Newland Presbyterian Church

Easter Worship by Newland Presbyterian Church

Palm Sunday! by Newland Presbyterian Church

Faith. Hope. and Love. Historically and practically, these qualities are called the "theological virtues," commended to us in 1 Corinthians 13. In the history of the church, they are also paired with the cardinal virtues of practical wisdom, justice, courage, and temperance. Grounded in humility, these characteristics are expressions of love that we can offer to God, even as they also serve as the...

Encounter leads to Faith. Faith in Christ to discovery of the Triune God of Grace. God's grace presents the possibility of Transformation. And so as we begin this 40-day Lenten season, a time fashioned after Jesus' 40-day temptation in the wilderness, we look at the gospel according to both Mark and Matthew, noting three temptations from Satan and how Christ's response demonstrates true humanity,...

Faith. My Faith. Our Faith. Of course, faith is so very important. But more important than either my faith or our faith...is Christ. The One in whom our faith is placed. As we continue in this second sermon in a series on the foundations of Christian Faith, let's "look to Jesus," the "author and perfecter or our faith." Let's look even like Peter, James, and John, who looked at Jesus upon the Moun...

Encounter. When Isaiah the prophet encountered the Living God in the Temple, he said, "...I saw the Lord, sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of God's robe filled the Temple." Isaiah also saw seraphim, those angelic ministers imaged as a flame of fire, and heard their eternal hymn, "Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of His glory." It was amazing. Ev...

Deep down, we know that we need to be saved. It is a truth so fundamental to our lives that we write books about it and tell stories about it and watch movies about people experiencing salvation. You can find it in Tom and Jerry, James Bond, High Noon, and Little Red Riding Hood. The experience of salvation coming in the midst of seemingly hopeless circumstance. Human beings are so obsessed with s...

The wise men were, "warned in a dream not to return to Herod [so they] returned to their own country by another way." Since we have now celebrated Christmas, many of us are back to our familiar routines. Perhaps, as we make our own way "back" to everyday life, this word to the magi, this invitation to "return by another way," can preserve in us the gifts that we have received in Christ: hope, love...

After hearing from angels, receiving heavenly messages from shepherds, and, of course, giving birth to Jesus, the Scriptures tell us that Mary, "treasured up all these things, and pondered them in her heart." So, come! And treasure with us in this online worship service, pondering in your hearts the great love of God with us, the incredible truth that God chose to be bounded by the womb of Mary (w...

Glorify Him! - Advent 4 by Newland Presbyterian Church

"Prepare the way of the Lord," cries John the Forerunner, the one whose task it was (and is) to get us ready to meet Jesus. John does this in a variety of ways: through his verbal proclamation, the witness of his own life, and even by and through the ways that the church remembers him. Depictions of John the Baptist in religious art (paintings and architecture) aid us in understanding John's witne...

Ambrose of Milan said, in regards to heaven and earth, that Jesus Christ is "the reconciliation of those two realms." This morning, Psalm 85 leads us a little further into Advent, offering us actual steps that we can walk as we see heaven and earth cohering in Jesus, the one that Isaiah the Prophet speaks of when he says that, "Unto us a child (of earth) is born; unto us a Son (the only begotten)...

"And going into the house, they saw the child with Mary, his mother. And they fell down and worshipped him." This is the end towards which Advent (and the whole Christian life) points. To find ourselves in the presence of the humble Savior, is to find ourselves in a posture of adoration, and of worship. Join us this morning as we journey with these wise kings from the east, who see a star (an ange...

Therefore, says the Apostle Paul, "be imitators of God, as beloved children." As we delve a bit deeper into this mystery this morning, hear how the doctrine of the Trinity, the call to imitate God, and the life of a child, coalesce into a great invitation to simply "be with" God, receiving there all of His love, and offering our love in return. This is the basis of the Christian life of participat...

This morning we were privileged to share in the Word and in both sacraments, baptism and communion. Word and Sacrament, the twin pillars of Reformed Worship. As we remember with Paul that there is, "one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of all, over all, through all, and in all," we journey back to the creation, to the flood and to the ark; we remember Moses pulled from the water an...

Anselm, about 1000 years after Christ's death on the Cross, was tasked with leading the English church. It was a position of immense power. Anselm promptly caught a nosebleed, haha! It has always been difficult for Christians to understand a proper orientation to power, for we serve a God who is all-powerful, yet who demonstrated that power by emptying himself in love on a Cross for us. In this mo...

Paul speaks of a mystery, a mystery revealed. It's the mystery of the gospel, of Christ, of all creation made one in Him. It's the mystery of how Jew and Gentile become co-heirs and one body with the Savior. And, perhaps most important for us, it's about how the church becomes the people who make known this mystery. So the call this morning is to "become" a mystery in order that we might reveal it...

In Ephesians 2, Paul says that upon the cross, Jesus breaks down the dividing walls of hostility that lie between us, so making peace. It is at this highest level of reality that we discover our unity in Him, who then sets the pattern for our own lives, where Jesus is both the "cornerstone," and the "keystone," the rock at the pinnacle of an arch which holds everything in place, giving meaning, sh...

We were spiritually dead. "But God, being rich in mercy, because of the love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ," says the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 2. So we were dead. But now God has made us alive with Christ. And by God's grace God has called us to good works. It's a three fold patter that is true for all of us. Death. Life in Ch...

Where did you learn to pray? From whom did you learn to pray? Or more importantly, how are you STILL LEARNING to pray? In today's passage, Paul offers up a prayer for the church...one that he prays for us, but also one that we can take up and pray for ourselves and others. At its core, Paul's prayer asks God's help in our knowing of Him...which results in a dramatic change. If you need proof of th...

"I do not cease to give thanks for you," Paul tells the saints in Ephesus. Why? Because, "I have heard of your FAITH in the Lord Jesus Christ, and your LOVE towards all the saints." Faith and love are the fruit produced by all of God's work in us, work that Paul has catalogued in chapter 1 as Grace and Peace and Blessing and Inheritance, and the guarantee of the Holy Spirit. And so we, too, give t...

"In him you have an inheritance," says the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 1. An inheritance that actually includes EVERYTHING, for everything belongs to Christ, including us. The Holy Spirit helps us to connect "things" as we typically experience them, to the shared life of God, where sanctified reality becomes a sacramental experience, and a participation in God's good news story. Listen in, and disco...

As we enter in to Paul's letter to Ephesus, we get no further than the first word before the reality of BLESSING meets us: we bless God because God has blessed us, and within that mutual blessing, we discover that God has set us apart to extend His own blessing to the world. In this message, we pay particular attention to the SPIRITUAL nature of God's blessing that Paul celebrates.

As we gather on the lawn this morning, within the theater of God's glory, we take a moment to remember. To remember God's goodness; to remember how God has spoken to us, comforted us, and led us during these last months. And then, we turn to Ephesians, where we hear from the Apostle Paul, who speaks to us "by the will of God," a word of Grace and Peace.

As we conclude our series on the Travel Narrative in Luke, we discover, in Christ's tears overlooking Jerusalem, the revealed truth of God's heart towards us, which is "compassion," a willingness to "suffer with us" in such a way that all of our past sin and all of our future suffering can be redeemed and transformed. And finally, an invitation for Jesus to enter the Temple of our hearts and make...