God had been leading Israel every step of the way—parting the Red Sea, dropping food from the sky, guiding them with a pillar of fire at night—and still, when twelve spies came back from the promised land, ten of them said it couldn’t be done, and the crowd went with them. Numbers 13 and 14 ask a question we face too: when the majority says no, does that settle it?
We fall into measuring our place with God by how much Scripture we know or how “spiritual” we sound. Paul tells us the real measure is somewhere else: “the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation.” What changes when we remember that the Christian journey began by hearing what God has done not what we do?
We’re good at looking pure—saying the right things, following the right rules, putting on the kind of life that earns approving nods—and that’s precisely the trap Jesus names in Matthew 5:8 when he calls the pure in heart blessed, not the pure in appearance.
There’s a blind man sitting by the road outside Jericho in Luke 18, and the crowd wants him to be quiet—he’s an embarrassment, a distraction from something more important. He cries out anyway: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.” Whatever it is that makes you feel like the person everyone else wants to go away, this passage is for you.
Christmas has a way of feeling like a destination—the carols, the decorations, the nativity—as though the manger is where everything finally arrives. John 1 won’t let it stay there: the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and the question John presses is what exactly that birth was launching toward and what it means for us now.
God is with us — that’s what we celebrate at Christmastime! As we enter into this season, we are going to take time to look at how His Spirit led men and women that first Christmas, and leads us now, that we can rejoice in His love.
God is with us — that’s what we celebrate at Christmastime! As we enter into this season, we are going to take time to look at how His Spirit led men and women that first Christmas, and leads us now, that we can rejoice in His love.
God is with us — that’s what we celebrate at Christmastime! As we enter into this season, we are going to take time to look at the real, genuine gift of Christmas in contrast to the far less satisfying things that distract us from that beautiful gift.
Pastor Tim continues our series, Steadfast, looking at Psalm 46:1-7, where we learn of God’s heavenly city He invites us into. What do we do when it feels like God’s dwelling place is far away? We look to His promises that come from His steadfast love.
Satan tempted Jesus, yet He did not fall to those temptations. Tonight we consider our temptation to seek shortcuts in faithfulness.