The Bridge Church Sermons

What wins in the face of division? What's the play we should call when it feels like it's an "us vs. them" game? In a culture that amplifies the loudest voices and the hottest takes, what if a win is gained by gentleness?  A few weeks back, Pastor Ian got to sit down with Scott Sauls, an incredibly gifted pastor and author who is passionate about a concept he calls "a gent...

There are times in your life where we would say pain is in our life. Other times, it feels like pain is more than that—that pain defines our life.  Naomi was a case of the latter, to the point that she described herself as "empty". When faced with all kinds of hardship and hopelessness, in times where our lives seem empty and defined by our pain, what do we do? Where do we find strength?...

A man humbles himself to bus tables for widows and ends up changing the world. How? Stephen was a man we know very little about, except for the end of his life. Confronted with death, he spoke truth and grace. From his story we see, as the Holy Spirit moves, we are filled with courage and compassion to communicate our convictions; allowing for grace, power, wisdom, and faith to grow in our lives. ...

Who are your heroes?  It's unlikely that anyone would name someone like Rahab—an unmarried woman living in enemy territory, working as a prostitute to simply survive on her own.  Yet it's Rahab whose desperation was so deep that when push came to shove, she committed treason to follow God—giving her a place forever as a model of faith (Hebrews 11).  It might just be that desperation for...

A few months back, as the war in Ukraine began, we got connected through some Bridge Missions partners to a pastor and evangelist named Karen and his family, who are incredible examples of what it looks like to live on mission.  The work he and his team has been doing in Ukraine and Europe over the last few years, but especially since the war began, is powerful and deeply moving. Pastor Ian had a...

When is the last time you've been fearful? Doubtful? Have you ever felt "half-in" with your faith, or maybe questioned where God was in the middle of a battle?  Gideon's story, in a nutshell, is this: 300 men defeat an army of 135 thousand, led by a man who begins the story by hiding in a hole—fearful and doubtful. God's plan rarely will make sense on paper, but He gives u...

Jesus often surprised people with His teachings. "Lose your life to save it." "The first will be last." "Pray for your enemies." But maybe the most shocking assertion Jesus ever made was John 14:6: "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." Yes, it's an exclusive claim... but also the most inclusive invitati...

Suffering is inevitable. It's in Scripture time and time again—people crying out to God in lament and anger, praying for pain and grief to be taken away, even wishing for death. But where our world has a way of brushing over suffering with bumper sticker phrases about strength and purpose for pain, God gives us so much more. He doesn't ask us to hide our suffering and mask it with joy—no...

Let’s call it like it is—miracles are one of the hardest things to comprehend. Some of us aren’t even sure… do they really exist? Were they things of the early church but not things of today? To know if miracles are real begins with understanding what miracles are in the first place.  And all miracles point to something much greater than our own desires and happiness—they point to the greatest mir...

Have you ever wondered what the relationship between science and faith looks like? You aren’t alone in asking these questions. Join us in "Curious" as we continue to dive into the hard questions and seek to understand the relationship between faith & science.  Science can define the how; only faith can define the why. Science is a gift from God when it is not treated as God. Support...

Can we trust the Bible?  For centuries, the Bible has transcended all economic, ethnic and geographical boundaries to bring transformation. But it has also led to questions. Confusion. Sometimes doubt or anger, even.  To know if the Bible can be trusted, we have to look at what—or better yet, Who—it all points to. It truly has the power to bring us to Jesus, and He can be trusted.  What's the...

2,000 years ago, the cross of Jesus was the end of the road… or so many thought. All the hope the disciples and other followers put into Jesus actually being the sent Messiah and Son of God turned to despair when they saw Him hung on a cross and laid in a dark tomb. Without a resurrection, there was no purpose to their faith. There was no hope left—only grief. But a stone rolled away. A tomb was e...

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The question is not, “Am I building my life?” We're all building a life. The real question is, what are we building it on? There are a lot of sandy foundations for our faith—If your life is built on—greed, competition, materialism, appearance, popularity, travel, you fill in your own blank. Here's the truth of the matter: houses built on sandy foundations eventually crumble in the storm....

One of the greatest deceptions we can fall into is thinking that because we are used by God, we actually belong to Him. It’s possible to do work for God without having spent time with God, and the fruit we bear will show the reality of where our roots really are.  Jesus addresses this important warning in the Sermon on the Mount, but we can’t only think of it as a warning. It’s also an invitation—...

Love is so much more than a feeling—it's an action. Kindness is possible even when affection is not. The way of Christ often involves treating others in a way we feel like they don't deserve.  Would you say you have a natural strength to do this? There is no question that it's uneasy. Unnatural, even. Jesus knew that, and yet He taught us to live radically different lives anyways. ...

Worry is a pandemic of the human heart. As much as we wish it was easy to simply stop worrying, it often feels impossible. Is that where you are now?  We have to depend on God wholeheartedly, if we have any hope to overcome our own anxiety. We have to seek Him first, trust Him and His love that promises to provide.  Where is the root of our worry, and how do we actually go about killing it?  Suppo...

Pride is more of a virtue in our culture than humility. What is glorified in the world are self-accomplishments, and we thrive on showing the world our best sides and hiding the rest.  Unfortunately, this makes its way even into our faith, and even when we're following the way of Jesus, the motive is all wrong. We're all guilty of it because we long to be noticed for the good we do.  The...

"Love your enemies." Some of the most applauded words in history, and also some of the most evaded. Following the way of Jesus never promises to be easy, but this command sometimes seems especially hard, don't you think? What did Jesus really mean by it? And how do we become people who live it out rather than run from it? It's an especially important question to ask in the day...

Sin discussions are hard. Let’s just call it like it is. Matthew 5 can be one of the difficult sections of Scripture to read because it addresses the hard truths of sin, and Jesus has some instruction for us that doesn’t feel easy or convenient. But Jesus was never out to teach the easy way—He taught the Kingdom way. And the Kingdom way looks beyond the surface and beyond simply behavior modificat...

Culture is not unchangeable. Hearts are not immovable. But it doesn't happen on accident. The world can experience the transformative power of Jesus when Christians move from merely existing in the world to engaging in culture. It is the privilege and responsibility we have as children of God to bring the love of Christ into the dark places of our culture and our cities.  The world is not loo...

Each of us could come up with our own definition of a "blessed life." When you think of what your life would look like as "blessed," what do you think of first? Money? Status? Family? Charisma?  The way Jesus talks about being blessed is so counter to what we feel or even believe. Even though we might know with our heads what Jesus says about blessings, our hearts have to grapp...

The people who Jesus calls "blessed" in the Sermon on the Mount may surprise us. It's the poor in spirit. The mourning and the meek. Those who long for righteousness. Our culture defines blessedness in a lot of ways, but Jesus came to define His kingdom, which is upside down from everything we know of this world.  So, who is really blessed?  Support the show

The people who Jesus calls "blessed" in the Sermon on the Mount may surprise us. It's the poor in spirit. The mourning and the meek. Those who long for righteousness. Our culture defines blessedness in a lot of ways, but Jesus came to define His kingdom, which is upside down from everything we know of this world.  So, who is really blessed?  Support the show

In Matthew 28, Jesus gives a mission to all His followers—then and now—for how to live in the world, called The Great Commission. Do you know what that mission is? In 2017, a research group called Barna asked that question to churchgoers, and the results were startling: 82% of churchgoers responded that they either didn't know or were unsure in their knowledge of The Great Commission. If we a...