Greater Life Church

The Christmas story is full of wonderful and powerful messages. Bro. Hughes notes that it is unfortunate that the Christmas message is only talked about during the Christmas season. The Christmas story is full of what Bro. Hughes calls Stars of Hope. Mary’s entire life was forever transformed by a word from God. The bible is full of stories where a situation or a life was changed by a word from Go...

In the story from our scripture text in Mark, we see one of the most prolific displays of how evil can ruin a life. Many read this story and dismiss it as not applying to their life because they do not perceive their situation to be as dire as the man Jesus found when he got off the boat. Bro. Hughes points out that often in scripture an example is taken to the extreme to illustrate a point. The s...

Life confronts us with many complexities and dilemmas. Many times in life where we are called to face situations that are greater than we can face with the resources we have available to us. Often we are staggered when viewing the difference in what we have available to us and what we are called upon to do. Our text sets up such a situation. The multitude gathered that day numbered in excess of 10...

Our ability to see is often taken for granted. We do not usually wake each day and thank God for our sight. However if we were to lose the ability to see, it would greatly affect our life. In addition to being able to see, the ability to look ahead and see what is coming in life is vitally important. If we cannot see past the present moment, we run the risk of making miserable mistakes. What we ar...

Bro. Hughes gives us a history of the events in David’s life that led up to the 34th Psalm. David opens this Psalm with the most important decision he ever made in his life. No matter the situation, good or bad, he declares: “I will bless the Lord at all times.” This decision forever altered his life. He realized that he had been operating outside of the will of God and that he had taken matters i...

Jesus began His church with 12 disciples. One of them used bad language, one was a doubter, and one was a traitor. The others also had their failings. But using these twelve flawed men, Jesus started a church that has grown and flourished to what we know today. He continues to use flawed men in His work. God’s work with man is fraught with difficulties and setbacks. God’s progress with work in our...

It is amazing how often we can go to the bible and find in that book written so many years ago, the answers to the current problems we may be facing in life. There is something about the word of God that is timeless. It is timeless because God is not constrained by time. Bro. Hughes reminds us that our journey through life will not be without incidents and issues. It is inevitable that each of us...

So much in life does not work out as we have planned. Often what we looked for did not come to pass. No matter how crazy life is, it goes on. It doesn’t stop or wait for us to catch our breath. Many times our faith is tried by the facts of life. In our text, Martha notes that Jesus was not present when she needed him to save her brother. The family’s faith was tried by the delay of Jesus arriving...

Bro. Kilgore shares his experiences and his burden for God and encourages us to simply love the Lord. Being loving and friendly and living a life loving the Lord is the best ministry to a lost world.

The members of the first century church saw the hand of God in literally every aspect of their life. Bro. Hughes notes that this is a wonderful way to live. When we live life that way, it settles many of the small details that confront us every day. First century Christians focused on and talked about the hand of God in their life. By contrast, we tend to think and talk about the circumstances and...

Life can often be challenge. If we are not careful we can fall into that trap of simply surviving. We seem to spend all our time simply trying to make it through. For many Christians, living for God appears to be an up hill struggle that one must endure to make it through. Bro. Hughes laments that one of the difficult tasks a pastor has it to convince people that God truly wants us to have a bette...

Our scripture text really begins with Jesus teaching a multitude of people. This is the miracle of the loaves and fishes. After teaching the multitude, he fed them and sent them away. Bro. Custer observes that is how it is with some people. They come and experience God and go home. Some in the bible experienced him as part of the multitude and went home, but others sought more and desired for more...

God has chosen a great variety of people to accomplish his purpose. Some are of great spirituality and faith. Others are less than what we would expect of someone who would be used by God. Samson was such a man. There are many things about him that were questionable. His carnal desires and his choice of friends are among those. We read in the life of Sampson of great triumph, but also great failur...

We live in a success driven world. The bookstores are full of self-help books. We view people and form opinions of them based upon their success or failure in life. Our society places a great importance on success. Many people in our world are focused on survival. They are struggling to survive and success is a bonus. Many describe life as a pressure cooker. Pressure cookers work on a compounding...

We live in a time where people are engaged in selfish living. They are only concerned with what is best for them or their family. It is for this reason that people will cut in line, or will otherwise try to cheat or disregard the polite rules of society. We live in a selfish world. Bro. Hughes laments that sometimes that same attitude can manifest itself in the church. Some people only come to chu...

Daniel lived in a time when men were being pressured to bow to a different kind of religion. He felt the pressure to conform to the cultural customs and beliefs that were in contrast with the life of living for God. He found himself in a strained and hostile environment. He was taken into captivity and there was no support system of other Christians to rely upon. Many of God’s people changed their...

The scripture we are more than conquers does not end there, but we discover it is through Him that loved us. This is not to discredit anything we have become or have been in the past but simply remind us, the best is yet to come. What I can be has little to do with what I am or have been. Some of us have become teachers, doctors, and lawyers, shepherds and even conquerors but that is not the end....

In Peter we see a case study in spirituality. We see him at both extremes of uncountable faith and believer and also at a point of denying and cursing Christ. We see his boldness and his failure. In our text Peter recognizes Jesus in a troubling situation, but just after that recognition, he expresses doubt. How quickly he moved from “Lord bid me” to “Lord save me”. Faith and fear often times come...

It has been said that the tongue is mightier than the sword. We must be careful with our words. Often words form in our head and come out of our mouth. Sometimes we do not take the time to run these words through a filtering mechanism in that process. The bible commands us to control our mind and our thinking process. Imaginations and thoughts are to be in alignment with God’s thoughts. The mind i...

There are many recorded appearances of our Lord after the resurrection. Most happened on the day of the resurrection, but some happened days later. The purpose of these appurtenances was to confirm in the disciple’s minds that He had in fact risen. The appearance chronicled in this scripture was perhaps a week or more after the resurrection. In this case, he appears to seven of the disciples who w...

So often in life we blame others for what is missing or has gone wrong in our life. The truth is that our destiny is never in somebody else’s hand. Some people blame all their failures on the actions of others. In our text, Jesus is at the wedding in Cana of Galilee where there was not enough wine. The mother of Jesus tells the servants “Whatever He tells you to do, do it.” At this point, the serv...

The Cape of Good Hope is on the southern edge of the continent of Africa. It is a point of navigation that marks the transition between the Indian and the Atlantic Oceans. The first European to reach the cape was the Portuguese explorer Bartolomeu Dias in 1488, who named it the Cape of Storms due to the tumultuous and quickly changing weather. For many years the Cape had a reputation for being tre...

As children we acted out and played what life would be like. None of us could have imagined how life would turn out and what we would have to face. Life doesn’t play fair. Life doesn’t play by the rules. Life for everybody gets frazzled at times. The pressures and problems in life can wear us down. God knows all this. He is the creator and knows all that we will encounter in life. God came to eart...

In our scripture text, we see Jesus struggle with his flesh in the Garden of Gethsemane. He pleaded for the cup to pass from Him. Jesus emerges from Gethsemane having defeated his flesh and was ready to face the cross. He provides for us an example of perseverance. The bible describes the struggle as being so intense that Jesus sweat as great drops of blood. On His way to this struggle, our text t...

One of the great tragedies of our day is that we have more than we ever have had, but for the most part, people are unhappier than they have ever been. More is the motto of the day. He who has the most, wins is the mantra of our world. Yet even in this time of plenty, so many are not happy. Simply put, more is not the answer. This is nothing new. God placed man in the Garden of Eden and gave him c...