Gulf Coast Community Church Podcast – St. Petersburg

For quite some time, we have been hit with a barrage of unsettling news reports of the uncertainties with Israel, Gaza, Hamas and various warring factions.  The interpretation of these events seem to abound including numerous conversations surrounding Jesus’ second coming. In looking for more complete understanding of these troubling events, we can seem to get fixated on the signs of His return an...

Transitions and trials are some of the hardest times of life. How do we, as followers of Jesus, have hopeful endurance through such seemingly relentless difficulties and unknowns? By pursuing patience. Patience, which is a fruit of the Spirit, is something that is formed in us by God as He molds and shapes us to become more like Jesus. When we express patience, rooted in the love of God, we show o...

Imagine you were in Bethlehem at the time of Christ’s birth. Maybe you were one of Joseph’s relatives that had also traveled to Bethlehem, or maybe one of the small number of residents. What did Christ’s coming impact you? In an immediate sense, it disturbed you. Whether you were ignorant of the events, a relative of Joseph and Mary’s, or Joseph or Mary, your life was upended. It is true that Jesu...

The book of Proverbs personifies wisdom as a noble woman and folly as a seductive woman (Prov. 9, 31). The book of Revelation is also about two women: a harlot and a bride. One represents the human city in all it’s luxurious grandeur (despite most its residents living in a box the size of a closet). The other, a bride who represents the New Jerusalem which is 1,400 miles square… plenty of room for...

Psychologist Barry Schwartz concludes his TED talk on the paradox of choice with the image of a fish in a fishbowl, and he asks: How free is that fish? Yes, of course the fish is confined, but shattering the fishbowl, removing all constraints, would not improve the fish’s situation. In fact, it would destroy him. The world and the rulers of this age rage against God and His righteous ways. The con...

Text: Acts 26:16-23

Revelation is a bloody book, to be sure. In fact, we are told in 14:19-20 that in the process of harvesting the earth, the blood flow will rise so high that it will spread the distance of 1,600 stadia (it doesn’t really matter what a stadia is… primarily that it is 1,600 of them), and up to the level of a horse’s bridle! That’s a lot of blood! Is this a declaration that the Lamb slain is now slayi...

In 1937, referring to the increasing tensions in Europe with Germany, Winston Churchill used near biblical language when he said, “Dictators ride to and fro upon tigers which they dare not dismount. And the tigers are getting hungry.” In our study of Revelation, this Sunday we arrive at the account of the Beasts out of the Sea and the Land. Who are these beasts? What is this meaning of 666? How do...

Lampstands, fire-breathing witnesses, a pregnant cosmic woman, and a water-spewing dragon. It’s no wonder Revelation isn’t the easiest book to understand. Yet, since it is God’s Word, we have to persist in it because it reveals something about how God is at work in the world that, though consistent with what is revealed elsewhere, presents its own unique facet. Revelation takes off the sheet from...

“Are you pre-trib(ulation), mid-trib, or post-trib?” or, more generously, “Are you premillennial, amillenial, or postmillennial?” The 1st question more or less assumes an answer to the 2nd. The latter question focuses on only one chapter in Revelation (20) and doesn’t say much of anything about how one reads the rest. They are largely unhelpful questions. A more helpful approach might be to ask, a...

Our text begins with the Lamb, looking as if he had been slain, opening the seals which will allow the scroll to be opened. It ends with the sealed people of God who suffered through the events of the seals standing on the side of the sea, before God’s throne, giving praise for their victory. What are these “seals” and how are God’s people “sealed”? Who are these four horsemen? What’s the meaning...

What is the purpose of the book of Revelation? If, as we discussed last week, it is not to provide a timeline for when Jesus is coming back, then what is it? To understand this, we need to think about what a suffering church needs. What would a church tempted into the idolatry of the empire need? What would a church following a suffering Lamb need in a world in which power and wealth hold sway? Th...

A couple of weeks ago I was wrestling with what our next sermon series should be at Gulf Coast Community Church. A thematic study of patience and the need for it as God’s strategy for mission and witness, or to finish our series in Revelation (recall that we left off last year after the 7 messages to the churches). Of course, the two themes aren’t unrelated. The events of last week made the decisi...

Text: 1 Corinthians 1:1-21

I thought we finished the series, Imagining the Kingdom, last week. However, I was encouraged by one of our members last week to consider covering these final verses on prayer (I won’t mention any names, Reggie). I immediately knew I would. In fact, prayer is essential for a genuine kingdom imagination, and it is essential to experiencing the culture of the Gospel of peace. There’s no wonder that...

One of the most well-known passages in the New Testament letters is that which calls us to “put on the full armor of God” (Eph. 6:10-18). One can even obtain plastic armor like that of a Roman soldier for their children to put on, though I’m pretty sure this does more to mask the text than help them understand it. Paul has been building a theme that climaxes here in this final chapter. As the adop...

During and following the 2016 presidential election, both sides claimed Russian interference in favor of their opponent’s campaign. It turns out, they were both right. In 2017 it was shown that both were correct (I dare not say “right”). In fact, it appears that the only goal the Russians have is to get our society to fight in order to tear itself apart. They may have succeeded. The church hasn’t...

“Ships do not sink because of water around them, ships sink because of water that gets into them,” said the Pracin Jain in The Times of India (I’m not kidding!) In a day when it is not uncommon to hear Christians in a panic because of immorality of the world around us, this is a good reminder. The church isn’t going to sink because our culture (or any culture where the church is) slides into a pit...

Irenaeus said, “The glory of God is a living human.” I believe this truth is central to the purpose of the Gospel. James K. A. Smith writes, “The gospel is the way we learn to be human…. To be human is to be for something, directed toward something, oriented toward something…. We are like existential sharks: we have to move to live. We are not just static containers for ideas; we are dynamic creat...

Text: 2nd Peter 1:3-11

After a 12-year relationship with Mia Farrow, Woody Allen (then 57) trying to explain his controversial relationship with his lover, Mia Farrow’s 19-20 year old adoptive daughter, said “The heart wants what it wants?” I’ve heard similar reasoning as a spouse explains why their new love relationship must be God’s will because it makes them happy. Referring to Allen’s explanation, Cornelius Planting...

How well do you walk? According to at least one fitness guru, “almost nobody is good at walking: not you, not me and not all the other people in the park….” This may seem odd considering most of us have been doing it since we were one, and that without much instruction. Do we really need to learn all over? Yes. At least I am pretty sure I need to learn how to walk physically like most, but I know...

Paul makes some audacious claims in his letter to the Ephesians. Not only has God, before the foundations of the world, chosen to adopt the Gentile Ephesians, but also Jews like Paul, in Jesus Christ, he has also made them one people. Despite their natural orientation toward rage and hostility toward one another, He has made peace between them through the cross of Christ. Is that enough? Is it jus...

I’d like to suggest that Paul’s goal in Ephesians 2, is for God’s newly adopted children to reimagine warfare, to reimagine the basis of our hostility. In His great mercy, God has rescued us out of our rage and disobedience, He has broken down the walls of hostility, and He has designed us to be his agents of good works—world transforming works. We do have an enemy, but we must rightly identify th...

Do you have a bucket list? What’s on yours? What’s important to have on it? Does it help you focus on what’s important? These days, everyone seems to have a bucket list, but as believers, do we have those things on it which Jesus said would be important? Last week I was prepared to give a short message around 1 of 4 parables Jesus gave concerning his return in Matthew’s Gospel. As it turned out, t...