Northwest Church of Christ Sermons

In this first sermon on rest, we are exploring 1 Kings 18-19 where Elijah first defeats 450 prophets of Baal and then immediately cowers before a death threat and flees. However, God doesn't get mad. God sends an angel to provide for Elijah in his exhaustion and in his running away. We cannot outrun God's love.

On Senior Sunday Nathan celebrate our seniors, but even more importantly celebrates our awesome God. We too often take God's incredible awesomeness for granted. But when we slow down and remind ourselves of God's greatness, it can restore our own sense of confidence in ourselves as his great creations.

On this Mother's Day we discussed the incredible power of prayer and how we too often pray for things without expectation, anticipation, or faith. Prayer would be more powerful if we instead spoke and listened and believed God's will and our will could become one in times of meaningful prayer.

God desires that He be the main thing in our lives. Whenever we make anything else the main thing it causes our lives to be wildly out of order. But when we put God into our life first, we then orient our values and time around it, then everything in life can fall in place. Is your life rightly ordered or is it time to make some changes?

In James 3, we are told that not everybody should be a teacher. But we shouldn't think of classrooms. James is thinking about people who teach by their words and their actions, who lead by example and influence others. In this way, every parent, boss, or mentor is a teacher and leader. And James isn't saying he wants fewer teachers, but that he wants teachers to be excellent in their heart and cha...

Don't show favoritism. It feels like the obvious instructions we give to children. But actually putting into practice is at the core of Christian discipleship. It means living according to King Jesus' Royal Law and keeps us from being judged. This sermon takes a serious look at how favoritism is the entry point for many other serious evils in our world.

Every year many people get a physical to assess their physical health. What if we used the Word of God as a mirror to evaluate our spiritual health? James 1 and 2 suggests that if we evaluated our spiritual health, we should start by seeing what actions our faith produces in our lives, how it affects our tempers, our tongues, and our treatment of those who can't help themselves. Maybe it's time fo...

This opening sermon to our series on James introduces the book and also shows how James desires for Christians to focus on eternal things and not get hung up on temporary things. This allows us to rejoice during trials and to not get caught up in money and wealth. When we get these priorities right, we can be children of life and not of death.

When the Apostles were questioned about whether or not Jesus was the "real deal" they would sometimes reply, "Come and see." When people encountered Jesus they so often left convinced. They had seen. Today the church must continue to invite the world to come and see, but we also make sure that when they show up we are ready to demonstrate the love and power of Jesus in a convincing way. Are you re...

Our God is always on mission and his design is to use his church to get it done. Rick Odell talks about the power of the church joining God on mission and the impact it makes on both the church and the world. 

In Matthew 10 Jesus sent his disciples on a mission trip, but he told them up front that it was going to be difficult and come at a cost. But they still went. Today we still go, and it's important that we go with truth and with compassion. The challenge is to stay both committed to truth and compassion to make a difference in the world. 

Jesus set the ultimate example of sacrificing so others might have life. He invites us to live in such a sacrificial way that we offer life in Christ to others. Will you follow his example and sacrifice for the mission of God?

This sermon wraps up our series on David. It reviews much of the study and then explores what caused God and others to describe David as a man after God's own heart and what it would look like for us to live that way today.

If you think that the story of David and Bathsheba was about her seducing him from the roof...you heard it wrong. She isn't on the roof. She isn't given a choice. David does have a choice and Bathsheba's husband and father are among his small elite fighting force and he knows it. The consequences of David's sin will echo for generations. And Nathan's confrontation with David reminds us that it's n...

Jim Rohm famously said that "You become the average of the five people you spend the most time with." David surrounded himself with great friends who would do incredible things to remove obstacles from his life and keep him safe. His Mighty Men did great heroic things on his behalf. Do you have friends that would do anything for you? Do you have friends who encourage you to be better or to remove...

David was anointed as the next king by Samuel as a middle teen boy. He would spend much of the next 5-7 years running and hiding for his life. He then becomes king of Judah and survives a seven year war with the House of Saul before he is finally anointed king of all Israel. During that time, God was growing David into the person he needed to become to be ready to be king. What is God doing in you...

David wasn't just a shepherd and warrior king. He was a poet, a songwriter and a musician. He wrote nearly half of the Psalms and they give us an incredible glimpse into how he had honest songs from his heart to God for every season of his life. Do you have a prayer life that is honest and sustains you in all seasons?

David wasn't a barefoot kid that trusted God to guide his little pebble. Saul wasn't a fool that believed a kid could beat a Philistine warrior. David was an Israelite slinger who had killed lions with his bare hands. He had built the faith and the habits to prepare him for this very battle. In the same way, Jesus prepared for his wilderness battle with Satan for years before his fight. Are you pr...

This lesson kicks off our series on King David from 1 and 2 Samuel. This week focused on how both Saul and David were each faithful and flawed in their own ways. But Saul does not have the heart for God or relationship with God that is a major part of David's life. The result of this is that Saul's family line is wiped out while David's line will reign on the throne forever, eventually in the eter...

If you were to evaluate your mood and emotions, do you find yourself more consumed with fear, anxiety, and anger? Or do you feel more joy, gratitude and contentment? The answer to these questions probably reveals whether you are focused more on the things of this world or more focused on Christ and things above. In this sermon, David Kaissling encourages us to received the life changing blessings...

This sermon is focused on how we should expect the Holy Spirit to show up and make a difference in our lives. It looks at the stories of Elijah's ascension and Jesus' ascension and how both had people waiting and expecting an extra measure of the Spirit to change their lives. What would it look like for us to live with this expectation today?

In the art world, the value of art is determined by how rare it is, how irreplaceable it is, and how much somebody is willing to pay for it. When we consider that God makes every one of us completely unique, that every human is completely irreplaceable, and that Jesus left Heaven to come to this world to die for us, the Christmas story reveals how much we are truly worth to God. 

One of the fruits of the Spirit is joy. Christians often talk about how they can have joy in all circumstances, but so often we think of it being something that is deep in our hearts. But joy should show on our faces and in our lives. So if you find you are consumed by anxiety or grumpiness and not joy then you might need to change your focus to let the Spirit produce Godly joy in your life. 

Dante preaches on how the birth of Jesus ushered in peace on earth and how we now become peacemakers as we look forward to a day when God's ultimate peace will reign in Heaven and on Earth.