Jesus – Son-Rise Christian Church, Marshfield, MO: Recent Episodes
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There are certain passages of Scripture that make us gulp. That make us pause, or speed up and skip on ahead, because we don’t want to think about the implications of what they mean. One of the scariest passages in Scripture is found toward the end of the Sermon on the Mount. Three verses who’s implications should make you tremble, at least a few times in your life.
The cry of every human heart is the desire to share something with somebody. These connections are made in friendship, in shared interests, in marriage and familial connections. And yet there is something deeply wrong with our world that tears these connections apart. Despite our best efforts to connect with others, we often end up feeling isolated, disconnected…lonely.
Of all the benefits of belonging to Jesus that Paul discusses in Romans 8, verse 28’s assurance that God CAN and DOES work for our good through everything life throws at us is one of the most treasured blessings. What other people intend in an evil way, God has the power to use it instead for good.
In Matthew 13 Jesus tells a parable about a farmer planting seeds that falls onto 4 different soils. Not every heart is ready to receive the truth about Jesus. What can we do to make these hearts more fruitful?
The mid 90s. The cool kids wore flannel. Friends was the newest hit on TV. We were just discovering the internet, email, and AOL. We had pagers and cell phones that looked like walkie talkies. Alternative music had become mainstream.At the midpoint of the decade a song by a new artist rocked the charts around the world. It wasn’t about dancing, love, or good times. Instead, this hit asked what is likely the most important spiritual question ever asked in a top 40 tune. The answer to this question gets to the very heart of the gospel.
Jesus calls us to seek God and promises that we will find Him. So, why is it that God can so often be so hard to find?
It’s so easy to see problems in others and completely miss them in ourselves. And then we criticize those faults, we make all sorts of negative assumptions about their motives and intentions, we judge their faith, and we label them with this negative trait or having that character flaw. However, if anyone dares point out […]
We all store up treasure. Where we store it is the issue. Jesus talks more about money and possessions than he does any other subject. More than salvation, more than prayer, more than love, Jesus talks about how we handle our stuff. Why would he do this? Because so much of our life is spent […]
There may be few messages more relevant, and more timely to 21st Century American ears than biblical teaching on fasting. Yet nothing sounds more foreign, more alien, more out of touch than fasting.
Giving and helping the needy is simply to be normal activity of the Christian. We are not to be self-conscious in our giving. Don’t sit and calculate how generous you are. How much you gave. Just do it and forget about it.
Forgiveness and Reconciliation can cure an angry heart. They stop murder before the hate even starts. And forgiveness and reconciliation are what God desires most of us.
As we continue our series on the Sermon on the Mount, we come to a passage where Jesus describes the kind of influence we, as Christians, should have on the world. Jesus doesn’t call us to withdraw from the world and leave it, but neither does he call us to attack the world and conquer […]
True blessing, it turns out, comes from the places we least expected it. Not just fleeting, momentary happiness, but blessing – what Max Lucado calls sacred delight.
In the opening verses of Matthew 5 Jesus offers us something more than happiness. He offers us divine blessing. In these 8 beatitudes Jesus marks the path to true “sacred delight.” In a world where everything leaves us empty, Jesus shows the way to fulfillment.
Three simple words in English – “It is finished.” In the Greek, it’s one word. Picture Jesus on the cross and he yells out this one word before breathing his final breath. He draws up all his last remaining bit of strength to make this one final proclamation, “Tetelestai!” This one word tells us so […]
If you ask most people why they don’t go to church or why they don’t become a Christian, or why they left the faith, one of the most common answers is a variation on this, “The church is full of hypocrites.” Jesus was well acquainted with hypocrisy and had much to say about it. So, […]
For a channel so devoted to Christmas, it’s amazing how little actual Christmas there ever is in any Hallmark movie. Don’t expect any signs of Christmas beyond cozy fireplaces, time with family, decorating trees and giving gifts. It’s a Christ-less Christmas. No one ever mentions Jesus. If you’re lucky you might get a verse of […]
One of the strangest stories in the Bible is found in Mark 11. It’s main point is about the dangers of being all eaves and no fruit, but we might miss it, because of the weirdness of the story. It requires some background we might not have.
We live in a world that loves everything up- upgraded, upscale, upbeat. We like to get thumbs up and for everything to be on the upswing. However, Jesus shows us that the path to true greatness lies in a different direction.
Christians universally celebrate the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Yet there is another event in the life of Jesus that is just as important as these, and that is his return to His rightful place in Heaven. There are several the ascension of Jesus has to teach us.
A Pharisee named Nicodemus sets out to meet Jesus at night and ends up discovering a divine love that changes everything.
Jesus didn’t enter Creation as the most brilliant star in space, or the most powerful hurricane to stir up the ocean into a most impressive message. He didn’t enter our world a massive cloud formation to write a message in the skies. He came as one of us. This is what theologians call the incarnation. God […]
If you were to ask Jesus what is the number one rule for life? What would he say? What is the single most important spiritual issue? Well, we don’t have to guess. We know the answer, because Jesus answered this question. In fact, he answered it twice. Jesus says that every moral rule and every […]
Jesus teaches the disciples (and us) how the leadership we so often see in the world is different from how leadership works in his kingdom.
What is the gospel? The short answer is good news. Originally, this word simply meant good news of any sort. However, when the New Testament talks about the gospel, it is referring to good news of a very specific sort.
In one of his final moments with his disciples before ascending back into heaven, Jesus passed onto them his most important mission. It is a mission that has been handed to the church, and each generation of believer down through the ages receives the same commission from Jesus.