St. Mark Houston

Jealousy vs. Kindness - Matt Popovits by St. Mark Houston

Anger is the giant we have all wrestled with since the first time we lost a game of Candyland. This week in our Giant Slayer series, we look at why anger is such a convincing liar, constantly telling us that whatever we feel and however we want to act on it is right and good. Most of us fall into one of three patterns: we burn, we boil, or we burst. But James reminds us that the anger of man does...

There is a giant lurking in the lives of many deeply blessed people, and most of us never see it coming. Spiritual apathy does not announce itself. It just quietly settles in until the external routines are still there but the inner fire is completely gone. We kick off our Giant Slayer series by looking at Jesus’s jarring words to the church at Laodicea, a wealthy, comfortable people whose faith h...

What fear is holding you back from the thing you know God is calling you to do? Not the fear of snakes or public speaking, but the fear that keeps you from saying yes to the obedience right in front of you. This week we sit with one of the most repeated commands in all of scripture, “fear not,” and discover that Jesus isn’t giving an unhelpful order. He’s making three promises packed into a single...

Healthy relationships require four things, and none of them are easy: honesty, repentance, forgiveness, and grace. We close out our Ties That Bind series by looking at what it actually means to walk in truth with the people closest to you, not just saying the hard thing, but saying it in love, because truth without love is just harshness, and love without truth is just sentimentality. We dig into...

What if the most powerful thing you could do for your spouse is not fix them, but offer them mercy when they least deserve it? This week in Ties That Bind, we explore one of the most countercultural ideas in scripture: marriage is not primarily about personal fulfillment but about mutual spiritual growth. God designed marriage to expose us, to strip away the carefully managed version of ourselves...

We live in a subscription culture where canceling is easy, but marriage was never designed to work that way. This week in our Ties That Bind series, we dig into what sets marriage apart from every other human relationship: it is not a contract but a covenant. Drawing from Mark 10 and Genesis 2, we explore what it means for God to join two people together as one and why that union was never meant t...

We all walk into our most important relationships carrying a giant box of expectations, and inside that box is something more vulnerable than a wish list. It is our wounds, our fears, and the things that make us feel less than. This week we kick off a new series called Ties That Bind by looking honestly at what we bring into marriage and why it so often leads us to idolize our spouse and then demo...

What does the blessed life actually look like? A recent survey found that most people point to careers, friendships, and experiences, but Psalm 1 offers a very different answer. The psalmist describes blessing not as a list of achievements but as a way of being: deeply rooted, perpetually fruitful, and unshakable even when everything around you is falling apart. The path there starts with two thin...

When faith gets complicated, which it always does, where do we turn? This week we dig into one of scripture's most beloved and surprising stories: the prophet Elijah and a desperate widow on the edge of starvation in enemy territory. God sends his own prophet 100 miles from home into Baal's backyard, feeds him through unclean ravens, and then asks a widow with nothing left to give away her last me...

We close out the Powering Down series with the fruit that grows when we actually stop: love. Not love as another obligation to add to an already impossible list, but love as the natural result of resting in Jesus and being filled by him. We dig into John 15, Galatians 5, and 1 Corinthians 13 to discover that the primary fruit of a life rooted in Christ is love, and that love has a very specific sh...

Life was supposed to slow down this summer. It didn't. And if we're honest, it never will, not on its own. This week we tackle one of the most countercultural ideas in all of scripture: Sabbath rest. But Jesus reframes the whole thing. Sabbath was never meant to be another burden to observe rightly. It was made for us, and Jesus, the Lord of the Sabbath, transforms it from a day we rest on into a...

Underneath all the busyness, the scrolling, the consuming, and the relentless doing is a hunger that most of us have never stopped long enough to name: a soul-level hunger for approval. It goes all the way back to Eden, where God looked at mankind and called us very good, and everything since has been humanity's attempt to get that back. This week we sit with one of Jesus's most scandalous parable...

Jesus offers one of the most countercultural invitations in all of scripture: come to Me, take My yoke, and I will give you rest. But what does that actually mean, and what does it look like on a Tuesday? This week we dig into Matthew 11:28-30 and discover that Jesus is not just offering a feeling of peace, but a whole reorientation of daily life, inviting us to let Him serve as our rabbi, setting...

Everyone is tired. Everyone is anxious. Everyone is distracted. And the instinct is to just power through, but this new series asks a different question: what if we powered down instead? We dig into the story of Mary and Martha in Luke 10, where Jesus gently confronts Martha not because she is doing bad things, but because she is drowning in good ones. The real problem, Jesus suggests, is not a ca...

We close out our Summer Shorts series with two of the Bible's shortest books, Second John and Third John, and they share one surprising theme: hospitality. John writes to a church navigating a world full of false teachers, people who denied that Jesus came in the flesh, and his message is both urgent and practical. Christians are called to be unreasonably inhospitable to lies and unreasonably hosp...

This week in Summer Shorts, we dig into the book of Jude, one of the Bible's shortest letters and one of its most urgent. Jude had planned to write about salvation, but something came up: false teachers had quietly slipped into the church, twisting God's grace into permission to live however they wanted. His message to the church then is just as relevant now. Contend for the faith, hold fast to th...

What are the greatest feuds of all time? From the Hatfields and McCoys to Hamilton and Burr, history is full of rivalries, but none with longer-lasting consequences than the feud between two brothers: Jacob and Esau. This week in Summer Shorts, we dig into the book of Obadiah, the shortest book in the Old Testament, written at the moment when Edom stood back and watched, even celebrated, as their...

This week in our Summer Shorts series, we dig into the entire book of Philemon, one of the shortest letters in the New Testament and one of the most personal. Paul writes from prison to his friend Philemon on behalf of Onesimus, a runaway slave, asking Philemon to receive him back not as property but as a beloved brother in Christ. Along the way, Paul models something remarkable: rather than pulli...

This week we kick off our new summer series, Summer Shorts, big truths from some of the Bible's smallest books, starting with the book of Titus. Paul's letter to Titus covers a lot of ground fast: what it looks like to lead a church with integrity, why sound doctrine matters and must be defended, and how older believers are called to pour into younger generations in real, relational ways. We also...

What does it really mean to be a good dad? In this Father's Day message, we look at Exodus 34, where God reveals his own heart as a father: merciful, patient, steadfast, and forgiving, and explore what it looks like to reflect those qualities in our families. We dig into what it means to have a tender heart toward those in our care, to protect our families from our own anger, to pursue our loved o...

What happens when the very place meant to bring healing becomes the source of pain? In this final message of The Tough Stuff series, we explore one of the most uncomfortable topics in the church: church hurt. Drawing from Ezekiel 34 and the Gospel of John, Vicar Alex unpacks the image of the shepherd and what it reveals about leadership, accountability, and the danger of entitlement in the pews. T...

What do you do with the mistakes you can't take back? In this sermon, we get honest about one of the most universal human experiences: regret. But scripture doesn't shy away from this topic. In fact, one of the most surprising verses in the entire Bible reveals that even God himself is described as experiencing regret over creating humanity. Rather than explaining that away with a comfortable inte...

What should you look for in a spouse, and what happens when you and your spouse don't share the same faith? In this message, we tackle one of the most tender topics in relationships: navigating a mixed-faith marriage. Drawing from 1 Corinthians 7, we explore what God's Word says about staying committed, finding peace, and understanding that your marriage, even an imperfect one, is valued and seen...

Have you ever been angry at God and didn't know what to do with it? In this message, Pastor Ben Griffin tackles one of the most honest but overlooked emotions in the Christian life: anger toward God. Drawing from Psalm 22 and Ephesians 4:26, we explore what the Bible actually says about anger, why unmet expectations and life's hardships drive us to frustration, and how God invites us, not to suppr...