King's Cross Utah

How can you ensure your life has meaning and purpose--that you won't look back with regret on how you spent your time? To celebrate the one year anniversary of King's Cross Church, we will spend the next few weeks hearing encouraging messages from the pastors of some of our partner churches. In part one of this series, Pastor JR Vassar of Church at the Cross in Grapevine, TX teaches us how to give...

We've all been there...that pile of laundry is calling our name, but we turn on Netflix instead. Or maybe that paper needs to be written, but suddenly the dirty dishes can't wait another minute. Perhaps we know we should get out our Bible, but we find ourselves wasting time on our phones.  These attempts to avoid hard things are actually an indicator of disproportionate love of self--a misguided a...

Bigger and better...that's what we strive for, likely more often than we even realize it. In today's society, we're constantly on a mission to acquire more. More clothes and shoes, a bigger house, nicer cars, larger paychecks, and the list goes on. This miguided pursuit of security is also known as greed--an excessive desire to acquire and keep. Listen to this teaching from Luke 12:13-21 to discov...

What makes you angry? Is all anger sin?  Anger is a complex emotion that we can control for good, or that can control us for evil. At the center of this misguided pursuit of justice is a desire to satisfy our own preferences, which is a problem when our preferences don't align with God's. Listen to this teaching to learn more about righteous anger vs. unrighteous anger, and how you can be free fro...

Have you ever heard the phrase, "Too much of a good thing is a bad thing?" Sometimes our desire to experience joy or satisfaction ends up hurting us more than helping us. Gluttony–the misguided pursuit of pleasure–leads us to overconsume food, media, substances, and more. But the temporary joy these things might bring us eventually becomes despair. In this teaching, we learn about how gluttony tur...

"Envy is feeling bitter when others have it better." ~Rebecca DeYoung What do you think you need to be happy? So often in life we find ourselves thinking that if only we had that other person's house, family, friends, job, bank account, etc., we'd be content. Afterall, it's just not fair that someone else has it better than we do, right? This misguided pursuit of contentment, also known as envy, c...

Where do you seek out intimacy, attention, and affection? Our desire for connection can often lead us down a path on which we are focused on our own self-gratification and pleasure, even at the expense of others. This teaching on lust, the next of the seven deadly sins we are studying, examines the misguided pursuit of love and looks at how we can experience the relationships with God and others t...

Every single one of us longs to hear "you are good" declared over our lives. If we seek to have this longing fulfilled through others or by our own achievements, these misguided pursuits of glory only leave us feeling empty and isolated. During this series of the 7 Deadly Sins, we are examining misguided pursuits to happiness and discovering way to find joy in the real thing instead of the counter...

We all want to matter and be a part of something that matters; this is typically why we set New Years goals and resolutions. But we all know deep down that the satisfaction we get from these things is temporary, and that even the things themselves will fade away and ultimately amount to nothing. So what can we pursue that will have lasting meaning? We come and go, churches come and go, but the kin...

"What should I pray about? Am I saying the right things?" "Do I pray often enough? Long enough?" "Why should I pray if God already knows what he's going to do?" Do any of these questions sound familiar? Prayer can feel intimidating and overwhelming to many of us, but the Bible tells us that we should have confidence in engaging in conversation with God. Listen to this teaching to learn more about...

What do you picture when you think of heaven? If images of puffy clouds and flying babies playing harps come to mind, you're not alone. But what the Bible tells us about heaven is very different. In this sermon based on Isaiah 65:17-25, Pastor Austin walks us through what heaven will be like and why it is something we should long for.  ----------------------------- Isaiah 65:17-25 New Heavens and...

Do you ever find yourself thinking, "How did I get here? How did the progression of my life lead me into this place that I don't want to be?" Or maybe you heard that the Christian life is full of joy and peace, but you are not experiencing it; you trusted in Jesus, but the life that you were promised isn't being realized. These occurrences are common to us all, and most of the time they can be tra...

How do you handle suffering? It can be tempting to let hardship overcome us, but it doesn't have to be that way. In this Advent message, Pastor Brent takes us through Psalm 22 where we learn about the context of the Psalmist David in the midst of his suffering, and how fulfillment is ultimately found at the cross of Jesus Christ. The call to action for everyone is to take up our own cross and foll...

Life is hard. Sometimes it feels like we are surrounded by gloom or darkness. It feels like the harder we try to fix things, the darker they get. This is exactly where the people of Israel found themselves almost 3000 years ago. They were held in Assyrian captivity and everywhere they turned, their life was filled with distress. It was in this environment that Isaiah declared, "Your gloom will be...

Do you want your life to mean something? Do you ever wonder about the legacy you will leave, or what others will say about you when your time on this earth has come to an end? While most people prefer not to think about the end of their lives, it is important to let the legacy we want to leave drive the decisions we make today.  In this teaching from 2 Timothy 4, Pastor Brent uses Paul's last word...

If someone asked you to list the things in life that you love the most, what would you say? Would you answer honestly or in the way you think you are "supposed to?" While there is nothing wrong with loving your family, your job, your home, and so on, loving those things more than you love the God who created them will always lead to satisfaction that doesn't last. In 2 Timothy 3, Paul writes about...

In a world that seems filled with chaos and unrest, do you find yourself succumbing to anxiety or standing calm and steady? It can be all too easy to slip into a pattern of worry and stress, or even to contribute to the cultural turmoil around us.  In 2 Timothy 2:14-26, Paul continues his letter to Timothy by describing the actions Timothy should take to be a non-anxious presence to others--to be...

We all know the feeling: we walk into the meeting, the classroom, the get-together and think, "How long until they know I'm fraud?" That inner critic loves to tell you that you're not good enough, not strong enough, not smart enough, not Godly enough. Imposter syndrome is that self-doubt that causes us to shrink back and miss out on the great things God has for us. This is not a new phenomenon. In...

Does the thought of telling someone about your sins make you anxious? Confessing our wrongdoing can feel vulnerable and scary, whether we are confessing to God or to others. In this text, John explains that we are all sinners, but that our gracious and merciful God made a way for us to be cleansed of that sin--Jesus! In this teaching, we learn how confession allows us to be in relationship with Go...

What do you fear? Sickness? The endangerment of loved ones? What your future will be like? Every single one us falls victim to fear. And this is only exaggerated during periods of suffering. In this text Paul is writing at his lowest low, on death row, and yet he is not afraid. What gives Paul this unshakable security? In this teaching we see how we can grow in faith instead of fear during seasons...

We are all on path chasing out what we believe to be the good life. Some of us will spend our whole lives in pursuit of the goodlife and never actually obtain the life we desire. Others will reach their goals only to realize that not everything that glitters is gold. So then what? Do we start over? Do we set more goals? Do we work and strive to achieve this version of life that we think we want? T...

Does the Bible endorse slavery? No! The Bible clearly states that all people are made in the image of God with inherent worth, dignity, and value. Slavery was a byproduct of sin and throughout the Bible we see that God is a liberator. In this passage we see Paul providing instructions for how bondservants ought to act in their service. This wasn't and endorsement of slavery. Paul says that bondser...

Over the last decade we have tragically seen many pastors whom we deeply admired become disqualified from ministry. We feel betrayed and hurt when this happens. Perhaps you have been hurt by a pastor or a spiritual leader and even thinking about church causes pain. How does the church keep Pastors accountable? How do we care for them to help prevent them from falling? In this section of scripture...

"It's not the church, it's the culture." "It's not the church as an organization that is bad, it's the culture of the church that has become bad." How many of you have heard excuses like this to justify an unhealthy church? The reality is, if the culture of the church is unhealthy then the church is probably unhealthy. So then, what type of culture should we strive after? We can have plans and str...

Entering the Christian life is a free gift of grace. We are reconciled to God by trusting in Jesus' sacrificial death on the cross alone. However, becoming a Christian doesn't mean that we get to move in on easy street. We still face difficulties in life, and we must press on and endure. We are instructed to toil and strive in the disciplines of our faith so that we might endure hard times and be...