Oak Hills Church, Folsom

All the time, Jesus the Messiah, the one born King of the Jews and of the entire universe for that matter, lay helpless as a baby born to a poor unimportant family, lying in obscurity, literally just a few miles away from Jerusalem. And however tempting it might be to look at Herod, and the Magi, and Snicker, and comment, like the emperor that wasn't wearing any clothes. Probably better, is to see...

Advent, in other words, is a time for wondering and marveling at the Christ child and a time for wrestling with the mystery of life's hard questions like, how, and why, and when? And just to wrap this up, this is not some psychological cathartic purge so we can really enjoy Christmas dinner. This is our faith in action. This is the Christian faith; not sugary, not phony, not surface level, not dab...

God speaks to whomever he wants to speak, about whatever he wants to speak, whenever he wants to speak to them. The message isn't about how to make God speak to us more. What we're talking about here is how to put ourselves in a posture to listen. To hear when he speaks. And I don't know about you, but if I am predisposed to not want to do what God says, and yes sometimes I'm not. Did you hear tha...

Seems to me Jesus, by his example, prefers a table at the back of the restaurant. He prefers the obscure. The small places. The small people. The small things. So, he works his plan through a carpenter named Joseph. A teenager named Mary. Some Shepherds working in the fields. A little town called Bethlehem. An atmosphere of poverty, powerlessness, and oppression. He prefers the simplicity and the...

The story that Luke chooses to begin his telling of the coming of Messiah with, is the story of a couple waiting. And sure, like with everybody else, they are waiting for the coming of the Messiah. Like everybody else in the Jewish Community was in those days. But more personally, Zachariah and Elizabeth are waiting for something else. They're waiting for a baby of their own. And as those who have...

This Faith thing is a we thing not just a me thing. But today we remember that Jesus breathed on each of his disciples. John, Peter, Simon, Matthew and all the rest were filled with His Spirit. Each had a transformational encounter with God and ongoing experiences with him for the rest of their lives. Their lives were never the same. Everyday life was never the same because the Holy Spirit now inh...

Jesus sends the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit judges the world and the verdict is guilty and that has implications for the particulars of our lives here at the end of 2024. If Jesus and his way, and His Kingdom, truth, and goodness are true north, the way things are supposed to be. The way God intended them to be. The way God wants them to be. Then the world, that is wrong about sin, righteousn...

Sometimes we wish God spoke more often and more clearly to us about the specifics of our lives. What major should we take in college? Is this the right job? Is this the right marriage partner? Should we move to a bigger house? What President should we vote for? Should I retire? What should I do after I retire? And a million other particulars that we might wish God would just stand in front of us a...

The other thing that Jesus points out here, is that the focus of the Holy Spirit's communication, his speaking, isn't in the direction of the Father, but it's in our direction. In verse 26 Jesus says, “But the advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.” If the Holy Spirit, Advocate role, was on ou...

The holy spirit is here with us right now, comforting us, guiding us, teaching us, challenging us, and yes even correcting us and telling us when we have missed the mark. You see, the Holy Spirit isn't simply God's afterglow or Jesus's afterglow. We'll talk about people in our lives who aren't with us physically, but we'll say stuff like, “well, you know they’re here in spirit,” which is really a...

A scandal in the Bible is something that causes us to stumble, to trip. A scandal in the Bible then is a rock sticking up ever so slightly, in the middle of the trail, and we don't see it, but our left foot clips it as we walk by, and we stumble, and we might even fall down. 1 Corinthians 1:23, Paul writing, “…. we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block, a scandal, to Jews and foolishness to G...

Christian hope is bound to the resurrection of Jesus. When you read the Bible on hope, you find hope very close to language about the resurrection. 1 Peter 1:3, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy, he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead…..” The New Testament's rallying cry is, Remember The Resurr...

From Mark 5:24-34, “So Jesus went with them. A large crowd surrounded and pressed around him.” Feel the claustrophobic crowd pushing in. Hear the cacophony of voices calling out. Smell the bodies pressing together and sense the excited uncertainty about what Jesus will do next. “A woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. She had suffered a great deal under the care of man...

Matthew 13:31–32, “Jesus told them another parable: “” The Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches .”” There are a whole bunch of things we could say about this short parable. But one will suf...