Madison Reformed Church

Deut. 11:18–23  Isa. 51:4–8  Luke 17:5–10  Gal. 5:1–6  Sanctification is the glorious teaching that God Himself works powerfully within us to make us more like Christ. Do we do good works? Of course. And it God who works within us, causing the very same faith that received Christ in the first place to being "working in love" (Gal. 5:6).

The end of each year causes most people to reflect on what's happened in the previous 12 months. Amid big changes and maybe some successes, there are big disappointments. Perhaps even disappointment with God? In this passage, during which infant Jesus is presented at the Temple, we learn what faith looks like in the face of disappointment as it's put on display by Simeon, Joseph & Ma...

The Magi's trip to find the newborn King reveals to us that the world is filled with danger for those devoted to Christ, but that He remains worthy of our deepest devotion and promises to defend us. Christmas Eve 2025 - Lessons & Carols Homily.

Lev. 18:1–5  Ps. 143  Luke 5:17–26  Gal. 3:10–14  We go through tests in life that feel like passing through a judgment. There is one judgment we can't avoid, the Judgment of God. But the doctrine of justification teaches us how to pass this judgment—one of two ways: either by perfect obedience to the law (which no one can do), or by faith in the obedient Savior.

In a self-centered world, John the Baptist teaches us to look away from ourselves to the coming Savior, Jesus Christ. In this advent sermon, we learn to listen to the cry of the voice in the wilderness, saying "Make straight the way of the Lord!"

What do you think of when someone says "the end of the world"? Jesus wants us to think— redemption . In this Advent sermon, we open to Jesus' Olivet Discourse, where He teaches us how to read the signs of His coming and to respond, not with a sense of doom, but great confidence.

Deut. 4:32–40  Isa. 44:1–5  John 5:19–24  Rom. 3:21–28  What is faith? For something so central to Christianity, we have a lot of confusion about it. In this message guided by Belgic Confession article 22, we learn where faith comes from (the Holy Spirit), what it is (a faculty of the heart), and what is brings about (Christ given to you).

The second Sunday in Advent. We focus our hearts on Christ's arrival into Jerusalem, which reveals to us the character of both His first and second comings, and—as a result—how we might best prepare ourselves to say with the crowds, "Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!"

Madison Reformed Church gathered on the evening before Thanksgiving Day to offer our gratitude to God for all His kindness to us. In this message, we learn the obstacles to giving Him thanks from a full heart.

In this final message in our Genesis series, we remember the ongoing work of God through His covenant, and how—despite the obstacles of death, doubt, and domination—His covenant mercies triumph in the end.

Lev. 16:1–5  Isa. 53:4–12  Matt. 27:45­–51  1 Cor. 2:1–5  What is the atonement? It refers to the work of Christ that He accomplished on the cross. But what the atonement means and what Christ accomplished by it takes us to its Old Testament roots. In this doctrinal message, we open up centrality of the cross, and the good news it still proclaims today.

Deut. 28:15–19  Jer. 11:1–5  John 11:45–53  2 Cor. 5:16–21  Around the year A.D. 130, an early Christian wrote a letter to a skeptic named Diognetus, and he explained that the work of Jesus Christ for sinners like this: "O sweet exchange!" In this message, we see how God poured out His justice against His Son in order to show mercy and goodness to us.

In a world of pain and sorrow, Scripture teaches us to take refuge at God's right hand (Psalm 17:7), where Jesus is preparing a Kingdom for His people. In the blessings given to Joseph and Benjamin, we get a glimpse of that Kingdom and of the Son of God's Right Hand. In Him, we have the strength to overcome adversity while we wait.

In this reflection from Reformation Sunday 2025, we consider the joy of being Reformed Christians.

The 12 sons of Jacob became the 12 tribes of Israel, the assembly of God's people at that time. We are one with them, and we learn about ourselves by studying them . It’s like a Bible-based personality assessment, helping us know who we are and what our place is in the Church. We are unique in what we bring to the table. But, like them, we are united in our need for the grace of God. In this...

Gen. 14:17–20  Ezek. 34:11–24  Luke 23:44–49  Heb. 5:5–10  Part of being any calling is learning its vocabulary. If you work in finances, you have to know the difference between assets and liabilities; equity, debit, and credits, and so on. There’s a Christian vocabulary too. It’s part of our calling. In this message, we learn the term “hypostatic union," which teaches that the Lord Jesus is...

Lions take advantage of the early morning hours to roar loudly as a warning to all who would try to take their territory. Lions are fierce and mighty. And in this passage, the patriarch Jacob blesses his fourth-born son Judah by calling him a lion .  One will come from Judah's line who is like a lion. It is our Lord Jesus Christ, descended from Judah’s tribe, a leader worth following.

Gen. 15:1–6  Jer. 23:1–8  Matt. 1:18–25  Heb. 2:14–18  Ever get tired of waiting? If you open the Bible, that’s a pretty constant complaint. “How long, O Lord?” is a question that’s on repeat. The incarnation of the Son of the God is God's answer to that question. In this message, we look at Matthew 1:18–25 to see how this great miracle came about and why God did it.

Have you ever thought about what you’d like to use your last words for? In Jacob's deathbed scene, he speaks prophetic blessings to his 12 sons. These words set the trajectory for the tribes that come from these men, and also give us a glimpse of life in the Church. In his first three sons—Reuben, Simeon, and Levi—we learn what God is able to do even through sinners whose sins echo down to th...

Gen. 3:8–15  Lam. 3:49–60  Mark 5:24b–34  Heb. 2:14–18  When humankind fell into sin, God could've acted in swift and overwhelming justice. But instead, He made a promise. He promised that a chosen offspring would come to battle the devil, and undo all his harm. This is the promise of the covenant of grace, forged by divine love, and useful for us in all our trials and temptations.

God’s will was that the covenant promises would pass on to the next generation in the unexpected way. That’s the divine pattern. He uses the weak to shame the strong. In Jacob’s adoption of Ephraim and Manasseh, we see Jacob embrace this divine pattern. After years of learning to discern the grace of God, he gets it right. This gracious God still works like this in the world today. And because tha...

What has the Church to do with the state? Genesis 47 gives us plenty of biblical insights into how God's people—who abound in blessings—are to bless the nations they inhabit. Energized by the redemption we have in Christ, we are called to godly engagement with our earthly governments, even while we rest and hope for the eternal Kingdom of God.

Deut. 7:6–11  Isa. 41:5–10  John 15:15–17  Eph. 1:3–14  The doctrine of election is not meant to be a topic for debate, but good news for sinners. God has chosen to save those who could not and would not save themselves. And in this message, we learn where this choice comes from, what it leads to, and why we teach it.

What has the Church to do with the Family? In Genesis, the covenant family of Abraham  is  the Church, and so we are given wonderful answers to this question when we study how this family makes it through trials from without and from within. In this message, we learn that the blessings God has given His Church are so abundant that they overflow to families who join themselves to it: the blessings...

Gen. 5:1–11  Job 14:1–6  Matt. 15:10–20  Rom. 5:12–21  Have you ever wondered why it is harder to maintain good habits than it is to slip into bad ones? Why do we need to teach children, over and over again, how to obey while disobedience comes naturally? In short—why is it so much easier to do wrong? The answer is that we have a deep, ingrained problem called a sin nature, or "original sin.&...