Central Community Church | Sermon Audio

Psalm 22:1-24 On the cross Jesus cries out to God, ‘Why have you forsaken me?’  This cry is one of the most painful from the cross and shows us a picture of what it looked like for Jesus to bear our sins.  Good Friday is a day of sorrow and salvation mixed together. 

What’s your approach or reaction when someone drives passing you on the right going over the cyclist’s lane and racing down the road? Or how about when walking down the park you notice a dog doing its business and the owner doesn’t pick it up after his dog? What do you say? How do you react? What are your thoughts? Most of us become outraged when people do things we find offensiv...

Matthew 7:1-6 Scripture does not tell us to not judge, but rather to exercise godly, gracious judgement carefully, with the right heart, motives, and method. Making sober judgements, beginning with self-judgement, contributes to a healthy, thriving church body and prepares us for God’s judgement.

Matthew 7:1-6 Matthew 7:1 is quite possibly one of the most quoted but misused verses in the bible. It is often used to defend the actions we seek approval of, but that was not Jesus’ intent when he said, “Judge not, that you be not judged”. What we see in our passage this morning is biblical grounds for healthy judgment that is beneficial for the church. It must begin with self-...

Matthew 7:1-6 Perhaps one of the most well-known phrases in the Bible is “Judge not,” and for good reason.  Jesus told us not to judge and one of the biggest reasons why people leave the church is because they have felt judged.  As Christians, we are called to inspect our own lives before we speak to others, and humbly receive correction from others.

Jesus' words stand in stark contrast to our culture of accumulation. As we gather more stuff, more money, more status, more security, more anxiety, more stress and, more sleepless, nights he gently invites us to come and change our perspective and pursue something that brings ultimate peace. 

Matthew 6:25-34 In an unstable and broken world, anxiety seems to be an inevitable reality. And yet, Jesus offers his followers hope and shows them they need not worry. In this sermon we’ll discover the reason for anxiety, how it’s overcome, and our new found freedoms.

Matthew 6:25-34 “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?" 

Matthew 6:25-34 In a world with so many challenges, how do prevent ourselves from experiencing anxiety for today and our future?

Money is a practical part of life. Some of us have less and some of us have more. The question Jesus invites us to ask is whether money has us.

Matthew6:19-24 Jesus said that where my treasure is, there my heart is. Will money master me, or will God? When God is my Master … when He is the treasure of my heart … I will love Him more and I will love others more, storing up treasure in heaven as a result.

Matthew 6:19-24 Money dominates so much of our life. Many of us spend most of our waking hours working to receive a paycheck. As a commodity, money is necessary for almost any and every transaction. But it’s easy to allow our need for money to become the all consuming focus of our lives. In Matthew 6:19-24 Jesus warns his followers against becoming prisoners of money, since no one focused on...

Matthew 6:19-24 Jesus calls his disciples to a single-minded devotion to God, but not without giving them a reason to do so.  Jesus has told his disciples again and again that there is a reward waiting for them, and so challenges them not to follow after other masters but serve the one whose reward never fails.   

Jesus warned his followers about treating their faith like an actor in front of an audience. Spiritual practices like Fasting are not a show that we perform for others so they think well of us. Fasting is about relationship, not law. It’s about formation not performance.

Matthew 6:16-18 Fasting is a spiritual discipline that unfortunately, is disregarded by most Christians today. Nevertheless, Jesus expects his followers to fast and even teaches that those who fast will be rewarded. As we await the return of Christ, might we demonstrate our hunger for Christ through willing participation in this powerful discipline.

Matthew 6:16-18 Jesus assumed that His followers would fast. He modelled it, and the Bible has a lot to say about it! Yet this difficult, but very rewarding aspect (just like giving & prayer!) of the Christian faith, which yields so much fruit in the life of the Jesus-follower and in the Kingdom of God when done with the right motives, is largely neglected. It’s time that we experience a...

Matthew 6:16-18 What is fasting and why would we do it?  Jesus expects that his disciples will fast when he leaves, but why does he want us to do that?  More than just a physical discipline, fasting is a spiritual discipline that brings us closer to our Heavenly Father. 

The Bible is primarily God speaking to us and prayer is primarily us talking to God. Jesus teaches us to approach the God of the universe and call him our heavenly Father. What a privilege! And yet we can still find prayer to be a challenge. This sermon on The Lord’s Prayer is an invitation for renewal; to accept the invitation of our heavenly Father and commune with Him through prayer.

Matthew 6:5-15 From an outside perspective prayer can seem like a pointless practice of speaking meaningless words into thin air. Yet Jesus’ teaching on prayer reveals that we have a loving heavenly Father who cares deeply about his children and who longs for us to come to Him with humble, genuine hearts.

Matthew 6:5-15 What is prayer?  Is it a ritual that we perform?  Is it a desperate pleading into the wind?  Is it just another form of meditation?  Jesus gives his disciples an instructional on how to pray by speaking to the God of the universe as our Father, on the basis of our sins being forgiven by Jesus Christ, with the help of the Holy Spirit. 

Jesus calls His disciples to live in such a way that shines bright for Him and His Kingdom in a dark world. That includes doing certain things and not doing certain things. What Jesus gets at in this text is that it is possible to even do the right Christian things but with wrong motives. As always, Jesus looks at the heart, including in how and why we give.

Jesus calls us to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect. Perfect in our action, and in our heart; but this is only possible when we are perfected in God. In this passage Jesus sets a much higher standard for His followers: To go against the grain of the “Me First”  life that is practiced and promoted by the world. But…this high standard should always drive us to the...

Matthew 5:38-48 Loving your enemies doesn’t make any sense.  Why would you love someone who is trying to hurt you?  Yet that is exactly what Jesus did for us and out his love we can those who haven’t deserved it either. 

Matthew 5:38-48 Jesus continues to call us to Kingdom standards, not cultural standards. In an “eye for an eye” or a karma based society, where people wish evil on those that have wronged them because they “deserve” it, Jesus actually calls us to love those that have wronged us. It may feel counterintuitive, but when we love those who have wronged us and love our enemies, w...

Matthew 5:38-48 Something deep down inside of us loves it when our opponents suffer. We love it when our adversaries get what’s coming to them. And if we’re honest, we love being the ones to give it to them. In Matthew 5:38-48 Jesus presents a completely counterintuitive teaching. As we seek to love like God, we are called to show even our enemies undeserved love.