Hope Christian Fellowship

On this day, we celebrate the triumphant entry of Jesus into the city of Jerusalem amidst cries of worship and honor. In that moment, it seems clear to all who watch (even Jesus’ enemies) that He can take over as King. Yet only a few days later, Jesus dies on a cross. What is the point of this episode in Jesus’ life and what did His disciples learn from it? It turned out that God’s work at that ti...

We all have those seasons where it feels like the harder you try to get ahead, the more you fall behind. You try to be more careful about your money and as soon as you begin seeing some extra in your account, an emergency hits that drains you again.  New Year was a time to set new goals on healthy eating, but at just the wrong moment, you have to go to a party and you wind up eating what you shoul...

Everyone wants to be liked, right? Disapproval and exclusion are powerful tools to pressure people to conform or fit in. Some people will do almost anything to gain the approval of others. It is such a universal reality in our world that many people get trapped in living for ‘likes’ or for the opinions of others. But we follow Jesus.  And on the night He was betrayed, He had some words for His dis...

How many times do we hear about the darkness of this world? Christians are presented with more and more opportunities to shine a light in the darkness, but how do we handle circumstances that are unfair or even painful? This week we will take a look at how the Apostle Paul endured being incarcerated for doing the work of the Lord.

Some people are really good with plants. Others are really bad with them. Whichever one you are, you understand the simple illustration Jesus gives His disciples about living in a way that changes the world. The spiritual reality is quite complex. It is hard to walk in what Jesus is instructing. But the picture He gives is simple, easy to understand, and gives us helpful insight so that we can kno...

Have you ever taken a minute to think about what it must be like to live in peace? Not for a minute or an hour, but as a normal mode of life – what would a life of peace feel like? Maybe it seems unrealistic because the only way we could figure out to live like that is to be superhuman (which none of us are) or to find some way to calm everything down around us. But Jesus tells His disciples that...

Nobody likes to need help. We’d rather be the ones giving help than receiving it. But life has a way of putting us in the position of need more often than we’d like to admit. Can needing help be more than just an inconvenient truth? Can it be part of changing the world? Jesus seemed to think so as He talks to His disciples at the Last Supper. He gives the disciples a few promises that seemed stran...

People have all kinds of ideas about God. Some think He is a distant old man sitting on a throne paying little attention to what happens in our world. Others imagine him to be an angry person ready to zap people who do the wrong thing. Still others pretend that He is a soft and warm guy who never gets upset and waves away any idea of right and wrong. All of these ideas (and more) existed when Jesu...

Is it possible to live in such a troubled world with an untroubled heart? We hope so… we want it to be true…  but most of us either don’t know how to get there or don’t believe that we can. At the Last Supper, Jesus has some very interesting words for His disciples that leads to one of the most famous statements He makes. How does Jesus being the Way, the Truth, and the Life connect to having hear...

Today, almost everyone agrees that love is one of the highest values that exist in human experience. The devotion of a parent to their child, the affection of a husband for his wife, the enduring connection of a friend – these are just some of the many examples in the real world of how precious we hold love. But love did not have such an elevated status when Jesus walked the earth. In fact, as he...

Betrayal is a wound in the soul that feels like it changes everything. You don’t know who you can trust or if you will ever be able to put your faith in someone again. All of your thoughts bend toward how you didn’t see it coming or didn’t believe what you saw.  Regret can spill into those thoughts as well and start to disable you from even trusting yourself. But in this story, we are presented wi...

Does this world need help? Perhaps it needs even more than that. Jesus’ world certainly did. Just before He died, He spent one last night with His disciples around a dinner table and talked to them about what He knew they needed to know. The result of that conversation eventually changed the world. When you think about it, those last words before Jesus suffered and died have more significance and...

A New Year. This moment is regularly used to evaluate what we need to change and how we need to hold onto what is valuable while letting go of what is empty. As a church, we’re going to begin the year by observing Communion together and by asking ourselves what kind of church Jesus wants us to be. What should be our focus as Christians and as a church family for this New Year? This morning we’re g...

If you could invite lonely and needy people to your Christmas table, would you? Of course, that’s a difficult question. We don’t know who is lonely unless they tell us (and we believe them). The same thing goes for those in need. But it’s likely that our hearts would WANT to include as many as possible if we truly believed we could help meet their needs. Christmas is good news because God’s heart...

This morning, we’ll take some time to keep talking about why Christmas is good news. Jesus’ arrival tells us that God is relational. That means He wants and seeks personal relationships with people. How does the birth of Jesus tell us that?  We’re going to look at Jesus’ words at the Last Supper to see what He says about why He came and who He’s connected to. Then we’ll see that it’s also the reas...

Here we are in December and it is time to celebrate Christmas! In the coming weeks, we’re going to look at why Christmas is good news for everyone. And today we start by talking about the way Christmas relates to one of the big questions of history and of our lives: Is there a God? Jesus’ arrival settled that question for all time. There is indeed a God of the Universe, all-powerful and glorious....

Have you ever looked back at some pictures of yourself from years ago and wondered what you were thinking?  You may even remember that you thought you really looked good. But now, with fresh eyes and a good deal of distance from that moment, you have a very different opinion of your appearance. For this last church in Revelation, Jesus tells the church at Laodicea that what they think of themselve...

With our state banning plastic bags, you may have found yourself in this situation over the past few months.  Since we’re so used to having grocery bags to carry all of our purchases, sometimes we forget that we’re not getting them anymore. That leads to an awkward attempt to carry as many loose groceries as possible into the house, which creates another problem… opening the door!  With no hands l...

Today, we hear a lot of talk about being ‘Woke’. That one word has been used as either a challenge or a derogatory label for people. Depending on what you think are the best answers for our country, you can think that being called ‘woke’ is a compliment or a curse. But long before it became a code word for some social or political ideology, Jesus came with a message to the church in Sardis, tellin...

If you have children, have they ever continually resisted advice you give them, but then when someone else gives them that same advice, they enthusiastically embrace it? This is one of many challenges in raising kids! Parents are pretty alert to the voices who have influence in their children’s lives.  That’s because they know that the choices their kids make are greatly impacted by who they liste...

These days, it is probably hard to imagine getting lost while driving to some new location. We use technology that tells us each turn to make and when to make it. We even get to see a map with a symbol showing us where we are and how we’re moving. But before smart phones, it was pretty easy to get lost if you were on the road.  Consulting a map could help, but it wasn’t always a guarantee that you...

We’ve come a long way from the days of traveling with a map that unfolds, which has made it harder and harder to get lost.  The hopeless feeling of being lost is one that is much harder to come by due to the abundance of GPS apps.  By looking at a popular parable given to us by Jesus, The Prodigal Son, we will explore God’s desire to draw all people unto Himself and the response we give as a resul...

When you kicked off this year, you may have made some resolutions.  They probably didn’t include any aspiration to suffer. We just don’t like the hardship or pain, and we look to escape as quickly as possible.  But Jesus talks to the church at Smyrna and tells them that He sees their suffering.  He goes on to tell them that they will suffer more and in greater measure. But instead of apologizing f...

Sometimes as you’re doing things online, you come across one of those videos where a service member who has been overseas surprises their family by coming home and showing up unexpectedly. If you’re given to emotion (and even if you are not), you can’t help but be overwhelmed with how much it means to the family to be reunited. When you love someone, you want to be near them. Plenty of people toda...

Sometimes when you’re watching a movie or a TV show, you see and actor and kind of recognize him or her, but you can’t quite remember where you’ve seen them before. In our world today, we whip out our phones and look up their name and their career so that we can connect the dots. It’s good to get an answer to the question “Who is that?” even if it’s for something as trivial as just not having to k...