Calvary Baptist Church in Jasper, Florida

The prayer of the unashamed is personal, pretenseless, plain, and persistent and this often leads to pursuit.

While the rich young ruler may have been sincere, he was self-righteous, was not willing to sacrifice his wealth to follow Jesus, and he went away sorrowful.

As Christians, we should possess child-like qualities such as feebleness, sincere faith and a willingness to follow Jesus.

In today’s passage, we will learn about the “Who?”, “What?”, “Why?” and “When?” as it pertains to marriage and divorce.

In this passage, Jesus gives three serious warnings: to not lead others to sin, to deal with sin and to be salty.

In our passage today, we see a dire situation, a doubtful statement and a dominant Savior.

Just like our first responders, may we never forget the service, sacrifice and selflessness of our Lord Jesus Christ.

In our look at the Transfiguration, we have the permutation itself, the participants involved, the purpose in regard to the event and the problem inside the disciples’ hearts.*

Being a true disciple of Christ requires one to contradict, carry and chase. These things are very challenging so we must have strong conviction.

In response to a question, Jesus blesses Peter. In response to a statement, Jesus bashes Peter.

The Pharisees had bad intentions while the disciples were ignorant regarding Christ’s identity.

Followers of Christ should have a hunger for Him exemplified by pursuit, persistence and pleasure.

The religious leaders used tradition as a basis for their views on cleanliness but Jesus denounced the tradition and claimed that what comes from inside a person is what defiles them, not what comes from the outside.

People recognized the power of Jesus, reacted immediately, realized their desperateness and received renewal.

Recognizing Jesus in the storm requires us to trust His perception, presence and power.

In the miraculous feeding of the 5,000, we see Jesus’ compassion for the disciples and the crowd, a caring command to feed the people, a confounded response by the disciples, and the completion of the miracle.

In two miracles from our passage today, Jesus healed a woman who had hemorrhages for 12 years after she touched His robe and He resurrected a 12 year old girl after touching her hand.

In this passage, evil spirits beg Jesus, the people beg Jesus to leave and the healed man begged to stay with Jesus.

A parental pattern to pursue is one that consists of position, posture, petition, patience, perseverance, praise and provision.

May we never forget God’s greatness, our sinfulness and God’s provision.

Even though storms arise in our lives, God is still in control in spite of His perceived silence. God is all-powerful and we should, therefore, have faith in Him.

In our passage today, Jesus tells 3 stories: one about a lamp stand, one about growing seed and one about a mustard seed. We can learn something from each story.

Super moms are not forgotten, feed their children and have faith in God even while facing difficult times.

All Christians are to spread the Gospel and leave the results up to God because the listener’s hearts may be hard, shallow, divided but some will be good.

Without the resurrection of Christ, there are things we don’t have. But, because the tomb is empty, we have awesome treasures! The resurrection changes everything!