Longwood and HSC Chi Alpha: Recent Episodes
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We are a group of dedicated followers of Jesus located at the colleges of Longwood University and Hampden-Sydney College. Stay up to date and catch our weekly sermons here!
This week we continued our sermon series on Abiding. Pastor Jenny looked at the book of Nehemiah and showed how he remained faithful to God and his people amongst hard times.
Points
Pay Attention to the Pull
Push through the Pause
Let God use the Pause to Purify your Purpose
This week Chris talked about how every Christian is called to take part in God's mission. God doesn't just call certain people to become missionaries, but Chris shows us in the Bible how God has called every Christian to live on mission and to go, give, welcome, and pray. Prior to joining Chi Alpha, Chris and his wife Kelly had spent 2 years serving as missionaries overseas.
This week at Chi Alpha, we had the privilege of having Pastor Alvin, who is the lead pastor at Fireplace Church, and your former Chi Alpha director back for a visit to speak. He gave us a powerful message and teaching about not living a life of compromise. He takes us through 2 uncommon passages, Revelation 2 and Numbers 22-24, and teaches us on the importance of not compromising our life or beliefs when the rest of society encourages it. He teaches us how those passages are related to one another and what we can learn from them today. This was a great word that you don't want to miss out on!
This week at Chi Alpha Pastor Jenny gives us a powerful message on winning the battles within in our mind. She discusses how to overcome thoughts that have been placed in us by other people or the enemy, and combatting those lies with truth (the Bible). Overcoming this will transform our lives and enable us to fulfill all that God has for us.
Sermon Notes:
1.) Your mind is like a garden.
2.) Identify what is not healthy by knowing the Truth.
3.) Uproot or cut the lies.
4.) Plant good thoughts.
This week was a little bit different, we got to recap all that God did on our mission trips we took over spring break. You will get to hear from a variety of students about what God did in them over these trips, and testimonies of how they saw God move. We sent students to WV, where they did a tour of three different Chi Alpha's and they got to serve and learn from them. They also got to help design and build a stage and wall in the sanctuary of a church that was burnt down. We also sent a group to DC to serve a ministry known as Urban Outreach, which serves and ministers to homeless people. The third trip was to Orlando Florida to work with a ministry known as CFAN (Christ for All Nations) and speak and lead small groups for a school.
We are so thankful to have gotten to take trips and watch our students grow. We look forward to doing mission trips again soon and hope you decide to say yes and come with us! God has so much that he wants to do!
The last sermon from our relationship series, Amanda shares about how you can trust that God is still good through your singleness. She shares from personal stories and from the promises of God that ensure we can still have a joyful, fulfilled life lacking nothing while we are single.
As we continued our relationship series, we got to hear from Pastor Bill McIntosh of New Life Church and Pastor Jenny, his wife and our director. We hear about their story and how God brought them together, and the power of spending time pursuing the Lord who heartedly. They played out a great example of what a Godly marriage looks like, and give pointers for us in this season of our life.
-Sermon Points-
1.) Die to your old self & old ways
2.) Always tell the truth in love.
3.) Learn new ways from other’s Godly healthy relationships.
4.) Depend on God’s love for your spouse. Your love is not enough to keep a marriage strong. He is stronger than any storm.
5.) Give grace & forgiveness EVERY DAY.
6.) Live in gratitude or you will grow discontent.
7.) Live in gratitude or you will grow discontent.
8.) Center your lives on Christ and stay plugged in a healthy church.
As we continued our relationship series Tuesday at Chi Alpha, Ricky and Ciera Epperly shared their story with us. Included in their story was some practical advice in our search for or handling of our relationships as we try to keep them Godly. We also touch on overcoming our desires and being made new and transformed by God.
Have you ever walked through something difficult in life and wondered, "Why God, Why me?" Tonight Amanda shares some deeply personal stories about different hardships she's walked through. She teaches us not just how we should tolerate these tough times, but actually be thankful that you had to walk through them because it was those moments that can make you who you are and strong in Christ.
Do you have a problem trusting in God? Pastor Jenny discusses how the more we know God, the more we will come to trust him. You never trust someone you don't know, but your friends you know well you trust. It is the same way with God! When we get to know him more and have a deep relationship with him, we will trust him more because we will get to know his goodness.