of the radical mercy of God, who brings hope through Jesus the Messiah, to us and to our rebellious world.
As we continue to learn from the prophet Micah in chapter 3, this week we’ll see God’s rejection of abuse, especially from leaders. In a world where even the people who are called to care for us fail, we are reminded of the way Jesus, whose servant leadership of grace is our only hope in a broken world.
This chapter shows us that God hates oppression, and that those who willfully destroy the lives of others will face God in the end. The chapter ends with a glimmer of hope, that God will lead His people as the ultimate King, guiding them to safety and flourishing in the end.
This week we start a new series in the book of Micah. This series will take us through the end of July. It’s always fun to spend time in one of the Minor Prophets, a name that indicates that the prophetic books are short, but no less important. Micah’s prophetic ministry in Judah was around the same time as Isaiah, before Assyria defeated the northern kingdom or Babylon defeated the southern kingdom, both resulting in exile for the Hebrew people. The book is filled with warnings for God’s people, but also intermixed with the hope of God’s faithfulness. The theme of the series is Micah: The God of Justice and Mercy. This week we begin with Micah 1:1-16.
This Sunday is the final sermon in our series as we study Revelation 22:6-21. It’s always bittersweet to finish up a series. I have loved the chance to walk through this book with you all over the past six months. I hope you have seen that it is filled with hope and intensely practical and important for us. We are living in the Last Days. Not just because we have lived through uprisings, wars and rumors of wars, global plagues, and bugs that emerged from the ground after a 17-year slumber to torment our eardrums. We are living in the time between Jesus Christ’s resurrection and ascension to the throne, and His return to renew and restore all things. Jesus promised to return soon. This week we will talk about just what that means, and how we are called to live in light of His return.
This Sunday is the penultimate sermon in our series in Revelation, we will wrap it all up next week. Revelation 21:9-22:5 gives us a portrait of the future glory of the New Jerusalem. It is a passage that is packed with beautiful imagery, ultimately showing us an image of the glory of God on earth. This is the end point of the whole biblical storyline and all of human history. Understanding it reshapes every aspect of our lives now.
This Sunday we celebrated Pastor Chuy Rodriguez’s ordination. In our denomination, ordination marks the completion of a 5-year process at minimum. The candidate is evaluated for his character, competency, and calling to ministry through the local church and through a rigorous theological evaluation that includes a paper that Chuy defended before our council. It is a lifetime credential that confirms Pastor Chuy’s calling. Dr. Bill Kynes, our sending pastor preached a sermon from 1 Peter 5.
Pastor Chuy Rodriguez preached to us on the Good News of the Gospel out of Ephesians 2:1-10.
This passage closes out the third vision of the book. It shows us the reality of final judgment before God that all people will face, and the eternal consequences of our lives. This passage also gives us a taste of eternity in God’s presence as we see the powerful and beautiful renewal and restoration of all things.
This is the most hotly debated and deeply studied passage in the entire book – which is saying something! It is another that is filled with powerful imagery. Satan will be bound, only to be released to wreak havoc before his final demise. Chapters 19-20 show us three stages of final judgment, first for the Antichrist and False Prophet, then for the Devil himself, and finally for all of humanity. We will explore the nature of the millennium (1,000 years, not the Falcon) but we will ultimately focus on the main point of the passage, that Satan’s days are numbered and he will be defeated in the end.
We finally see the return of Jesus in this week’s passage! As we have seen, there is much more to this book than just the second coming of Christ. However, Jesus has promised He will return and reign as the King of kings and the Lord of lords. The second half of chapter 19 shows that return in its splendor.
This is a beautiful and glorious passage that shows us an image of the Wedding Feast of the Lamb. Life can be so hard, and the Christian life can be so hard. This passage shows us the great hope we have in Christ. And it shows us that the gospel is a celebration and a feast.
This Sunday we continue our series with Revelation 17-18. That’s right, we are covering two chapters again. After this, we will slow down a bit in the book. I think you will see that these two chapters really do hang together, though. In them, we see powerful imagery of a Prostitute and Babylon the great. Ultimately, it shows us that the indulgences we are offered in this world that draw us away from Christ look appealing but will be deadly in the end.
There is a massive debate within American Christianity over the topic of justice. In this week’s passage we see a major theme of divine justice brought to bear. It’s a heavy passage, but it shows us that God is working both for our salvation and to let justice roll.
This Easter Sunday, we worked through Matthew 28 together. There may never have been a year that we more desperately longed for the light of resurrection and life to break through the darkness of death.
Throughout the ages, the church has gathered on the Friday before Easter to remember the path Christ took to the cross. Good Friday is an invitation for us to stop and reflect upon Jesus as He lived out the lowest of human experience. It is a call to sit in the dust, hand in hand with our own doubts and sorrows. This Good Friday, we gather as a church to reflect upon the sufferings of Christ, see the great cost of our sin, and foster an anticipation for Easter Sunday.
This passage has both glorious and terrifying imagery of the end. It focuses in on the great harvest as Christ collects those who are His, just as He said He would. It’s an important passage for us to consider and a timely call to repent and reset our priorities on Palm Sunday. As with so much of Revelation, it is a call to us to faithfully endure to the end in great hope.
Pastor Chuy preached from Acts 12:24-13:3 after announcing his desire and plan to plant a new Redemption Hill Church in Northern Virginia. It will be called Iglesia Redención.
This Sunday we continue with Revelation 13. This is the passage many of you have been waiting for – the Antichrist, the False Prophet, and the mark of the beast. All of this flows out of chapter 12 as Satan, the great dragon, stands poised to make war against God’s people. We will see in our study together that in that war, Satan mimics God in his efforts to deceive and destroy. There is a clear call to us directly in the text that helps us to know how to live well in these last days.
Revelation 12 starts a new section of Revelation. Chapters 12-16 take a pause to give powerful imagery that peels back the curtain to allow us to see the spiritual reality that exists throughout human history. Chapter 12 shows us the cosmic conflict between the woman and the great dragon. It’s a great passage that teaches us a lot about our enemy and the reality of suffering in our lives. I look forward to walking through it with you!
This Sunday we continue with Revelation 10-11. These two chapters are an interlude that follows the 6th Trumpet and leads into the 7th. This week’s passage brings up one of the most controversial sections of the book. There are lots of opinions about the identity of the Two Witnesses in chapter 11. The good news is that this section ends with incredible hope and promise. It also answers an important question for each of us who follows Jesus – what is our role in this world? What purpose do we have and how do we know if our lives make a bit of difference?
This week takes a turn toward judgment in the end, but even that is not without reason or hope. As six of the seven Trumpets sound in these chapters, we are met with disturbing imagery and prophecy. It’s worth taking the time to read them before Sunday, but make sure you read all the way through the end of chapter 9. In our study together we will see that the Trumpets are wakeup calls, alarms sounding to open our eyes and lead us to repentance.
This Sunday we continue with Revelation 7. This chapter is an interlude between the sixth and seventh seals, and it gives us one of the most beautiful and compelling pictures of God’s people that is found in Scripture. We will explore together the 144,000 who are sealed as we look at the Great Multitude from every nation, tribe, people, and language. I’m eager to walk through the imagery and implications together.
So far in our study of Revelation the imagery and text has been relatively clear. Sure, there has been some symbolism to sort out together, but a vision of Jesus, and visions of the Throne in Heaven, along with the letters to the churches, are fairly clear. This week the drama of the book takes off as the seals of the scroll are broken. It’s the first of three major movements in Revelation – seals, trumpets, and bowls. The first four seals in our passage for Sunday are the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. So, fasten your seatbelt and hang on for the ride. I hope we will see that this passage applies powerfully to our lives even with all of its symbolism.
Today we continue our series with Revelation 5. Last week set the stage with a vision of God’s throne. In this chapter the drama of the book begins to unfold with a powerful image of the One who is worthy to open the scrolls, revealing God’s plan for redemption in its fullness. The Lion of Judah is the Lamb who was slain.
This Sunday we will walk through Revelation 4. Chapter 4 sets the stage for the drama to unfold throughout the rest of the book. As I have already emphasized, Revelation it primarily a book about hope. It is intensely practical and helps us in moments and seasons of uncertainty and despair. Even while our city feels like it is taking a collective breath this week, the most important source of our hope will always be the beauty and majesty of God’s presence and His sovereignty on the Throne. It is impossible to allow our imaginations to run too far as we read Revelation 4. I am eager to walk through this section together.
This Sunday we continue our series with Revelation 2-3. We see a summary of the encouragements, warnings, exhortations, and promises given to these churches. All of it extends to us today. This is the biggest section we will cover in a single sermon in this series. We will cover all the letters to the Seven Churches in one sermon! I decided to take it on this way because I preached a whole series on the Seven Churches just a few years ago. If you would like to dig into them in much greater detail, go ahead and give a listen.
This book is as mysterious as it is misinterpreted. It looks to the revealing of the glory of Jesus Christ. Our theme in this study will be “Kingdom Come” as we see why we pray for it to be on earth as it is in heaven and find a settled confidence in God’s power to make all things new. This week we begin with Revelation 1:1-20. The opening scene of the book jumps right in with a vision of the Risen Lord Jesus Christ in all His glory.
This week we close our series with Romans 16:25-27. This closing benediction to the letter gives us a beautiful, gospel-rich, densely packed summary of the entire letter that precedes. It’s a chance for us to be reminded of everything we have seen and learned over the past year in our study of Romans together.
Our passage this week is a closing warning to the church in Rome about the dangerous potential of divisive people in the church. It’s an important passage for us as we walk through one of the most divisive times in many of our lifetimes. The beauty and unity of the church is itself a witness to the power of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and a reflection of our hope that the day is coming when Satan will be crushed.
This passage lists a whole bunch of names and people that Paul sent personal greetings to in Rome. At first blush, it may be tough to see how it applies to us, but it does! Paul’s ministry is deeply interconnected with people who were fellow-workers. There is a lot we can learn about the makeup of the early church, who were key contributors, and what it looks like for us to work alongside each other even through to today. The church is a crazy mashup of men and women from different cultural backgrounds and ethnicities, different economic levels, across generations, all working together as a family on mission. This week is a much-needed encouragement to us this week.
This passage turns to the final section of the letter, as Paul talks about his own ministry and personal connections with people. There is so much to learn about our own lives and ministry opportunities! This week we get to see that following God’s calling in our own lives will never be boring. It won’t be comfortable, but it will put us squarely in the middle of what God is doing in bringing hope and healing through Christ, and there is nothing more exciting!
This week we get to hear from Pastor Rich Rivera. Rich was born and raised in the Bronx. He is an experienced church planter and pastor. He is currently beginning the work of planting Matthew’s Table Church, and Redemption Hill Church gets to be in on the action with him. We have formalized a partnership with Rich, and RHC is acting as his sending church in providing accountability and support for the work he is doing. Our church has helped plant churches in major cities across the world – from Belfast to Mexico City to Havana, and now NYC. So, we are pausing our series in Romans for one week, and you won’t want to miss the chance to get to know our newest church planter.
This passage closes out the section on how the church needs to come together in the midst of sharp disagreements. We have already seen calls to both the weak and the strong through chapter 14. This passage brings it all together with a call to live in harmony with one another. What a perfect way to think about things! That means that Christians can be singing distinct notes and melodies with their lives that are able to complement one another and come together to make a more beautiful whole. This is a timely passage for us in the uncertainty and division around us. The Church has hope to cling to and to offer to others that can’t be found by any other means.
This continues the practical application of the call to love, especially in the context of disagreements in the church. While last week we looked at the temptation of the weak to judge those whose consciences don’t align with their own, this week we turn to the strong. The strong, in this context, are those who are able to rest in the accomplished work of Christ for their justification and righteousness, freeing them, not to sin but to greater flexibility in life. The call to the strong is no less difficult than the call to the weak. We will see that the strong are called to lay down freedoms for the sake of the weaker brother or sister.
This week we continue in our study with Romans 14:1-12. This chapter takes the foundation of the letter as a whole and applies it to some divisions within the church in Rome. The divisions are not over biblical truth, or what is clearly laid out in God’s Word. The Christians in Rome were dividing over gray areas, disputable issues, matters of conscience. This is, once again, a timely text for us. We will take the chapter in two parts, to address the weak and the strong in turn. So, this week we will see what it means to be spiritually weak as Romans 14 defines it, what the challenges are, and how to live together in unity with other brothers and sisters in Christ. Ultimately, we are all weak in some areas and stronger in others.
This passage is quite literally a wake up call. It’s a call to understand the times we are living in, and to understand how following Jesus changes us right now. Too often, Christians are very comfortable in trusting God with our eternity while not trusting Christ’s sovereignty in our lives this week. This may be especially true in the stretch we find ourselves in now. This is a timely and important passage for us to walk through together as we work to walk in the light side-by-side.
This week we turn from looking at a foundational level to get a bit more practical on an individual level. While part 1 focused on the Church gathered, this week we will focus on the Church scattered, and the role and calling of individual Christians in political engagement. We will again focus on Romans 13:1-10.
Over the next two weeks, Pastor Bill will preach on Christians and Politics. This isn’t chasing a news cycle, this is the next part of our series in Romans as we begin chapter 13. This Sunday we will begin with a foundation of understanding the differentiated roles of the church and the state, and a biblical view of government. Next week we will focus more explicitly on how Christians can engage in life in the public square as individuals. Through it all, we won’t leave the theological foundation we have worked to build through the past nine months of studying Romans together. These are important Sundays for all of us.
This final section of Romans shows The Power of the Gospel to transform us. This week we see that the defining mark of every Christian is love. The love that Scripture talks about goes far beyond the warm fuzzies we might think of, though. And our passage for this Sunday gives a realistic look at what we are called to.
In this sermon, Pastor Chuy unpacks statement 8 from our doctrinal statement of faith: "God's gospel compels us to Christ-like living and witness in the world: We believe that God's justifying grace must not be separated from His sanctifying power and purpose. God commands us to love Him supremely and others sacrificially, and to live out our faith with care for one another, compassion toward the poor and justice for the oppressed. With God’s Word, the Spirit’s power, and fervent prayer in Christ’s name, we are to combat the spiritual forces of evil. In obedience to Christ’s commission, we are to make disciples among all people, always bearing witness to the gospel in word and deed."
This week we start a new section of the book of Romans, the final section of the letter. This is the point in Romans that things get practical. Chapters 12-16 show us that the reality of the gospel transforms our lives as we follow Jesus. This week we start it off with Romans 12:1-8, which gives us an overview of what is to come and focuses on the importance of every member of the body of Christ, the church.
This passage closes out this section of Romans with a strong push toward a vision of the unity of God’s people in Jesus Christ. Before heading into the final, most practical section on the letter, Paul closes this theologically dense section with an explosion of praise and worship for our God. Robust theology ought to lead us to worship.
At our 2020 Leadership Retreat, Michael Wear gives encouragement to those who are leading a church. How do we fulfill a calling to be a prophetic voice while also fighting for the unity of the church? What are pitfalls that our leaders ought to be aware of?
At our 2020 Leadership Retreat, Michael Wear gives an objective, broad outline of the challenges for Christians engaged in the political world at this moment.
There is a strong warning against self-righteousness in this passage, but it ends with a vision that is filled with hope. With God there are no lost causes. He is working to save all people for our good and His glory. This is a glorious promise that God is not finished with you, or me, or anyone else. Join us to hear the hope we have in Christ.
This passage shows us the way that the gospel has advanced from the very beginning as God’s people have been sent to proclaim the good news of Christ so that others will hear and some will turn in belief and repentance to embrace new life.
After establishing God’s sovereignty in chapter 9, this chapter turns firmly toward human responsibility in salvation. Romans 10 is intensely practical and personal for us, exposing that our passion alone can never save us. But salvation is easily accessible to everyone.
As we continue to explore the theme of God’s sovereignty in salvation, Paul raises three important questions for us. Is God just? How does God still hold us accountable if He is sovereign? And is God fair? These are important questions to consider. As this text works to provide answers it digs deeply into the stories and consistent theology of the Hebrew Bible, our Old Testament. We will work together to walk through this important passage and to see that there is a great source of hope and peace for us, which is welcome in times that seem to be absent of both.
This Sunday we continue with Romans 9:1-13. Romans 9-11 is a very controversial section of Scripture. Some would say that the chapters are an unwelcome intrusion into the letter the Apostle Paul wrote. I think the next few weeks will show us that they are important both to the letter to the Romans and to us today. This week’s passage shows us the reality of God’s sovereignty, a theme that we need in the midst of our current circumstances.
Join us as we learn from Philippians 2:1-30 and see what it looks like to live in unity.
Building on the theological foundation that secures the reality that we know that God is working all things for our good, this passage goes on to raise the questions that plague every one of us. What about opposition we face? What about our unmet needs? What about accusations? What about condemnation? What about the dangers and suffering all around us that threaten us? Can any of this threaten to separate us from God’s love? Can anything take His love away from us?
This Sunday we continue our series with Romans 8:28-30. In the context of suffering, Paul makes the strong statement that God works all things for our good. How can that be? And what does that mean? This is an often quoted and misapplied verse. The context is key for us to understand it. The assurance we have that it can be true that all things work together for our good lies in what many have called the golden chain of our salvation. This passage is timely and hope-filled.
Suffering is one of the only universal human experiences, and it messes us up. Even more than suffering personally, it's hard to know how to make sense of the world around us. God's Word doesn't ignore the reality of suffering. It makes sense of the world and helps us to see that all of creation is groaning, but redemption is coming.
This week we continue through Romans 8 with verses 12-17. In this timely passage, we see the highest privilege of the gospel – that in Christ we are adopted through the Spirit to be children of God, all calling out to one Father together. We will spend time working out how this powerful theological foundation impacts our lives practically as we approach others as brothers and sisters in Christ.
This week we continue through Romans 8 with verses 9-11. This is a deeply comforting passage at a time that we all need great comfort. For all who are in Christ, we are promised that the Spirit of God dwells within us. This Sunday we will look at who the Holy Spirit is, and what it means for us to be indwelt by God’s Spirit.
This week we continue through Romans 8 with verses 5-8. A major characteristic for all who are in Jesus Christ, having now no condemnation, who are walking in the Spirit, is that we will experience transformation to a spiritual mindset. We need to be careful not to get this backward, as we so often do, thinking that it is our minds and right thinking that will lead to transformation in our hearts. Rather, it is God’s work by His Spirit to transform our hearts that will show up in a changed mindset in our lives.
This week we continue through Romans 8 with verses 3-4. If you missed last week, it would be worth going back to listen and get caught up in this powerful chapter. Last week we saw that there is no condemnation for anyone who is in Christ. This week gives an explanation for that, showing us what God has done to set us free, by Jesus’ work accomplished for us, and to walk in the Spirit.
This Sunday we continue our series with Romans 8:1-2. That’s right, one week after covering a whole chapter, we are slowing things down to two verses. Lord willing, we will take about eight weeks to walk through Romans 8 together. God’s Word powerfully meets us where we are, and brings rays of light to the darkest of times and places.
This incredible passage shows the struggle within us between our desires, and the good and right things we want in life, and the sin that still lurks within us. It is a powerful look at the battle within and shows how victory is won.
Writing from prison, Paul made a striking claim that death would be better than life and suffering can bring rejoicing. For him, to live was all about Jesus, and to die was to be present with Jesus. He was torn between obligation to the people he loved, and desire to be with the Savior who loved him. This is the freedom that hope in the gospel can provide. To live is Christ, to die is gain.
As we gather from scattered places this Sunday, we will continue in our series with Romans 6:12-23. This passage is focused on our emancipation from slavery to sin. It’s a timely theme for us, having celebrated Emancipation Day in DC just Thursday. We will look together at what it means to be freed from sin and bound to Christ.
As we gather from scattered places this Easter Sunday, we will continue in our series with Romans 6:1-11. This passage gives us a clear calling with its foundations in the death and resurrection of Jesus. If we have come to God by grace through faith in Jesus, we are united with Jesus in His death, burial, and resurrection. Our baptism joins us to Him in unity. Then we are called and freed to live in the newness of life, free from the dominion of sin. This is the beauty of what we celebrate on Easter. Not just that these are true historical events, and they are, but that we enter into the story by the work of God’s Spirit in our redemption.
In this section, Paul answers the question, “How can one person’s actions save us?” In doing so, he pulls way up to a view of all of human history, and with it redemptive history. For all of the ways we divide, and all the categories we create for others, the biblical perspective is that there is one human race. We are all in Adam or in Christ. This passage is timely as we look at the results of sin and the one place we can find hope as we are faced with death itself.
As we gather from scattered places, we will continue in our series with Romans 5:6-11. Last week we saw the timely call to rejoice, even in times of suffering, knowing that God loves us. This week continues the same themes but is helpful at a more concrete level. When we don’t feel God’s love for us, how can we still know in our hearts that it is true and sure? Rest assured that our hope is not merely fanciful but is rock solid and historically rooted. This paragraph is densely packed with gospel beauty and God’s love, at full cask strength with no dilution.
This chapter starts a whole new section of the book. As I prepared to preach, I was struck again at God’s timing for us in a series that was planned out long ago. This text addresses suffering head on and calls us to rejoice even in the midst of suffering. That runs contrary to everything that we naturally turn to when things aren’t going our way. In the face of uncertainty and anxiety about living in the middle of a global pandemic, this passage will help us all recenter ourselves and remind us of the greatest source of hope we could ever have.
This Sunday we stay in our series in Romans and close the chapter with Romans 4:16-25. It is an incredibly timely text for us. This passage takes us into a further exploration of Abraham and Sarah’s life and shows us how to respond when we are living in the gap between the hopes we have and the reality we experience. How do we respond when the promises of God feel distant? What does it mean to have faith when things are uncertain and scary? How can we have hope when we get knocked down over and over again?
As we begin a new chapter in the letter to the Romans, the argument turns to the Hebrew Bible to support the idea that it is God's grace alone through faith alone that we are declared righteous in God's sight. Over the next two Sundays, we will explore the story of Abraham and see how it points ahead to what was accomplished through Christ.
Some have said that the first paragraph of this section is the most important paragraph ever written, and Luther called it the center of the whole Bible. After spending 2 1/2 chapters setting the stage with the intense need we have for a Savior, the text takes an abrupt turn to show us that there is a great hope!
This Sunday we start a new chapter in Romans and round out the argument that the Apostle Paul has been building since chapter 1. If we are ever going to hope to understand the beauty and glory of the gospel, we need to first understand the need every one of us has for a Savior. Romans 3:1-20 can serve as a diagnostic test for our own souls. It is incisive, helpful, and universal in its application.
Last week we saw that all of us will face God in the end and that all of our secrets will be revealed because God shows no partiality. This week turns squarely toward the most religious of those in the church at Rome. Paul exposes the emptiness of religious practice that misses the heart of God’s Law, over-focused on the letter of the law and missing the spirit of it. This text hits home for those of you who grew up in church or have bought into more legalistic forms of Christianity. It’s a good corrective to remind us that we cannot save ourselves, even with the most careful moralism.
As Paul continued to develop his eagerness to proclaim the gospel, he turned toward addressing the religious in Rome. This passage is a stark reminder to every one of us that we will one day stand before God. All that we are and all that we have done will be revealed and clarified. God is just, and all people, however religious or irreligious will stand before Him. We will be responsible for what we know and how we have lived that out.
We have seen a progression so far that Paul was eager to preach the gospel in Rome because it is the power of God to save, and because the wrath of God is being revealed. Last week we came to understand that God's wrath is often the opposite of the way we think about it, and that it shows up in God turning us over to our desires, giving us what we want apart from Him. This week that explanation continues and we will see that the symptoms in our lives are that things get twisted up. Our own separation from God shows up in twisted sexuality, twisted minds, and twisted religion. We will work together this week to find clarity on what Scripture has to say about these culturally sensitive issues, and see where we can find hope.
We saw last week in Romans 1 that Paul was not ashamed of the gospel but was eager to preach it in Rome, the capital city, because the gospel is the power of God for salvation for all who believe. This week we will see that another reason for his eagerness is that the wrath of God is being revealed in the lives of people who don’t believe in Christ. All people, across all ethnicities and cultural backgrounds, are caught up in twisted worship that has dulled our hearts to the One True God. The result is that we are twisted, and it shows up in our lives through twisted sex, twisted minds, and twisted religion. This section will frame up the next three weeks in our study together. This week we will focus on Romans 1:18-23, which lays the foundation for understanding God’s wrath and the impact of idolatry in our souls.
We all struggle to define our purpose in life and are always trying to weigh what really matters, especially as Christians. What should we value? What is our purpose? What should we use as a matter of success in our life? Many of these things are good things- education, family, financial stability, comfort, and safety. As we dig into this text, we will see what the Apostle Paul tells us that the proclamation of God's Gospel is more important than everything else.
As we start the new year, we also will start a new series in Romans. Martin Luther said of this book,
“This Epistle is really the chief part of the New Testament and the very purest Gospel, and is worthy not only that every Christian should know it word for word, by heart, but occupy himself with it every day, as the daily bread of the soul. It can never be read or pondered too much, and the more it is dealt with the more precious it becomes, and the better it tastes.”
This week we begin with Romans 1:1-7, which is one long sentence that lays out the most theologically rich greetings that I can imagine. We see the purpose of the letter very early in the first chapter: the good news of what God has done for us in Jesus Christ.
In this sermon, we close out our series in Exodus. It’s almost hard for me to believe that it’s over so soon! I have loved the chance to walk through this foundational book of the Bible together. I hope you have been able to see how Exodus sets up the broader storyline of redemption that we see carried out through the rest of Scripture. Our closing study together will focus and the Tabernacle and the items within it. A major portion of the book of Exodus is devoted to the Tabernacle. Chapters 25-31 describe the preparation and plans in great detail, while chapters 35-40 describe how the Israelites carried out the plans to prepare it, with a dramatic close to the book of Exodus as the glory of God filled the Tabernacle. We won’t be able to read all 13 chapters in our gathering on Sunday, but we will walk through each item that made up the Tabernacle worship. We learn important things about God’s character and the nature of worship as we focus on the Tabernacle. As with all things in Exodus, the Tabernacle itself is a shadow of the ultimate that was shown to us in Christ.
Because of the volume of text devoted to the Tabernacle, I encourage you to take the time to read those chapters in Exodus on your own. Making the time to do so will only enrich and illuminate this sermon for you.
This Sunday we jump back into Exodus. When we left off, the Israelites had created a golden calf to worship. God's anger burned against these people and Moses was working to intercede for them. This week we continue with Exodus 33-34 and we will focus in on Intercession and Covenant Renewal. We can learn a lot from Moses' approach to God in prayer. And, as one commentator put it, “In the lengthy dialogue between God and Moses in these chapters we may be brought as close to God as it is possible for Scripture to take us.”
As we reach the end of the year, it is natural to look back at what has been and to look ahead at what is to come, to assess and evaluate our lives and what we have accomplished. That can be invigorating, but it also can be deeply discouraging. None of us is quite where we’d like to be. This passage is a great encouragement that the work that God begins in us, in Christ, will be brought to its fullness and completion.
Moses was gone on Mt. Sinai for 40 days and when he returned, the people had gone crazy in a festival to worship a golden calf they had constructed. We will take some time to try to understand the identity of the calf - what they were actually worshiping - and the reasons it was so offensive to God. There are revealing themes for us in the passage. It will be a fun one to get through together.
This Sunday we get to hear from Pastor Andrew Elder, the planting pastor of Village South Belfast. Andrew was born and raised in Northern Ireland. Redemption Hill has partnered with Village Belfast from its very beginning and now there are two congregations: in East and South Belfast. Andrew will preach from 1 Corinthians 9:19-27, and help us see that as followers of Christ we must be prepared to deny ourselves in order to win people to Jesus.
We will continue our series in Exodus with a look at the Law. Last week we saw the covenant that God initiated with His people, Israel, and how that became a foundational piece of God's redemptive work, leading straight to us today. This week we will take a deeper look at the place and the role of the Law as part of that covenant, and how the Law applies to us today - what role Christ's work plays in how we see the Law.
Over the last month as we watched the Washington Nationals' postseason run unfold, there are clear moments that stand out as pivotal, crucial to the storyline as it developed. This Sunday we come to one of those pivotal, crucial moments in the storyline of the Bible - Israel at Mount Sinai. Now that God had saved the Israelites from Egypt, and brought them out into the wilderness, He invited them into a covenantal relationship, that Yahweh would be their God and the Israelites would be His people, His treasured possession and a kingdom of priests. I can't wait to open this transcendent text with you and see together how it sets the course for the rest of redemptive history in the biblical storyline.
This Sunday we will jump back into our series in Exodus with 17:8-18:26. This passage starts with an amazing story of the Israelites' first battle after leaving Egypt. As Moses held his staff aloft overlooking the battle, the Israelites would win, but when his hands dropped, they would start losing. Moses needed help to carry the burdens of the people he was leading, and that was noticed by his father-in-law, Jethro, who stepped in to give Moses some advice on how to structure things to be more sustainable. This is a great opportunity for us to talk about dealing with the exhaustion of the burdens we carry, and the importance of community - having people around us to help with the heavy lift.
Many people say they are Christians. Many people say they are disciples of Jesus. But Scripture makes it clear that being a disciple is a call to count the cost. Jesus tells us that if we want to be his disciples we must first evaluate what that means. Pastor Chuy preached to us from Luke 14 on what it means to be a disciple.
We left off with the dramatic crossing of the sea, as God made a way for His people and destroyed the armies of Pharaoh. This week the story continues and we see the Israelites in the wilderness. Shortly after their dramatic deliverance, the people turn to complaining again. Even still we see God’s loving kindness and care for them as He provided for them in the wilderness - sweet water, bread from heaven, and water from a rock. We will see how our own wilderness experiences give an opportunity for God to show His love and care through providing for us as well.
This Sunday we continue our series in Exodus with what is perhaps the most well-known story in the book - the crossing of the sea. After the Passover, Pharaoh finally told Moses and Aaron to take the people and go. Even that was short-lived, though, and he soon sent armies to chase the Israelites down. Faced with Pharaoh's armies behind them and the sea in front, the people had only one hope - that God would be their Warrior and Savior. On Sunday we will explore how these important themes extend to us and give us hope even today.
This section is often known and thought of as the Ten Plagues. We are going to take a look at the overarching themes that emerge in Exodus 5-13 this Sunday. Last Sunday we saw that God revealed Himself personally to Moses, by name, and that God continues to reveal Himself to the brokenhearted. This week we will see Moses and Aaron walk in obedience to God's command, confronting Pharaoh and demanding that he let the people go. Pharaoh's response was to spiral down a path of an increasingly hardened heart. Eventually, God's power is put on display and the people are set free, but only through sacrifice. God's work of redeeming His people in this passage is foundational for the rest of the storyline of redemption in the Bible's narrative, leading us through the sacrificial system in Israel and ultimately and directly to Jesus Christ.
These chapters are packed full of vitally important and foundational realities. On Sunday we will focus in primarily on 3:1-12 and the scene at the burning bush, and 6:1-10. Up to this point in the story, the Israelites lived in a world that made it feel like God was distant or at least uninvolved - a world much like our own. In chapter 3 everything changes as God does directly speak and begins to incredible work of preparing to save His people. In all of it, Moses can only see his own limitations and weakness, but God reveals Himself by His personal name and promised to be with Moses.
This chapter introduces us to Moses, who will be an important figure in the rest of this story. As the chapter closes there is still a sense of God's absence that we saw so clearly in chapter 1, but there is also a glimmer of hope. This chapter is important for us because every one of us wonders at some time if God really hears us when we pray. We can feel alone and unheard. The end of chapter 2 will help us to understand that God sees, hears, remembers, and knows.
This Sunday we will walk through Exodus 1. As the book opens, the Israelites are in Egypt, the land that God had placed Joseph in to provide for his brothers and their families. But that was 400 years ago. And things had taken a turn. The Israelites had become enslaved by the Egyptians. The Egyptians were ruthless slave masters and the Israelites lives were bitter with hard service in building projects and in the fields. Their children were being killed. The opening chapters of Exodus leave the impression that God is absent, that He no longer responds or intervenes. Our own lives can feel that way, both in times of ease and suffering. This week and this series will help us to see who God is and how He works.
This Sunday we begin a 2-week series that explores the foundational mission, values, and vision for Redemption Hill. We have learned so much about the Church and the movement of the Spirit through the book of Acts that leads directly into the application of those principles to our church today.
It's always bittersweet for me when we close out a series. On the one hand, I have loved walking through this with you and have learned so much. I have hope that we have been shaped as a church to be more Spirit-led and to see our part in the story God is writing as the Word advances through the church of Jesus Christ. On the other, it's hard to say goodbye.
In this passage, Paul makes it to Rome at last. That doesn't mean it was easy, though. When we left off, he and the others aboard the ship had made it safely to land after a shipwreck. We see that they had landed on the island of Malta. There are clear themes of hardship and hospitality throughout this section. In all of it, we will see that God's promises bring us freedom, and our ability to trust His promises will free us to live life to its fullest.
On Sunday we had the privilege to hear from Pastor Lucas Parks. Lucas is a dear friend of RHC. We have partnered alongside the Village Church Belfast for six years now. This past year they planted a new congregation, leading our expanded partnership with Village East, and Village South Belfast. This past year was also a difficult one for Lucas and his family, as he was diagnosed in the fall of 2018 with cancer in his throat and neck - frightening for anyone to walk through and perhaps even more so for a preacher. Through the common grace of medicine the Lord has brought Lucas through. He preached for us from Luke 18:9-14 and shared with us what God has taught him over the past year.
This passage is the most detailed nautical narrative in any ancient literature. It is a gripping story of sailing, a storm, disagreements on board, and an eventual shipwreck. Through it all, Paul shows an incredible sense of calm, focus, decisiveness, and confidence. He had faith that Jesus would bring him to Rome, even if it wasn’t quite the path he, or anyone else, imagined. This is an important passage for us. There is an important interplay of faith and action, trust and wisdom, in our lives.
In this passage, Paul encounters his 5thtrial and interrogation. This time it is in front of King Agrippa. We will focus in on Acts 26:13-32. In the face of intimidating circumstances, Paul is strikingly bold and focused. He is also incredibly winsome, taking the opportunity to proclaim the Risen Savior Jesus to Festus, Agrippa, and all who will listen. It's an incredible example of what it looks like to live life as a Christian with nothing to lose. So, we have the chance to consider what it is that holds us back from similar boldness and allow God's Word to challenge us to live with greater abandon.
Our final sermon in the book of Joel turns to focus on God’s justice and judgment over the wicked and wicked nations, contrasting the Lord’s might to save His people. This focuses on the reality of The Day of the Lord on an eschatological level. There are implications for us as God’s people as we look ahead to the end of all things. God’s might and power will be a source of fear for the unjust, but a source of joy and peace to us as his people. The key verse is 3:16, the Lord is a refuge and stronghold for His people.
This section focuses on God’s mercy and grace. The key verses are 2:28-32, which are quoted by Peter at Pentecost in Acts 2. There’s a clear command to rejoice and the passage ends with God’s promise of salvation which will ultimately lead us to joy. God is good, and His Spirit is at work in all of His people.
Chapter 2 turns attention to individual sin, and looks with hope to God our Savior. It is a call to true repentance, not just outward action, relying on God’s goodness and faithfulness, and love. The key verse is 2:12-13, “Rend your hearts and not your garments. Return to the Lord.”
In this first sermon of our new series, Pastor Chuy focused on the reality of suffering around us. It is a call to open our eyes, recognize the realities of the destruction and pain in this world, and to respond by crying out to God. The key verse is 1:14, a call to cry out to God. In the midst of no ability to bring our own offering, we only have hope in God who provided the ultimate offering for us in Christ.
Last week we saw Paul on trial before the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem, and transferred to a Roman court in Caesarea. This week we will see what happens when he stood on trial before Felix, and later Festus. Two years later. That's right. The Apostle Paul sat in prison in Caesarea for two whole years awaiting a decision on baseless charges. It can't help but feel like a waste of his incredible giftedness as a pastor and church planter. Paul's posture and approach throughout his imprisonment will help us as we wrestle to understand God's timing in our own lives and circumstances.
Leading up to this passage, Paul was attacked by a rioting crowd in the Temple courts. The Roman guards came through to save his life, but still arrested him. In this passage, Paul is put on trial before the Sanhedrin, a religious council that is the very council that was responsible for the death of Christ. Paul was thrown back into prison and as he sat alone in the middle of the night, Jesus met him and called him to take courage. This passage shows us that in our darkest, loneliest moments, Jesus doesn't abandon us. He is not distant or unaware of what we face. He stands by all who are His.
Pastor Chuy Rodriguez focused on the part that we play in the big story of God's work in and through His people. He also had updates and highlights from the church plants that Redemption Hill is part of around the world.
Paul finally made it to Jerusalem and stepped into a culturally divided context where the heat was getting turned up. As he tried to navigate the tensions of the day, it ended up being personally costly, but he was able to speak the beauty and hope of good news into a culturally heated context. There is massive crossover for us as we navigate the divides of our time and see the realities that we must understand if we are going to join God in His good work in our city.
This Sunday we will jump into the fourth and final section of the book of Acts. The major theme of this section is that The Story Continues. The same Spirit continues to advance the Word of God and the gospel of Jesus Christ. We are part of the story God has written and continues to write. Acts 21:1-16 starts off Paul's journey back to Jerusalem. It's a crazy section. People around Paul claim to be hearing from the Holy Spirit and do some bizarre things, like tying themselves up with his belt. Paul continues on in the face of it. We are going to take time on Sunday to approach the question of what we do when Christians come to different conclusions while pursuing the will of the same Spirit of God. How do we deal with disagreement? How do we walk in step with the Spirit, or with any confidence that we are actually following Him?
As Paul headed back toward Jerusalem he stopped off to meet one last time with the elders of the church in Ephesus in Acts 20:13-38. It's an emotional scene that shows the tenderness between the Apostle and this church. It also shows us something of the calling to serve in leadership in local churches. We will see this week what the focus needs to be to keep a planted church on mission.
This Easter’s sermon comes from Acts 20:7-12, continuing our current series in Acts with a dramatic story of a young man named Eutychus who fell from a window and was brought back from the dead. The raising of Eutychus is only a shadow of the glory of the resurrection offered to us in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We will see that God sees our suffering and sorrow, and that death does not hold the final answer.
This Sunday we will continue our series with Acts 19:21-20:6. This passage is a riot. Literally. After two years in Ephesus, Paul's ministry was recognized as a threat to the social and economic order of the city. It shows us that the gospel truly does turn the world upside down. This passage will help us to assess the broader cultural idolatry of our city and to see the divergent paths of the Way of this world and the Way of Jesus.
This Sunday, we continue our series with the beginning of Paul's 3rd missionary journey in Acts 18:24-19:20. This passage shows us a young upstart preacher who needed correction, a deficient understanding of repentance and baptism, and demons that whooped a group of brothers and sent them running down the street naked. In all of it, we see a distinction between ministry done from our own understanding and power, versus the Spirit-filled power of God brought to bear. This will be a fun one to explore together.
In this passage Paul goes into the city of Corinth. Corinth was a notorious place, a financial and trade center and a city that offered its proud inhabitants anything and everything they could wish for. Paul ended up spending 18 months there planting a church, but it took a vision from God to give him the confidence to stick it out in the face of opposition.
This Sunday we come to a passage that has been foundational for Redemption Hill Church since the very beginning. Even before our church had a name, when it was just an idea, Acts 17 and Paul's time in Athens shaped what would be our approach to life and ministry in this city. I continue to believe that DC is our culture's Athens - a place of education and learning, where ideology is openly discussed in the marketplace, and it is filled with inhabitants who "spend their time in nothing except telling or hearing something new." I am eager to open this text up together and to see what we can learn as we continue to work to bring good news to this great city.
This Sunday we continue our series with Acts 17:1-15. This passage shows Paul's ministry in Thessalonica and Berea. The gospel turned the world upside down. And the advance of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ always calls for a response. It stands upside down and against the kingdoms of this world and the kingdoms of our own hearts. The result, as we see in these two cities will either be jealousy and violence, or eagerness for God's Word.
This Sunday we continue our series with Acts 16:16-40, which shows the impact of the gospel in Philippi. The ups and downs of Paul’s journey continued, and still things just didn’t go as he would have liked or planned. But this passage shows us that the power of the gospel can change lives and overthrow systems even in a great city. It’s an important passage for us as we continue to live and work in DC, with great hope to see God at work in our city.
Paul's second missionary journey continued, but nothing went quite like he hoped. Along with Silas and Timothy, after the Spirit forbade them to go to the cities they had planned on, he ended up in Philippi. Throughout it all, even with clear closed doors, the travelers continued forward, trusting that God was directing their path wherever it led. We will see that God is good and sovereign, and that His leading will lead to unforeseen opportunities to join Jesus in good work.
This Sunday, we paused our series in Acts to focus on a much-needed topic: Rest. Our city is not a well-rested one. No matter the neighborhood or background, DC has a hustle to it. Understanding the need for rest, and the biblical concept of rest is essential for us.
In the aftermath of the Jerusalem Council Paul and Barnabas headed back to Antioch to teach together. They agreed to go out from there to revisit the churches they had planted together on their first journey. Not all went as they planned, but God was able to work in and through them even in the midst of it.
This Sunday we come to a watershed moment for the Early Church. The Apostles Peter, James, and Paul came to a point of conflict that could have threatened to divide the entire church. The future posture of Christianity was hanging in the balance. So, a council was called in Jerusalem, gathering the Apostles, the Elders, and the people of the Jerusalem church together. There is much to mine in this pivotal passage. As we walk through it together, we will see what is essential to the gospel, and something of how to handle things that we hold important but that are less essential.
This Sunday we will continue our series with Acts 14:20-28. Last week we saw that the Apostle Paul was dragged outside of the city and left for dead. This week we see his response. He got up and went back into the city. It's an unpredictable move that showed his passion for the work God had called him to. Not only that, Paul proceeded to go back through every city that he and Barnabas visited on their journey. Remember these are all cities that they had been run out of! Beyond the resilience of these men in their ministry, we will also see the beautiful reality that gospel proclamation and the advance of God's Word leads to church planting as people's faith is strengthened, disciples are made, Elders are trained and appointed, and the church is gathered to celebrate God's goodness and grace.
This passage shows the continuation of Paul and Barnabas' first missionary journey, as they went on to a city called Lystra. There Paul healed a crippled man, similar to the beginning of the ministries of both Jesus and Peter. The people of the city started to worship the two men as gods before making a quick turn against them. This passage shows vividly that when we idolize, we will demonize.
This section shows us the ways that people responded to Paul and Barnabas as they preached the gospel in various cities. They preached to Jews and Gentiles, and got responses that ranged from belief and repentance to plots to kill them. The passage shows us the ways that our hearts are prone to respond to the gospel.
Paul and Barnabas continued their journey to a city called Antioch in Pisidia. There they focused first on preaching the good news of Jesus to the Jews in the city, which was a pattern for all of Paul's ministry. This passage is unique in that it captures Paul's sermon, and illustrates for us the approach that he took as he preached about Jesus in synagogues. We will see an emphasis in this passage that God keeps His promises and His Word to us.
The lens of the book shifts to the ministry of the Apostle Paul, as he pursued the call Jesus placed on him to be a witness to the Gentiles. Paul's journeys take the gospel to the nations. We begin with Acts 12:25-13:12, which tells the story of Paul and Barnabas being sent out from the church in Antioch and preaching the gospel on Cyprus. This passage will show us what it looks like to live our lives On a Mission from God.
This Sunday is the final Sunday of our series in Haggai. We close it out with Haggai 2:20-23, which is addressed to one of the all-time-great Bible names, Zerubbabel. We will see in this passage that God has a promise for His people and that Zerubbabel is declared to be God’s signet ring. In our time together we will explore the implications of big Z’s status as a signet ring, and the significance of Zerubbabel’s appearance in the genealogy of Jesus Christ.
This passage shows us that the Law cannot actually make us clean. On our own, we are all defiled people. Yet, God has not abandoned us. He loves us and pursues us, and has promised blessing even before our obedience has shown itself. So, as we celebrate Preparation Sunday, we will do so with great anticipation for God's blessing for His people.
This second section of Haggai highlights the promises of God and the centrality of the Temple in the worship of the Israelites. We will take some time to consider the importance of the glory of God and the way His presence manifested itself throughout the history of His commitment to His people, extending to us today.
The first chapter of Haggai challenges God's people on their priorities. Written during the return of the Exiles to Jerusalem, it is a book focused on the dawn of a new era in the life of God’s people. This passage challenges us as God's people to evaluate our own priorities as they line up with God's.
This passage starts off pretty bleak. James the Apostle is killed, Peter is imprisoned and awaiting execution, and Herod is triumphing over the church. But God...This passage helps us to see that in the darkest of times, God can surprise us by bursting through with glorious light. His work can be surprising and confusing. The one thing we need to have confidence in is that His Word will continue to spread and increase. So, in the darkest days, God's people pray.
This passage shows us a glimpse of the founding of the church in Antioch. The church in Antioch was the original church planting church. This passage shows us how we as a church can join God in His work as His Word advances. It’s an incredible passage that shows the power of the gospel and the value and role that each one of us has in the church.
After Peter witnessed the movement of the Holy Spirit extended to the Gentiles in the salvation of Cornelius and his entire household, he returned to Jerusalem. The homecoming could not have been what Peter hoped for. His church family back home heard reports of what Peter had been up to and met him with criticism and questioning. This is not an unfamiliar story. When the Holy Spirit moves, it will always mess with our categories. Even today, feeling out of control can make us turn to fearful and critical hearts. Peter's thorough response helps us to see how to respond to each other in patience and love, pursuing unity as we join God in His work.
This passage is pivotal for the book of Acts and God’s work in saving all people because it shows us the moment that the gospel went to the Gentiles and the Holy Spirit fell on them. We will take a look at the pathway of both Peter and Cornelius as we spend time reflecting on the barriers that keep us from being part of God’s work in saving all people, and consider the barriers that had to be overcome for us to hear the gospel.
One of the biggest challenges Christians face in the public square with rapidly shifting ethics is the criticism of inconsistency. You've heard it before - "If you believe in ______, then why do you eat shellfish? Why do you wear mixed-material clothing?" People will point to Old Testament laws on food and clothing, and then claim the ability to extend similar fluidity to other moral and ethical lines. We will see this Sunday that what feels like a complicated web of determining what ethical laws still stand, Scripture is remarkably clear and helpful for us. This passage stands at the center of that discussion as Peter had to wrestle through God's command to do what stood against some of the OT law.
This passage brings the Apostle Peter back into the narrative as we see his pastoral care for Christians who were scattered throughout the region. We also see the ministry of Jesus extending through Peter in power as he heals a man and raises a woman from the dead. It's a stunning and miraculous set of stories. It also shows us something important for our lives.
Every one of us is fighting against wounds. For some they seem crippling this week. This passage will help us to cope with the reality of pain and suffering in life, and to find hope in a Savior who has the power to overcome it.
This section shows us the immediate aftermath of Saul’s conversion to follow Jesus Christ. In the face of intense pressure and attack, the Church still multiplied. We talk about multiplication a lot at RHC. This passage helps us to see the means God used to multiply the church, which shows us what we can focus on if we want to see His multiplying work in and through us.
This is a critical moment for the early church. We have seen already that Saul was ravaging the church, overseeing the execution of Stephen, and persecuting and arresting Christians. In this text, a crazy turn is taken as Jesus met Saul on the road to Damascus. It's a powerful story and helps us to understand what happens in our own salvation. The power of the gospel is on full display for us as we dig in this weekend.
Pastor Chuy preached from Acts with a special focus on evangelism. The past two weeks we have seen Philip's effort with the Samaritans and with the Ethiopian Eunuch. The upcoming chapters show us more stories of individuals coming to follow Jesus in powerful ways. The same Spirit is still moving through God's people today. This week we will explore our part in the story God is writing.
Philip, who was introduced last week, follows God's leading from Samaria to a roadside encounter with an Ethiopian man south of Jerusalem. The evangelism we have seen in Acts thus far was proclamation to large crowds of people. This is the first of a series of individuals' stories that we see in the bigger story of the advancement of God's Word. We have a lot to learn from Philip's approach, as well as from the faith of the Ethiopian man.
We begin with Acts 8:1-25 as we see that the persecution erupted in Jerusalem following the martyrdom of Stephen. The suffering was real and intense, but had an unexpected consequence that the Word of God and the gospel spread beyond the geographic and ethnic lines that we see represented in Acts 1-7. The first chapters of Acts are dominated by the ministry of Peter and the Apostles. In chapter 8 we see the scattered church proclaiming the gospel as Philip brought God's Word to Samaria.
To close the series, Pastor Bill Riedel recapped the journey through the previous weeks and cast vision for the future. This combined a vivid picture of what Jesus has called His Church to, in every time and place, as well as a particular vision for what this church is called to at this time in this place.
With a theological foundation and an understanding of church history, this sermon will turn toward understanding our own story and place in God’s work through history. This will include a survey of Christianity in America, including a clear-eyed look at the role Christians have played in racial division and injustice. It will also look at the history of DC, and work toward an understanding of the historic brokenness of our city, and how the gospel can bring healing and reconciliation.
From the Day of Pentecost forward, the Church reflected a broad diversity of people, cultures, and backgrounds brought together in a new community. The Early Church felt growing pains in the friction that so often accompanies proximity, as people were brought together. In this sermon, Pastor Chuy Rodríguez will look at the earliest history of the church, and the admonishment from the Apostles on unnecessary barriers to the gospel based on cultural constructs. The description of the Early Church will both challenge and inspire us to pursue unity in Christ today.
Our current cultural moment is consumed by discussion of race. Biblically and theologically, there is only one race – the human race – made up of a multiplicity of ethnic groups. Race is a construct that was developed in the 19th century in order to subjugate entire people groups as inferior based on skin color. The gospel of Jesus Christ is that a new, restored humanity has been established and inaugurated. Within this new humanity, our ultimate identity is in Jesus Christ, who renews and restores every part of us into His image and likeness.
The foundation for Christian anthropology is rooted in the very first chapter of the biblical text and storyline. Every person, male and female, is made in the image and likeness of God and, therefore, has a divinely ascribed dignity. This sermon will explore the beauty of this foundation as well as the ongoing implications. If the church believes that all people carry equal dignity, then it is critical that the church work to uphold and restore dignity for all people.
Pastor Doug Logan joined us to open God's Word for us to Revelation 7:9-12. The portrait of Jesus’ throne in Revelation 7 is that people from every tribe, tongue, and nation are gathered together to worship Him. This beautiful portrait is often a point of reference when discussing diversity in the church. The passage is focused less on diversity, though, and more on the glory of Christ. In this first sermon, Pastor Doug set the tone for the series, showing the barrier-shattering reality that comes from an ultimate identity found in the glory of Jesus Christ.
Pastor Doug is is the Director of Diversity and Co-Director of Church in Hard Places with Acts 29. He formerly served as Senior Pastor of Epiphany Camden, a church founded under his leadership in 2012. In 2016, he authored his first book, On the Block: Developing a Biblical Picture for Missional Engagement. Doug and his wife, Angel, have been married since 1996 and have three adult sons and three grandchildren.
Pastor Josh Soto of Remnant Church in Richmond, VA was with us this week. God is majestic and worthy of our praise. The Psalms call us to praise Him and to remember the myriad reasons that God is worthy of that praise. Psalm 103 is packed with vivid imagery that calls us to praise God.
This week will explore the heart of lament through Psalm 13, and the confidence we can have in approaching God openly with our hearts. Lament is different than self-pity or depression. It is inviting people into our own brokenness. A lament grieves that the world is unbalanced. It grieves the gap between reality and God’s promise. It believes in a God who is there, who can act in time and space. It doesn’t drift into cynicism or unbelief, but engages God passionately with what’s wrong.
Eddie Cole, District Superintendent of the EDA, kicked off our first week of this series by introducing the Psalms through Psalm 1. We are called to pray expectantly for wisdom throughout Scripture. We will see that the ultimate expression of God’s wisdom has come to us through the cross of Jesus Christ, which is the only hope for our lives and our redemption.
Understanding God's design for work and how to invest in our work for His glory can still leave us open to exhaustion and overwork. Finding sustainable patterns and rhythms of rest is an essential part of life. We will take time to explore the biblical concept of sabbath rest and see how it applies to us today.
The regular weekly grind can make the most rewarding jobs feel like they are empty and pointless at times. Last week we saw that we can join God's work in forming, filling, and cultivating this world. This week we will bring that down to a very practical level and see how our work connects to God's work in His world, whatever the career field.
There is a terrible misconception that work is only a result of the curse. This makes people feel as if any work other than full-time vocational ministry is fruitless and a lesser option. The Biblical reality is that God designed us for work from the very beginning, modeling it for us Himself. Understanding God’s design for work is fundamental in understanding our purpose in cultivation and service and gives an inherent dignity to every calling. Genesis 1-2 are hugely helpful for us, and will be our focal point this Sunday.
This has been a timely series for us as a church, and I have had a lot of fun preaching through the Beginnings of the early church, seeing the foundation of what we are and what we should pursue as a church. This Sunday we will focus in on Acts 6:7, which shows us what we should pursue in order to be a part of the advance of God's Word.
This is a huge narrative section that shows us the ministry, life, and death of Stephen. Death is a shadow that hangs over every one of us. In a world that seems every-increasingly bent toward self-realization and expression, it is a shocking text to see someone self-sacrificially committed to the transcendent kingdom and cause of another. This text shows us how Jesus reorients our lives, and how Christians see and experience death.
As the early church grew quickly, some complaints rose up within the church family. The Apostles, filled with the Spirit, led with wisdom, though, and didn't allow things to fester. An all-church meeting was called to roll out some new structures to accommodate the needs of the growing church. This passage is essential for us. It shows us that the church is one body with many members, and that the opportunity for and burden of ministry falls on all of us together. It also shows us some of the foundations for the structures of the church that we carry through to today.
This passage shows the Apostles brought back in front of the Sanhedrin to be questioned, for a second time. The council was in a rage and ready to kill the Apostles, just like they had killed Jesus. Peter stood boldly, though, and an older Pharisee named Gamaliel spoke up with some prophetic words of caution. This passage will show us why Christians can rejoice even in the midst of real opposition and suffering.
This Sunday we will pause our series in Acts, picking that up next Sunday. Pastor Chris Bennett, who leads Renewal Church in Memphis, and is speaking at our Men's Conference, will preach from Lamentations.
The Holy Spirit moved through the early church to shape it with great grace and great fear. In this week's passage, we see that the power of God was not limited to stay within the already-existing community that had formed. This new community, the Church, took ministry to the streets. There was a public-facing witness to the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That also doesn't mean it was easy or unopposed. This week's text will help us to better understand the role and calling of the church in public life.
This passage shows a massive contrast in the early church. It was a community shaped by the gospel of Jesus Christ that showed off the grace of God beautifully. Still, in those earliest days, people tried to take advantage of the community and elevate themselves to notoriety. That's right, the first Sunday after Easter we're jumping into the story of Ananias and Sapphira. This passage shows us the stark contrast between true gospel Christianity and self-centered religiosity. Let's lean in and learn from it together.
Friday and Saturday give a powerful picture of our reality, and the waiting anticipation to see if God will work in our clouded grief. The sorrow of Friday and the silence of Saturday look ahead with a building anticipation to the celebration on Sunday. The grave could not hold Jesus, He was raised from death to life! This Easter’s sermon will come from 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 as we see the bold historical claim that Jesus resurrected from death to life and look at the implications for us.
After Peter and John stood boldly in the face of their own arrest and questioning at the hands of the men who had killed Jesus, they were set free. This passage shows us that they went straight to their friends and church family, and that they all gathered together to pray. It's a helpful passage because it shows us how we can pray together in the face of massive opposition and suffering.
After Peter healed a crippled beggar at the Temple gate, and preached a sermon showing how all of Scripture points to Jesus, he and John were arrested. They were dragged in front of the same group of religious leaders who condemned Jesus to death just a couple of months earlier. Peter, who abandoned Jesus the night of his arrest, and denied even knowing him in the High Priest's courtyards, is back in the place of his denial. He is faced with his greatest failure and pressed to stop proclaiming Jesus. This time, though, filled with the Spirit, he is bold and clear. This Sunday we see, in Peter, that the Spirit empowers us to boldness.
Last week we saw Jesus heal a crippled beggar at the gateway into the Temple courts, through the Apostle Peter. That healing created a ruckus. Everyone knew that old crippled man and were shocked that he was walking around on strong legs. As a crowd gathered on a covered porch in the Temple called Solomon’s Portico. The once shy Peter stood and preached his second sermon in Jerusalem since the Holy Spirit came on the Apostles in power. This passage is that sermon. In it we see the overwhelming centrality of Christ and understanding who Jesus is, along with a beautiful promise and assurance to us through Him.
This passage transitions us from the day of Pentecost to the earliest days of this newly formed, Spirit-empowered community. A shocking event occurred one day in the Temple courts, as Peter and John strolled through the gate into the Temple grounds. Peter healed a crippled beggar in the name and by the power of Jesus Christ. This surprised everyone who saw it, just like it would surprise us today. So, we will spend time together exploring miracles and healing. The same Spirit who worked through the Apostle Peter is at work through God’s people today.
This passage is absolutely foundational for us as a church. It is referenced in every Foundations Class we have ever taught, and shaped our longings and vision from the earliest days of planting Redemption Hill. It shows us what the earliest church devoted itself to, and how it was shaped by the gospel into a new family and community. It also shows us the incredible impact that a gospel-shaped community can have.
As the first Christian sermon concludes, Peter’s hearers were “cut to the heart” and asked what they should do. Their sin was exposed. Peter’s call was to repent and be baptized. This is the normative pattern in the New Testament: God’s Word is proclaimed, people are cut to the heart, they repent, and they are baptized. We will take time to explore what real repentance is and why baptism is important.
In the first Christian sermon, Peter established that Jesus the man is the Savior we need. He didn’t stop there, though. He went on to proclaim the powerful reality that Jesus is the King we need as well. He came in the line of David, anticipated by David’s own Psalms, and Jesus is the ultimate King that was promised to David. The implications for us are massive, not only individually, but on the whole of how God’s people think about the role we play in this world corporately.
After the Holy Spirit came upon the Apostles in power, just like Jesus promised, the Apostles spilled into the streets of Jerusalem speaking in tongues. The crowds responded with wonder and amazement, while some mocked them and thought they were drunk. Peter stood up and delivered the first Christian sermon. The same man who had denied knowing Jesus just a couple of months earlier now stood with boldness, beautifully applying the texts and prophecies of the Old Testament and pointing the the supremacy of Jesus the Christ. 3,000 people were saved that day. This Sunday we begin a 3-week look at Peter's sermon, and we will see that Jesus is our Savior.
The waiting finally came to an end on the day of Pentecost. The Holy Spirit filled the Apostles and worked in power in Jerusalem. Christianity swept through the Roman Empire and on across the world in the most unlikely of ways. This passage is what started it all. Join us as we take a look at how to recognize the movement of the Spirit of God in our own lives and church.
The Apostles and their friends, 120 total people, followed Jesus' instructions after His Ascension and headed back to Jerusalem to wait. This passage shows us what they did in the interim. I'm not good at waiting. Most of us aren't. Living in a city exacerbates that whole problem. Everything is fast-paced all the time. This week we are going to see what it actually looks like to wait on the Lord to move and act.
The book of Acts details the first days of the early church, the beginning of God's movement to form a people for His glory from all the peoples of the earth. It shows how the Word of God advances and spreads in the most unlikely of ways, through the most unlikely people. As we begin a new year together, we will see new beginnings through Acts 1-7. This Sunday we begin with Acts 1:1-11, the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ.
This is the final chapter in this prophetic book. After the Lord had spoken through chapter 2, Habakkuk responded with a prayer. His prayer is again helpful for us. We have already seen that it is good for us to come before God in open lament, and that His plans will not always make sense to us in the moment, but that we can trust that God is good and sovereign. Now we see what it looks like to truly live by faith, even in suffering. The difficult things that God warned Habakkuk about were not eliminated, but Habakkuk still is able to respond with worship and rejoicing.
In this passage God continues His answer to Habakkuk, but it takes a hard turn. After detailing the profile of the wicked, and calling the righteous to live by faith, God went on to mock the arrogant Chaldeans. There are five "Woes" in this passage, but it could also be taken or translated as five "Ha's!" It's an important passage for us because it shows that even when the world seems like it is descending into chaos and like God is silent, that all is not as it seems. The wickedness and injustice will not win in the end, and those who advance them will ultimately answer to God. This passage gives us a continued outline of the brokenness of the human condition, and the splendor of God.
Last week we saw the despair of the prophet’s complaint, and that what he saw continues to reverberate through today – that violence, wickedness, and injustice are everywhere and it can feel like God is distant from it all. God’s answer was that He is active, and has a plan, but that we wouldn’t believe it if we knew what He was doing. This week we see that God laid out His plan to Habakkuk, and it seemed, at least to the prophet, to be a very bad plan! This is so often the case in our own experience. Even if we believe and accept that God is engaged and working in our world, and in our lives, it can feel like His plan just doesn’t make sense. This weekend we will see where we can find hope and how we can make sense of God’s plans, even when they don’t mesh with our own.
Habakkuk is a powerful book that expresses the cry and complaint of the prophet, and receives God’s answer. How can God use a wicked nation for His purposes and glory? Where is He in the midst of suffering? How long will God wait to bring righteousness and justice, and fulfillment of His promises?
This is the summation of the letter and a final charge from the Apostle. At its center, Paul has a curious statement on his grounds for boasting - in the cross of Christ alone. We're going to take some time together to remember the major themes of the letter, and to see how we are called to boast and given freedom to boast.
This is a critically important passage if we are going to understand what it looks like to live together as a spiritual family in the church. The law of Christ will compel us to act in love toward one another, bearing each other's burdens and walking alongside one another in sorrow and celebration. At RHC we often use #churchasfamily. This week will help us to better understand what that actually means and how it is lived out.
The letter to the Galatians has turned to full-on application at this point. This Sunday's text shows us that the reality of our hearts will show up practically in our lives. In alignment with Jesus' teaching that a tree will be known by its fruit, we see the fruit of our hearts will show up in how we live. The fruit of the Spirit is as clear as the fruit of selfishness and sin.
This section is a turning point in the letter. Paul moves from establishing the theological foundation of the gospel toward its outworking in our lives. If we have come into the family of God by grace through faith, it will show up in our lives. The four Sundays remaining in this series will look at the practical outworking of salvation in our lives as individuals and in the life of our church. The primary thrust of this week's passage is that the gospel frees us to love.
We continue our series in Galatians with the most difficult and confusing passage in the letter. Paradoxically, it also may be the most important, the climax of the theological argument Paul has been building through the first four chapters. Galatians 4:21-5:1 presents a contrast between Hagar and Sarah, Ishmael and Isaac. Paul uses this Old Testament reference to provide an allegory, or illustration, of a broader theological principle. Ultimately, there are only two ways to follow God. One is to believe fully on the promises of God. The other is to believe fully on the promises of God, aided with our own help to work them out. Only one of those brings freedom and life.
In this passage we see the issue of idolatry addressed head-on. The idea of idolatry can be confusing to us - most of us don't have issues with bowing to actual statues. It's important for us to understand that, as Martin Luther said, "Anything on which your heart relies and depends, I say, that is really your God." We all have an idolatry problem, and our worship will show up in our lives. Ultimately, anything other than Christ will enslave us and lead us to destruction. Our text this week helps us to see that Jesus frees us from slavery to false gods.
David betrays an abiding love for God and the things of God all across the psalms. Maybe nowhere more clearly than Psalm 63. In this Psalm, we see a deep spirituality shaped by a view of God in three parts.
In a world that is broken by division, injustice, and hate, there is hope for us in Christ. His people have the opportunity to be part of God's work in healing and restoring this world. We will take time to have a clear-eyed look at the brokenness around us both in our nation and in the American Church. All of this, though, will point us to hope and practical action to be part of God's work in healing and reconciliation.
This passage breaks down the life of Abraham and the relationship of God's promises to Abraham with the Law given through Moses. Ultimately all of this relates to Jesus Christ, who brought the culmination of all of God's plans and promises.
Over the past two Sundays we have explored a major conflict between the Apostles Paul and Peter. Paul confronted Peter because the issue of justification was at stake - how we achieve right standing before God. Galatians 2 clearly establishes the importance of our righteousness coming by grace alone, through faith in Christ alone. This Sunday the letter turns back to the churches in Galatia and to the issue of sanctification - how we are made holy. Once we have been given the gift of right standing before God, there are implications for how we live. This Sunday will be intensely personal and practical for us.
In Galatians 2:15-21 the beauty of justification is on brilliant display. Every one of us chases righteousness, right standing. That is shown in the guilt and shame that we all experience as we fall short of it. There is hope in Jesus Christ. I can't wait for us to gather together to celebrate it!
After learning about the unity that developed between Paul and the other Apostles, we read in Galatians 2:11-14 about a public confrontation between Paul and Peter. This was a watershed moment for the early church. It teaches us about the critical foundations for the new community that Christ established, and what is worth defending in the church.
A few times each year Redemption Hill gathers at one service with our families. This means that everyone will be in service – parents, kids, singles, community groups, everyone together. We’ll have a simpler service of extended singing together and a shorter sermon or prayer time. Our hope is that this will be a sweet time of gathering together as the young, the old, and everyone in-between declare the praises of our God and fellowship as a united body. This also gives a chance for our teams to rest, especially our Kids Worship, Band, and Tech teams.
These patterns are formative and fun for our church. It will help us center on Jesus as the most important aspect of gathering together on Sunday and it will give us perspective and opportunity to be the family that God has made us to be.
Paul continues to fill in gaps in the story of his early years as a follower of Jesus Christ. This Sunday we will focus in heavily on 2:4-5. People in the early church slipped in to spy on Christians who exercised different freedoms than those to which they were accustomed. They couldn't believe that other Christians thought differently, or practiced different things - all while clinging to the One True Gospel of Jesus Christ. So, they tried to drag them backward into slavery to unhelpful rules and regulations. Whoa! The same thing happens today. We all can fall victim to it, and to perpetrating it. Let's figure out what real Christian freedom looks like as we dig in together!
We all want to be liked, recognized, appreciated, and loved. When people believe false things about us it messes with our minds and can seep deeply into our hearts, so we slide into self-protection. Last week we saw the firm foundation in the gospel of Jesus Christ, and that there is no other gospel. This week we will see that the gospel frees us from people-pleasing.
October 31, 1517. A monk in a small town in Germany with a troubled soul and much trepidation attempted to invite a theological debate within the church. He didn’t realize that this spark would set off a building powder keg of tensions that would explode and change the course of history. The Protestant Reformation followed. This fall marks the 500th anniversary of that day.
Join us this fall as we take the next few months in a study of Galatians. One of the letters that was vitally important to the Reformation. As we do, we will do so with an eye toward the original context the Apostle Paul’s first letter to the first churches he had planted and an eye toward the Reformation.
The life of David is a constant help where every Christian may find comfort, example, and the gospel. Though faced with fear, anxiety, and hurt David is able to rest in the promise and word of God leading him to trust-fueled worship. We likewise see David’s example, and are drawn to the perfect example of Christ, who endured all things, fear, anxiety, and hurt on our behalf bringing the salvation of God to the people of God.
From Pastor Jon Rees: This Sunday is my last Sunday as your Pastor at RHC. The past five years have been a joy, honor, and privilege to serve alongside you in reaching Capitol Hill and beyond with the gospel of Jesus Christ. As most of you know, the Rees family is moving to Washington, IA where I will be the Senior Pastor of Faith Baptist Church. This is an exciting adventure for us and one we are anxiously awaiting what the Lord is going to do in and through us in this transition. We will pray for you that the light of the gospel will shine bright here in D.C. and that a gospel awaking will break out in this city through all the gospel-preaching churches. It is such a joy for me that I will be able to preach one more time to RHC this Sunday. Please come and hear God's Word and prepare yourself through prayer and by reading 2 Peter 1:3-11. The call of this passage is to not forget the gospel, something I know you don't want to do. So, come and worship with your church family this weekend and please be sure to say "goodbye" to us as we journey from this place. We love you and we will miss you, RHC.
Jesus has hard words for the church of Laodicea - that they are neither cold nor hot, but their lukewarmness makes Jesus sick. We will see on Sunday that the historic context of the city of Laodicea opens the way for us to understand Jesus' rebuke. We will also see a call that all of us need to hear as we respond to Jesus' words.
This church felt small and insignificant. Jesus has no criticism for them, though. There is only praise and encouragement. Jesus has opened a door for the gospel in their city, and their faithfulness is more significant than they could possibly realize. The church in Philadelphia helps us to see what it looks like to live missionally in DC, trusting Christ to build His Church.
Sardis was a well known city, maybe even the most storied city in the list. Jesus has nothing good to say about this church, though. He confronts them as the one who has the fullness of the Spirit of God and tells them that though they have a reputation of being alive, they are really dead. We might hope that this kind of church isn't around us today, but that is sadly not the case. It is easy for churches to be consumed with activity and have great reputations but still be spiritually dead.
The church in Thyatira was doing a lot of good work, and Jesus commended them for it. There was a major problem, though. Some of the Christians in Thyatira had embraced a lifestyle that stood opposed to the holiness of Christ. He let them know that He saw their lives and actions, and called them to repent. Christians today face the same kind of pressure. A stand for biblical morality can become a divisive problem outside of the church and can even compromise social and economic opportunities. This is another important text for us.
Pergamum was a government town, which means it had a level of arrogance and a feeling like it was the center of the news cycle - we don't know anything about that here in DC, right? The Christians in Pergamum faced tremendous cultural and political pressure, and Jesus told them that their city was the place where Satan's throne was. While the Pergamites did hold to Jesus' name, they allowed their beliefs to sway to the whims of the pressure they were under. This is a particularly important church for us to see and understand. The pressure to change and adapt the gospel to fit the culture of our time and place is nothing new. Jesus has strong words to say, though, and reinforces the importance of His Word.
Smyrna is one of the only churches of the seven to receive no criticism. This letter is for all of you who are suffering and struggling, even wondering where God is in your life. Jesus has words of comfort and a call to faithfulness even in the face of suffering, but a sweet promise of life from the One who has passed through death to life.
The church in Ephesus worked hard and fought hard. They denied false teachers. They did everything they knew to be the right thing and even worked to distinguish themselves from the world around them. Yet, they lost the love they had at the start. So, Jesus threatens to take away the church. There is so, so much for us to learn here.
In this passage we see a vision of the Risen Lord Jesus Christ. He is the firstborn of the dead and the ruler of kings on earth. John has a vision of him in power, resurrected, reigning, fearsome and holy. We will take time to see the seven characteristics of Jesus Christ that shape what He has to say to the seven churches.
Giving and sharing life is one thing. Giving and sharing the Gospel is another thing. But as we see from 1 Thessalonians 2:1-12, we are called to do both. Pastor Jon shares with us 3 ways how we can do this.
This Sunday brings closure to our Passion series. Phil Maucieri will lead us into understanding how Luke 24:36-53 reveals the mission of God that was accomplished in Jesus Christ and extends through His people. We are part of God's work in His world, witnesses to His glory and grace.
In this passage, we see the encounter that two travelers on the Road to Emmaus had with the risen Lord Jesus. This was on the same Sunday on which Jesus had risen from death to life. In the midst of their sorrow, the travelers didn’t realize who they were talking to. We will see the revelation of Jesus in the whole of the biblical storyline – how all Scripture whispers His name.
This Sunday we will celebrate the victorious resurrection of Jesus Christ, conquering sin and death. As we do so, we will reflect on Luke 24:1-12. Mary Madgalene, Joanna, and Mary the mother of James, along with other women, came to Jesus’ tomb on Sunday morning at dawn and found it empty. Even the Apostles didn’t believe them. But Peter, even in the wake of his denial and failure, ran to the tomb to see it for himself. We will see the historical reality of Jesus’ resurrection, as well as its importance for us.
Throughout the ages, the church has gathered on the Friday before Easter to remember the path Christ took to the cross. Good Friday is an invitation for us to stop and reflect upon Jesus as He lived out the lowest of human experience. It is a call to sit in the dust, hand in hand with our own doubts and sorrows. This Good Friday, we gather as a church to reflect upon the sufferings of Christ, see the great cost of our sin, and foster an anticipation for Easter Sunday.