Benediction Church, #HamOnt

Message Date: November 27th, 2022 Scripture: Luke 1:26-55 Speaker: Mike Mileski When we meet Miriam of Nazareth, she is a sweet, invisible, submissive girl. After her visit with the angel and her cousin, she is changed into a bold, outspoken, subversive, prophetic activist. Sometimes God sends us visitors to help us believe the things we find unbelievable, and Miriam is an example for us. She begi...

Message date: November 20th, 2022 Scripture: Amos 9:11-15 Speakers: Mike Mileski and Trevor Seath The book of Amos ends on a hopeful note, with promised restoration for God's people: He'll gather His people from the places to which they were scattered, and they will find a home. This beautiful news is happening before our eyes in cities across Canada, and we wanted to end our study of Amos by cele...

Message Date: November 13th, 2022 Scripture: Amos 8:1-12 Speaker: Mike Mileski As we approach the end of Amos, we've seen all kinds of evidence that they love things more than people. God's judgment is coming. In this message, we trace the rest of the story to see that even when it seemed like it was too late for God's people, it wasn't too late. A century ago, it seemed like Hamilton was a God-fo...

Message Date: November 6th, 2022 Scripture: Amos 7:10-17 Speaker: Mike Mileski This week, Amos comes face to face with a bully - Amaziah, priest of Bethel, an ancient Pope. He's a typical bully: he wants to control and conquer Amos, and he fights dirty with gossip, lies, and manipulation - the same things any of us will face if we're faithfully serving God in our city. These Scriptures offer insig...

Message Date: October 30th, 2022 Scripture: Amos 6:1-8 Speaker: Mike Mileski Amos turns his attention to the rich, powerful, elites of his day - those whose pride, greed, and indifference to the suffering of others insulated them and allowed them to live in comfort while the rest of the nation starved. Our city has its own problems with privilege - like comparing first- and third-world countries,...

Message date: October 23rd, 2022 Scripture: Amos 5:18-24 Speaker: Mike Mileski Doing justice in the city can feel impossible - the problems are so big, and the systems are so broken, we don't know where to start. We don't need lessons on what to do - we need inspiration to help us believe we can make a difference at some level. This week Amos offers a different way to think of justice - not someth...

Message Date: October 16th, 2022 Scripture: Amos 3:1-4:13 Speaker: Mike Mileski Is Hamilton being punished by God? Is that why things are the way they are here? For everyone who looks at Hamilton as the Ambitious City, there are twice as many people for whom Hamilton is a broken promise. Despite the city's high hopes, they lived and suffered through the decline of the steel mills, many face povert...

Message Date:  October 9th, 2022 Scripture: Amos 1:3-2:16 Speaker: Jordan Moss Unlike the gods of the nations who are too busy or self-absorbed to involve themselves in human affairs, the one true God sees and cares about what happens on the ground in the cities of the world. He sees the human trafficking, greed, corruption, exploitation, and oppression; He promises that every wrong will be m...

Message Date: Sunday October 2nd Scripture: Amos 1:1-2 Speaker: Mike Mileski Do you sometimes get angry over what you see happening in your city? Is anger okay? Is it justified? 
In the book of Amos God doesn’t tolerate evil - evils like exploitation of the poor, abuse of children and elderly, greed and corruption among the leaders, even human trafficking - some of the very same things happening i...

Message date: September 25, 2022 Speaker: Mike Mileski There is perhaps no other part of life where we so compare and compete with one another than in our work: some work is indispensable, some work is just a job, and some work is holy. The result is that all work is dishonoured, when it should be celebrated. Work is good; we were made for work, and in this message we learned some of the differenc...

Message date: September 18, 2022 Speaker: Mike Mileski Consumerism may be the most powerful force our culture has ever seen; it affects how we think, feel, and see the world. It teaches us there's never enough, and we must strive for more, and better. For Millennials, it's worse. It turns out that community is exactly what we need most, and until we commit to being in community with people who are...

Message date: September 11, 2022 Speaker: Mike Mileski In ENOUGH we're subverting the narratives of comparison, consumerism, and competition. We’re acknowledging that God has given us amazing gifts; three of them deserve special focus: God’s Word, God’s people, and God’s calling on our lives. In this first week we begin by reflecting on what a gift it is to be able to hear and read God’s own words...

Message Date: July 10th, 2022 Scripture: Matthew 12:24-30 Speaker: Paulo Caproni This world and the spirit world are not separate, but one. In this parable of the Divided Kingdom, Jesus teaches that His mission was a spiritual one: before He could free the prisoners, Jesus would first bind the strong man by the power of the Spirit. What difference does all this talk of spirits and strong men make...

Message Date: July 3rd, 2022 Scripture: Luke 16:1-15 Speaker: Mike Mileski We begin our series in Jesus’ parables here, with a study of the ancient “Wolf of Wall” street. There’s a lot of good we can learn from this bad example: What kind of managers will WE be of the wealth God has entrusted to us? Will be faithful, or greedy? Do we use money to show that it - or God - is our master? This parable...

Message Date: June 19, 2022 Scripture: Matthew 23:29-36 Jesus’ harshest words in all of Scripture are here, and they're for the Pharisees: religious leaders who know their Bibles, who believe they’ve learned the lessons of the past; they've deconstructed, yet they didn’t recognize God when they were face to face with Him.  Would we recognize Jesus if we met Him? Would we know His voice? Or, h...

Message Date:  June 12, 2022 Scripture: Matthew 23:27-28 It seems we’re flooded by stories of prominent pastors and church leaders who abused their power, exploited people, and disqualified themselves from ministry. Jesus called them “whitewashed tombs” and “wolves in sheep’s clothing” - in our day we might call them narcissists. All their effort to appear righteous, important, and busy is a...

Message Date: May 29, 2022 Scripture: Matthew 23:23-24 Do you know the difference between a gnat and a camel? Does your church?  In this week’s WOE, Jesus is upset because of the tiny problems the Pharisees can’t tolerate, and the major problems the Pharisees won’t bother with. They “strain out a gnat and swallow a camel”. They ignore the big problem, because of the tiny problem they find sho...

Message Date: May 22, 2022 Scripture: Matthew 23:16-22 The Pharisees were in charge of a religious system where you could to break your word and betray one another when it suited you, without any consequences. They offered “believers” a way to live how you want; a religion that makes almost no demands of you in terms of you beliefs, character, or behaviour. This is consumerism, and for the Pharise...

Message Date: May 15, 2022 Scripture: Matthew 23:15 Are you an evangelist? It’s ok, most of us aren’t either. Neither were the Pharisees, though they had lots of converts.  For people in the Church today who don’t see themselves as “evangelists” there’s good news, and in this messages we learn there’s a better way to introduce people to Jesus than the colonialism that many of us have come to...

Message date: 05/08/2022 Scripture: Matthew 23:13 In Jesus’ first ‘woe’ Jesus confronts the Pharisees who had become the self-appointed gatekeepers of the Kingdom of heaven in their culture. They turned people away, and failed to enter as well.  In the same way, the Church must stop saying, “no” to people to whom Jesus has already said “yes”. In this message we learned reasons to be glad our...

Message Date: May 1, 2022 Scripture: Matthew 23:1-12 What would Jesus say to the Church? In Matthew 23, Jesus goes off on a seven-part rebuke of the Pharisees, for their hypocrisy, their apathy, their vanity, and their sense of superiority. Yet that’s not how they started. If the Pharisees could lose their way, could we? If we’d become the Pharisees in our culture, would we know it? Would we want...

The situation between Russia and Ukraine is an opportunity for the Church to consider how we are tempted by, or fearful of, the power of the powerful. In this message we're reminded of what God promises to those who follow Jesus - that the same power that raised Him from the dead on Easter morning is, and will always be, at work in us. The Church need never fear Caesar (or Putin) nor should the Ch...

(Message date: April 10, 2022)  In this final study, we explore the end of Ruth's story, and reflect on how she should be remembered. Interestingly, Ruth isn’t included on most lists of the great heroes of the faith; but why not? She's every bit as faith-filled as Abraham, as driven as Moses, and as devoted as David. Not only has Ruth given us invaluable lessons on how to trust God during tim...

(Message date: April 3, 2022) The meeting at the Bethlehem gate (Ruth 4:1-12) is a scene that powerfully shows us the Gospel of Jesus. It’s a high-stakes negotiation that narrowly succeeds. Here, Boaz shows us — by contrast to the other guy: Chad — the sort of redeemer he is, and ultimately, the sort of Redeemer God is. Just as they weighed the costs and risks of redeeming Ruth and the land, God w...

Message Date: March 20, 2022 What we believe about God’s providence makes all the difference for how we face hard times. In this lesson in Ruth 2, after an eventful day on the farm for Ruth and Boaz, Naomi — who a chapter ago insisted on being called “Bitter” — now praises God for showing unexpected loving kindness. Is she right? Our answer really, really matters.