Church in the Valley - Ontario Ranch Campus

One of the major mental blocks to getting into the Bible is the myth that it is difficult to understand and must be interpreted by “experts”. It’s the privilege of Christ followers to get into the word of God and hear God speak directly to them.

Nobody would know the truth about God or be able to relate to Him in a personal way if He didn’t choose to make Himself known. The Bible is the record of God’s self-disclosure – through it we come to know God and can learn His ways. This means we should make it a priority to get into it and understand it.

In a culture, streams of thought develop and define what the people in that culture consider normal. People are pulled by this current of thought to adopt the perspectives and values of the society at large. We must learn to respond wisely to the "informal" settings in which the mainstream flows.

There is an ongoing conversation in our culture (and every culture – both formally and informally) about what lifestyles and practices are acceptable and normal. Defining normal is important because the collective understanding of right & wrong/good & bad has a powerful impact on the way the people in that culture live

Are you feeling alone? Are you frightened by what you see? Can’t see? Did you know that God is everywhere at once. His omnipresence doesn’t mean that He is spread so thin that He has lost His grip on being God, He’s not spread thin. In fact, all of Him is fully present in all the world, certainly in our lives.

Many times the future and the unknown are aspects of life which cause much concern and fear. However, if God knows everything and is never surprised by anything, how can this help us as we approach the unknown? We can face the future with confidence because God will guide us out of His unlimited knowledge.

Our loving God is one of unlimited and great power and we can see God’s power in creation but God also wants us to experience His power in a personal way

God’s perfect and constant love brings a comfort and security that can only be found in Him, and knowing this truth can release us to really love and experience love even when people let us down.

God grows our faith in trouble as we decide we will cooperate with Him in the midst of the hardship. When we do cooperate with Him, God Directs and Corrects us which greatly strengthens our faith is the midst of trouble.

Opportunities to serve provide key ways for our faith to be stretched as we move out of our comfort zone to meet the needs of others.

Doing what the Bible says is a sure way for faith to grow. When we’re challenged with teaching that calls us to action, our faith is stretched as we determine whether we are going to take following Jesus serious enough to actually do what He says.

This message will look at how to grow in faith by earnestly seeking Him and committing to the essential ingredients that grow our faith.

I can do all things through Christ who gives me the strength. Can that be true? Yes. You learn this through experience. When you set your mind to do God’s will and then God gives you both the power and resources to do it.

God says the man who does the will of God will live forever. Can that be true? Jesus’ resurrection is evidence of the reality of this statement. There is plenty of evidence that the world is passing away. Since this is true, we should set our minds to understand and do the will of God.

Grace is bigger than all of our sin, regardless of what we’ve done, how far we’ve strayed, grace is greater!

Grace is not reserved for good people, but for the most unlikely and undeserving.

In the New Testament, grace is personified in Jesus, but it didn’t begin with Jesus. Stories of grace are seen throughout the Bible, beginning with creation and the first man and woman.

Helpful principles and strategies with our finances can only take us so far. We need to keep our heart in check since our heart drives what we do, which means having the right perspective and values as we manage God’s resources so we make choices that please Him

The way we ultimately honor God with our finances is through giving. Jesus Himself reminds us that giving leads to a more blessed life. Giving is a way of taking the focus off the money we make and putting it back where it belongs, with an open hand, for God to take and use since we cannot take anything with us.

As a manager—we need to determine the areas in our finances that we need to manage more closely in order to please God and leverage the resources God has given us. We all need God’s wisdom to do this effectively.

Our view of money is greatly determined by whether we see ourselves as money managers or money owners. This message will look at how our perspective of money greatly determines its power over us.

One of the major strategies of our enemy, Satan, is to create a feeling of isolation and alone. Often, if we feel like we are the only ones who are doing the right thing or concerned about doing right then we lose heart and we stop trying to make progress.

When something in life seems unfair, our native reflex is often to grumble, complain and blame others (family, friends or authority) or “life” itself for stalling our progress. The only thing you can control in a given scenario is your response to the circumstances.

When circumstances create a situation where we need to do something we don’t want to do – we’re tempted to shrink back and stubbornly refuse to do what’s necessary to work through the problem and make progress toward our goal. When this happens, those who depend on us to come through pay a price for our selfishness.

*When we think “I’m too tired” to handle my responsibilities, we relax our grip and by doing so we miss opportunities and leave weak spots in our stewardships that hinder progress and create damage. In these moments, we must learn to tap into the strength that God will provide to accomplish His will. ***Due to a technical difficulty the first minute of this recording is missing. We apologize for t...