Foothills Church (Audio)

God after establishing his love for Israel transitions the debate from that about Love to that of Theology. Throughout the rest of Chapter 1 and the first 9 verses of chapter 2 we see God and Israel debate theology. Before we engage in this debate over theology it is important for us to have an understanding of what I mean when I state theology. Formally, the study of theology is defined as a set...

Have you ever found yourself debating with God? Questioning him? I know many of you have lost loved ones, even recently. Often times the grieving process is made up of us questioning God looking for answers. Some of you are currently going through rough times as I speak, you have just been diagnosed with cancer, or are jobless after years and years of applying for different positions. Have you eve...

Today we look at our third conversation with God, when Jesus talks with Simon Peter on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. Unlike the previous conversations where Jesus spoke with strangers, this scene has some important back-story that we need to look at first. As we look back at the life of Peter, I hope communicate to you that we don't have to be superhuman to be disciples of Christ. Peter was on...

Today we want to look at John 4 and eavesdrop on a conversation between Jesus and a woman as they sit by a well in the middle of Samaria. So, open your bibles to John 4. If you don't have a bible, feel free to grab one from the below the chair near you, put your name in it and make it your own. Bring it with you each week because it's your handbook for knowing and walking with God.

Today we begin a three-week series we're calling: Conversations with Christ. We are going to be looking at three extended conversations Jesus has with three different individuals that I believe each of us we will see ourselves in. Today we're going to listen in on Jesus conversation with Nicodemus. Spiritual darkness keeps people from seeing how to get to heaven. John 3:1-2 Nick comes at night. Ma...

Over the past 6 months or so, as our staff has been praying through the prayer requests that have come in from Sundays, we have been moved by the myriad of requests for all sorts of healing-mental, emotional, spiritual and physical. In addition, I have had a number of conversations with folks around our church who have carrying God sized burdens where they desperately need God to work a miracle, b...

King David, Israel's greatest king wrote, "Unless the Lord builds the house its builders labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain" (Ps. 127:1). As it goes for the home, so it goes for the country. Some of you will naturally want to make this a political sermon, and you will listen to it with the bias of your own personal political views. Instead of tha...

Now today, I want us to close off our time in this letter by going back to it's opening and a prayer that Paul prays for these Colossian believers. I thought exploring this prayer would be a meaningful way to wrap this series up together because it has become a prayer that I pray for myself, for our staff and ministry leaders and at times, I have found it fitting for opportunities for private pray...

We've been saying that just as caterpillars have the DNA of butterflies long before they can fly, so to Christians have godly DNA and the Spirit empowers a growth in them so that they can mature into who they are in Christ. Practically this means that people who know you but haven't seen you in awhile when they run into you, they will notice that you are different than when they were around you be...

Welcome to our 2014 Annual meeting and celebration. Before we take care of the more formal and legal matters as a church together, I want to briefly share with you what God laid on my heart for us this morning, as we stop and take stock in what God has brought us through this past year and what he seems to be leading us to this next year. If you have your Bibles with you turn to Mark 8. Leading up...

Today we take another step in our series that I'm calling "Christ-Centered Freedom." So far we have been breaking down Christ-centered freedom into some smaller components. We are to use our freedom in Christ to keep at the change process because God's energy is zealously and actively re-creating us-at work in us to change our will and affect our actions in order to fulfill His good purposes. As P...

Last week Brian reminded us that just as the caterpillar has all of the DNA inside it to be a fully developed butterfly, so it is with us. "God has given us the DNA of complete and full godliness." In Christ we have been given the gift of his righteousness, nothing we do can make us more righteous or cause God to love us any more. This morning we get to look at the process of putting on the new se...

And now in our text for this week, Paul begins to describe for us how caterpillars can fly, so to speak. He is asking us take this freedom mindset and see the new opportunities it presents to us and begin to live them out. That's why I'm calling this message freedom's new opportunity. Today Paul begins to get real specific about how those who now have this Christ-centered freedom he's been talking...

Today our Colossians text Paul is speaking to our mindset...our outlook....our perspective!!! Paul is fundamentally arguing for a change of mindset for these new believers. He's basically saying, " Christian...you have to start thinking about yourselves differently." He's trying to open their minds to their new reality "of being complete in Christ." Their old ways of thinking about how to find fav...

Today, we are continuing on in a series that we started on Easter titled "Christ Centered Freedom." In this series we are breaking down Paul's letter to the new Christian Church in the City of Colossae. As we discussed last week the city of Colossae was a lot like that of the United States. It consisted of a melting pot of worldviews and religions. The church was surrounded by a bunch of Greek cul...

Whether it is your wedding day, the birth of a child, or those times when you just look up at the stars; when was the last time you where amazed by someone or something? Do you remember that feeling? OK... so now when was the last time you were just completely amazed by Christ? Not amazed by what he has done for you but amazed by just simply WHO he is? I'm not talking about oh yeah Jesus is cool.....

Athletes often use the need for redemption from some past failures, mistakes or poor performances to motivate themselves to train and prepare. For example, teams who blow large leads and lose to a team they are favored over try to come back the next week and redeem themselves. They try to perform better to make up for their failures earlier. In instances like these, it seems that athletes, teams,...

Today I want to wrap up our "From Garden to Glory" series by talking about the Big Idea of the entire Bible! Though we have seen that the Bible is written over the course of two centuries, by thirty-seven authors, in sixty-six books, and though it doesn't always read chronologically and isn't always easily understood, there is an overall unifying theme that reveals it's ultimate author's purpose a...

Welcome to Session #9 of our 10-part series I'm calling From Garden to Glory: Getting and Overview and Grasping the Big Idea of the Bible. We've been stepping through the Nine main eras of the Older Testament and these last few weeks we have stepped through the first two eras of the New Testament called the Gospel era and Church era. Today we're spending some time in the final era-the missions era...

Last week in our Bible overview we stepped into the New Testament and began to look at the Gospel era. In the chart on your note section today, we covered that first column called the Gospel era. Today, we take another step into the history of the NT in order to get an understanding of the beginnings of the church in the next column called the "Church era."

From the time of Malachi more than 400 years pass before the storyline of God is picked up again in the times of the New Testament. These 400 years have come to be referred to as the Silent Years or the time between the Testaments. It seems best to understand "silent" to mean that while God still moved among his faithful, inspiring and leading them, he didn't inspire anyone to write additional wri...

Welcome back to week 6 of our series: From Garden to Glory where we are trying to get a broad overview and high level perspective of the Bible. Though we are not unpacking specific verses we have been able to identify major themes and broad sweeping life lessons from this high level pass over the Bible. On your sermon note page today I placed the chart that I presented to you week one. Take a look...

Today we will be traveling the final leg of our journey over the peaks of Israel's history recorded in the Older Testament. From our flight plan chart I handed out a few weeks ago, here is the specific plan for this leg of the journey. Just like last week I don't want us to get distracted by the events...rather I want us to reflect on how the themes of this sweeping history apply to our lives.

From the very moment Adam and Eve rebelled against God's boundaries in the Garden of Eden, God's primary focus is on a plan of redemption. God desires a people through whom he can work to produce a reflection of himself, and through whom he can spread the message of his redemptive plan through the world. The redemptive strategy all starts on the River Euphrates, in a town called Ur. One day a man...

This week I want us to press the pause button on the map and zoom in a bit closer to take a look at Genesis 1-11. As we saw last week in our chart of the Nine Eras of Israel's History there are four major movements in these opening eleven chapters of Genesis: Creation, Fall, Flood, Tower of Babel (Nations). Open to Genesis one. And let's get a glimpse of the general sequence.