True Life Church: Recent Episodes
True Life Church
This is the Sermon Audio Podcast for True Life Church Located in Jefferson City TN. Come join us each Sunday at 8, 9:30, and 11am.
We impact the world through multiplication. We train the next generation, equip pastors and missionaries, and plant churches in the United States and the world.
Naturally we go through life, living and then learning from our mistakes. God through His Gospel is pleading with us to learn from Him and truly live by walking in His truth.
Genuine biblical Christianity always has been and always will be counter-cultural. This was true in 1st century Ephesus and is true in 21st century America. The issue of sex is one of the issues where this is most clearly demonstrated.
"We have lived in darkness for so long that now we are afraid of the light.” Thankfully, we do not have to stay in the darkness because Jesus, the Light of the world, came to change us from darkness to light.
We crave love and know that we should love others, but we often fail to love. Why is this the case and how can it change?
Words are very powerful. Proverbs 18:21 says, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruit.”
The renewal of the believer's mind is only possible when we believe and live out what Jesus has done for us. That is, we believe and live out the Gospel in our everyday lives.
When the body of Christ is functioning by people being properly equipped and operating in their gifts, three gospel outcomes exist: We step up and serve one another, we stand up in truth, and we grow up into Christlikeness.
We live out what Jesus expects of us by living out of what Jesus has done for us.” This statement will serve as our guide as we study the rest of the book.
Avery Willis writes, “By mission, I mean the total redemptive purpose of God to establish his kingdom. Missions, on the other hand, is the activity of God’s people, the church, to proclaim and to demonstrate the kingdom of God to the world. The word mission comes from the Latin word mittere meaning to send. God is both the sender and the sent (in Christ). The church is sent by God on mission and cooperates with God to send missionaries.”
We live out what Jesus expects of us by living out of what Jesus has done for us. 1. We see the gospel as the means of our salvation AND spiritual growth. [not just the diving board but the pool also]2. We live a new life out of a new heart. 3. We realize that the Christian life is not behavior modification but total life transformation into Christlikeness. 4. We keep our focus on Jesus and what He has done for us.
We come to a turning point in the book where Paul begins to focus on how we live out what Jesus has done for us. This is the practical application section. It is time to ask the so what question? So what do I do with this? So what does this mean to my life? So how do I live this out?
Today we come to the end of the first half of Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus as we finish up the doctrinal section of the letter.
Paul began a prayer in verse 1 when he said, “For this reason.” He then digressed to write about the revelation of the mystery that Jews and Gentiles have been reconciled into one united body in Christ.
What is the mystery of the gospel, what does it mean to us, and what do we do with it? We see that the plan of God unites people in the Son of God to proclaim the mystery of God and display the wisdom of God for the glory of God!
We saw a couple of weeks ago that to be in the church is to be a citizen of God’s Kingdom. The image we are looking at today in Ephesians 2:19 is that we are “members of the household of God.” “Household” is a word that refers to a family. So, we don’t go to church, but we are the church. To be the church is to be part of God’s family.
We are going to temporarily skip ahead into the family section of Ephesians on Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. The first three chapters of Ephesians are doctrinal, and the last three chapters are focused on applying the truths taught in the first three chapters
We tend as Americans to sometimes struggle with church because we are individualistic, consumeristic, and spoiled. We don’t just go to church, but we are the church. So, what does it mean to be the church?
We long for peace and unity but live in a world that is full of strife and division. There is racial division, gender division, division in families, division over religion, political/idealogical division, and many other types of divisions.
Everything this world has to offer will ultimately leave us empty. Only Jesus will truly fill us up. People often ruin their lives trying to fill them with all the wrong things. How many stories have you heard of people who seemingly had it all ending their own lives? Stop looking for satisfaction in the wrong places.
Are we saved by works? Are we saved by faith plus works? Are we saved by faith without works? Are we saved by faith that produces works? These are common and important questions in religious circles. It is vital that we are correct about how we actually are forgiven of our sins, have a relationship with God, and goto heaven so these are not just theoretical questions.
What is the ultimate purpose of salvation according to the Bible? I think there is some confusion regarding the answer to this question, and people get the answer wrong sometimes. Even more commonly, people give an answer that is part of salvation but not necessarily the ultimate purpose of salvation. So what is the ultimate purpose?
Are people born good in a moral sense? Or are we some kind of blank slate molded by the environment around us? Or is Christian theology actually correct when it asserts that we have a sin nature that leads us to commit sinful acts?
Acts 6:7a says, “Then the word of God spread and the number of disciples multiplied greatly...” One of our core values at True Life says, “We impact the world through multiplication.” I have said before that healthy churches multiply disciples, leaders, small groups, and other churches. However, we need the multiplying power of Jesus in order for this to happen. How do we experience the multiplying power of Jesus?
As we begin a new year, it is important for us to be clear about where we are headed as a church so we can be on the same page and collectively use our gifts to do what God has called us to do. In light of that, I want to answer three important questions in this message. What are we doing? Why are we doing it? Where do I fit in?
As we are concluding the "This Is Us" series today, I think it is appropriate for us to summarize the big ideas we have talked about and also be reminded of our power source for living out these truths. Our power source is the Holy Spirit.
This sermon sets the stage for talking about the topic of the Kingdom of God. Here's some verses relating to that: Psalms 103:19, 1 Chronicles 29:10-11, and Matthew 6:10, 33.
How do we deal with sin in our lives and the lives of others? How do we handle sin in the church? How should Christians relate to non-Christians?
Here are our final two core values. They go together in some ways and this message builds off a previous message.
It is vital to understanding this chapter to understand the audience that Jesus was addressing. There are really two audiences, the tax collectors and sinners is one, and the scribes and Pharisees are the other.
The word, "boast," means to glorify, exult, or brag. This text gives us two contrasting options for what we boast in. We can either boast in ourselves and our religious deeds or we can boast in Christ crucified.
As we continue with the, “This Is Us,” series, we are going to start going through our core values (although not necessarily in order) because they express who we are. Our third core value states, “We reject moralism and embrace grace: We proclaim Jesus and His gospel of grace alone (the New Covenant) as the only means of salvation and spiritual growth and refuse to go back to religious legalism and moralism (the Old Covenant).
What does it mean to train the next generation, to prepare them to be fully devoted followers of Christ? Follow along as we explain what this means.
Jesus describes danger, persecution, betrayal, hatred, and even murder as distinct possibilities for us to experience, and large numbers of Christians do experience this kind of suffering. We are in a war, and there are no participation trophies.
In Matthew 10:1-4, Matthew records Jesus calling the 12 disciples (of course, one of them was a false disciple) to Himself, empowering them, and sending them out.
https://www.elegantthemes.com/blog/divi-resources/5-cool-things-you-can-do-in-divi-with-anchor-links#open-accordion-item-with-anchor-link
Lost people matter to God so the church is here to be the missionary to the community and the world.
Think about where Naomi and Ruth were at the beginning of the book of Ruth. Ruth was a Moabite idol worshipper. Naomi was following her husband to Moab to escape a famine. However, when they did this and their sons married Moabite women (one of them being Ruth), they were getting out of the will of God.
Jesus is our Kinsman-Redeemer who became one of us in order to redeem us so that we can enter into union with Him and receive the inexhaustible riches of His grace.
Today we’re going to see the characteristics of this family that is used by God to prepare the way of the king! This whole beautiful story is built on integrity and trust.
All of us are looking for love. However, we are often confused about the true nature of love. Today, we are going to learn from God's Word; based on the examples of Naomi, Ruth, and Boaz; what love really is.
Have you ever wondered, “If God’s in control, then am I essentially a puppet or robot?” Maybe you’ve thought that God created everything, set the wheels in motion, but has now stepped back to let us do what we choose. Maybe you have an entirely different idea of how our choices mesh with God’s plan. We see in the Book of Ruth, specifically chapter 2 in this sermon, that God’s in control, but we have a role.
Acts 3:19 says, “Repent therefore and be converted that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord.” Ruth’s story, her conversion, is a beautiful example of this. How did she, and we, turn to God?
Job said, “Man who is born of woman is of few days and full of trouble” (Job 14:1). Life is full of problems. Even the best things in life include problems along with them. It’s not a question of if we are going to have problems but what problems and how are we going to handle them.
Have you ever experienced someone twisting your words, taking something you said out of context, only sharing part of what you said, or adding to what you said?
By making the Bible a part of my life, I mean getting God’s Word into my mind and heart, and then getting it into my life by surrendering my will and obediently putting it into practice.
2 Timothy 3:16 says that “all Scripture is given by inspiration of God.” It literally says that “every Scripture is God- breathed” (see also 2 Peter 1:20-21) as opposed to inspiring. Scripture did not come from us, but it came to us perfectly from God.
What makes the Bible unique among books, particularly other religious books? How do we know that it is true and other religious books are false? How do we know that it is really the Word of God?
In one sense, the Bible is 66 books written by about 40 different authors over a thousand year plus period of time. Yet, in another sense, it is one book with one author and one overarching story.
God is faithfully connecting the dots of our lives in order to use us to make a difference in the world. How can we make a difference?
2 Timothy 2:13 says, “If we are faithless, He remains faithful. He cannot deny Himself.” A famous preacher from the past, Samuel Rutherford, wrote, “Often and often, I have in my folly torn up my copy of God’s covenant with me; but, blessed be His name, He keeps it in heaven safe, and He stands by it always.”
Life can seem really random sometimes, but God is working out His sovereign will through free moral agents. The book of Esther pictures divine sovereignty and human responsibility perfectly intertwined together.
Prayer begins and ends with the glory and Kingdom of our God! Prayer is not about manipulating God to do our will, but it’s about transforming our will to do His will and bring Him glory! Strategic prayer begins with a relationship with the Living God and surrender to His will and plan to reach the lost with His Gospel and bring them into relationship with Himself!
Does God want us to pray about our own needs? If so, how and what do we pray? We will see this week in Matthew 6:11-13 that God instructs us to ASK HIM specifically for provision, pardon and protection.
Kent Hughes has written, “The Lord’s model prayer is an outline of the elements that an ideal prayer should contain. Its simple structure is very specific. It begins with the foundational awareness that God is our ’Dearest Father’ with whom we have the intimacy of a father-daughter or father-son relationship.
We are planning to study the Lord's Prayer over the course of the next three weeks. This is Jesus teaching His disciples hot to pray. It is our pattern for prayer. Jesus sets this up by teaching us how not to pray. He tells us not pray like hypocrites by praying to impress other people. (v. 5-6). He then tell us not pray by using vin repetitions and thinking we will be heard because of voicing a lot of words (v. 7-8).
Posture can be defined as “the position in which someone holds their body when standing or sitting.” That is primarily how we think of posture. However, another meaning of the word is “an approach or attitude.” I want to focus on posture in relation to prayer in the message today, and I am not referring to posture in an outward, physical sense.
Are you ready to communicate with the God of the universe? Sound intimidating? Well, that is what we are actually invited to do through prayer. How is your prayer life? So, how do we actually pray? What are some practical guidelines for praying effectively? Our text suggests four to us.
Why is the birth of Jesus such good news? The birth of Jesus is good news because it is historically factual. It is not fake news, but it really happened. The birth of Jesus is good news because it is spiritually transforming. This is such good news because a Savior had come. The Messiah was here. God had come into the world.
There was another unusual birth that was a part of the Christmas story, the birth of John (often known as John the Baptist), who was related to Jesus through their mothers. His birth was a miracle because his parents were past childbearing age (it was a confirming sign for Mary regarding the virgin birth), because he was filled with the Holy Spirit from the womb (v. 15), and because he was appointed to be the forerunner of the Messiah.
We usually want to announce good news, and we do it in a variety of ways. Sometimes we tell people in person, sometimes we call or text them, sometimes we use social media to announce things, and sometimes we even have parties to make an announcement.
For more information, check out our Small Groups page: https://thetruelifechurch.com/connect/small-groups/
What kind of person has God created and saved me to be? The answer is found in Romans 8:29, which says, “For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.”
Anxiety is a common problem. Everyone worries about something at least from time to time. Some people have extreme problems with anxiety and/or fear. Anxiety is rampant in our society and over the world. Behind worry is fear. Behind fear is a lack of trust.
It’s time for us to stop making excuses and choose to make progress in our lives. Excuses enslave us, but we can by set free from them. In this text, I want to show us three choices we can make that will enable us to make progress and 3 reasons why we should make these choices.
Vance Havner, a famous preacher from the previous century, talked about how in our Christian experience and really just in life that there are mountaintop days, ordinary days, and dark days. All of us deal with this.
Our identity is who we really are. In reality, our identity comes from God, and we are who He has made us to be and who He says we are. We are made in His image and are His highest creation.
This is not a popular message. It’s not an easy message. This is the kind of message that would make some people mad! Some may not think this is for them, because they have so much pride!
So far in this series, we have seen that Jesus sets us free through His finished work on the cross as we trust Him. Today we are going to see that in order to experience and live in the freedom that Jesus purchased for us that we must know and do the truth.
Did you know that religion is a bondage? It is because it promises salvation but cannot deliver. I define religion as our attempts to earn favor with God by our own efforts and/ or goodness instead of through Jesus and His finished work on the cross.
In order to have a relationship with God, we have to stop trusting in our own efforts to keep the law and/or doing things to make ourselves right with God, and trust Jesus alone for our salvation (Romans 10:4-13).
We are looking at a story from the Old Testament, but it is a picture of the cross and the freedom that we have through what Jesus did on the cross so we are going to make the New Testament applications of the story.
Romans 15:4 says, “For whatever things were written before were written for our learning, that we through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope.”
I believe that in every situation, including trials, God is working for our good and His glory and Satan is working to destroy us. God tests us in order to build us up while Satan tempts us in order to eat us up.
Every marriage will be a trial at times. We don’t realize it before we get married, but this is inevitable.
Perspective is very powerful. In fact, how well we make it through trials is partially determined by how we view those trials.
In verse 8 of this passage, the Apostle Paul said that he was “burdened beyond measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life.” Have you ever felt this way?
I think that if we are honest we have to admit the way that Jesus works in our lives does not always make sense to us. We sometimes spend time wondering what He is up to. At times, this can really challenge our faith.
Chuck Swindoll writes, “Much of life’s music is played in the minor key. Hurts, headaches, pain, problems, disappointments, sickness, suffering, disease, and death pile upon us and won’t go away. This creates within us questions regarding God’s justice and life’s purpose.
We often wrestle with the issue of why we experience so much suffering in our lives. In the previous message in this series, we looked at this question in a general sense as it pertains to the world at large.
A young man who seemingly had everything going for him came to Jesus one day and asked him a very important question. He said, “Good teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?” Jesus invited this young man to follow Him, but the young man walked away sorrowful. Jesus also calls us to follow Him today, but we have a choice as well. Are you following Jesus?
This sounds like a theoretical topic, but it ends up being very real and personal. The title of the message is one of the most commonly asked philosophical/religious questions.
Most people would agree that we live in a troubled world. Our country, and really the whole world, is still feeling the aftershocks of 9/11 and the continuing war on terrorism.