Christmas can arrive wrapped in lights and joy while grief, loss, and the sense that this world is deeply broken remain close at hand. The Gospel of Mark opens with “the beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ,” echoing creation itself and pressing an Advent question beneath all the decorations: What kind of beginning can Jesus bring to lives that do not feel whole?
Rules, hypocrisy, conflict—those are the words people most often reach for when they describe the church, and if we’re honest, we’ve sometimes given them reason to. Galatians 5 doesn’t flinch from that indictment; it sets the works of the flesh against a vision of the church so different, so beautiful, that it could only come from one source.
Jim Wolfe traces God’s redemptive plan through four Old Testament “roadside attractions” that foreshadow Christ R12; skins, boxes, baskets, and snakes. Along that scenic route, we arrive at the true meaning of Christmas, an attraction we actually need.
Most of us hear “You shall not make for yourself a carved image” and assume the second commandment is aimed for some folks worshipping a metal statue long ago. But the same human frailty that raised the golden calf still reaches for something visible, manageable, and reassuring. What have we begun to trust, protect, or worship in place of the God who rescued us?
Solomon, Rehoboam, and Jeroboam all treated God’s promises like something they could improve on or control on their own terms only to encounter the pavement courtesy of the black ice of sin. Our efforts end like that, but God’s faithfulness outlasts our failures.
How you respond to Jesus depends entirely on whether you’ve truly grasped who He is—and in John 6, as Jesus walks across the sea to His disciples in the dark, He makes that question impossible to dodge.
They tell you to sit down before they speak. When Nehemiah heard the remnant lived in affliction and reproach, the wall of Jerusalem broken down and the gates burned with fire, the strength of his legs gave out. He wept, mourned many days, fasted, and prayed—knocked down by the news, God’s work still before him. Nehemiah 1 presses a question every overwhelmed heart knows: what do you do when the need is undeniable and your strength is gone?
What is required to be a Christian? We believe that trusting in Jesus for salvation, confessing him to be your Lord and Savior, is the necessary step for being a Christian. At the same time, there is much more the Bible has to say that it is important for Christians to know and to grow in the truth of and what follows gives you an understanding of how we understand different key Biblical teachings at Little Hills.
Pastor Tim continues our series from Psalm 1, looking at what it means to be a “tree planted by streams of water.” It tells us more about God’s care than we might think at first!
Pastor Tim takes us to the Epistle of 2 John tonight to think about how God’s commands, Truth and Love come together in our lives.