Oakhaven Church Podcast

As we near the end of our sermon series, “Going to Church,” we begin a short “series within a series” and look at prayer in some of its many forms and the way it blesses us as a community. Or rather, the way GOD blesses us in and through our prayers! One of our foci is the variety of flavors prayer comes in, and to illustrate this,  Psalm 147:1-11 , Philippians 4:5-7 , James 5:13-16 , and Matthew...

Giving back to God can be the most spiritually significant thing we do in worship if our head and heart are in the right place as we do it, but it's something many people are uncomfortable talking about. In today's sermon, we look back to the beginning of worship, and see the role of giving in the life of God's people across the ages.  This podcast includes the special presentation...

After several (see below) messages surveying the scriptures from beginning to end, we take a step back to examine its themes together: the themes of God and His relationship with Humanity. Though we are created in His image and set in paradise, we are exiled in the very first pages of scripture because of our disobedience. God sets our rescue on course within a few chapters, and spends the rest of...

We’re completing our survey of the New Testament, focusing in this episode on the first chapters of the Book of Revelation and its message of encouragement and warning. The Lamb Who Was Slain has shown us the Way ahead, and written in the Book of Life the names of those who belong to Him and are faithful. He will see you through to the end, WHATEVER comes before!  To investigate this most importan...

Today we finish our survey of the New Testament, focusing in this episode on the later chapters of the Book of Revelation and its message of encouragement and warning. The Lamb Who Was Slain has shown us the Way ahead, and written in the Book of Life the names of those who belong to Him and are faithful. He will see you through to the end, WHATEVER comes before!  To investigate this most important...

Welcome to worship at the barn at Oakhaven Church! On this snowy morning in Oshkosh, we are gathering to praise God for His greatness, to pray prayers of blessing and healing over one another, to sit across from each other at the table with the Risen Jesus at the head, and to reflect on His word and its message for us today. We’re continuing our survey of the New Testament, focusing on several lat...

Our service began with a reflection on the example and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr..  In his powerful I Have a Dream speech, he calls for freedom to ring and spread across the land. The day's sermon serves as a sequel to last week's in which we surveyed the four Gospels, each a distinctly different portrait of Jesus and His ministry and gospel. In today's lesson, we look at...

We pivot today on the postludes to Jesus' birth in the Gospel of Luke into a brief overview of all four Gospels. While they have much in common, they are also significantly different in tone, content, and purpose. Having these factors on our radar when we read them greatly helps our understanding of Jesus as we seek to know and follow Him. To investigate this most important of stories further...

Happy New Year, friends! We hope that as the year has turned, the love and care of God for you has been evident and clear. As we gather together for our first time of worship in 2021, we hope that your spirit is refreshed by His Spirit, and that the hope and promise of His presence in the coming days and months is as strong a guide as the star of Bethlehem was to the magi two millennia ago. In our...

Welcome to worship with Oakhaven church! We continue our celebration of Jesus’ birth by looking at ancient traditions of faith that have marked His incarnation. (If you watch the sermon you’ll learn why Christmas isn’t over yet!) We also consider how our current culture has “borrowed” the power of Jesus’ story in ways that sometimes distract us. Then we travel to ancient Israel and find unlikely m...

Our guest speaker last week raised many themes, the primary theme being God’s long plan for our redemption: since before creation! This week we look at this and other themes through the lens of Mary’s visit to Elizabeth (as instructed by last week’s speaker) and of her song of praise to God, The Magnificat . We’ll look at Luke 1:39-56 , Galatians 4:1-7 , Exodus 34:29-35 , and 2 Corinthians 3:7-18...

We view Christmas through the eyes of the angel who got the story moving: Gabriel. Bringing a timeless perspective to the birth narrative, Gabriel puts the manger story in a broader context that helps us remember just what is at stake in all this, and helps us to appreciate why such a strange, secretive birth was the path chosen by the Lord of Hosts for His Son's nativity. To investigate this...

Welcome to worship with Oakhaven Church at the barn in Oshkosh! Today we step alongside the nation of Israel in their wait for Yahveh to fulfill His many promises of sending His Messiah ( Isaiah 9:1-7) . We look through lenses provided by prophet Isaiah ( 7:10-14 ), as well as the stories of God’s faithfulness across the years, beginning with Abraham in a crescendo that peaks with the visit of ang...

After a reading of Philippians 4:4-9, Pat, one of Oakhaven's elders, uses the imagery of the first Thanksgiving - new beginnings, new friendships, contrasting cultures side by side at the table - in which differences are set aside in order to gratefully share in the table. When we disagree and we can’t communicate, we "divide" the table. The table gets broken. Communication ceases,...

Duey, one of Oakhaven's elders, describes the transition God has led the Oakhaven family through in recent years, encouraging the body of Christ to live in faith and faithfulness. ( 1 Corinthians 1:4-9 ) God is continually seeking to do something new among us.  "May we be still for a time and let God’s Holy Spirit fill us up, let God’s Holy Spirit organize us, and let God’s Holy Spirit d...

Things are tough for everyone right now. Today we take courage and strength from the promises of Jesus when He tells us that He will give us rest in Matthew 11:28-30 .  This rest comes from our “taking His yoke” - being bound to His life, His strength, and His ways. We don’t have to do things on our own, we don’t have to just “get by in survival mode.” The Creator of the Universe is right beside u...

Today, Orphan Sunday is marked by churches across the world. Today at Oakhaven Church, we look at God’s heart for orphans. The tender love He has for the least among us is woven into His identity. Time and again in scripture He essentially introduces Himself as the Mightiest of the Mighty and the Lover of the Orphan . When He warns His people of judgment through the prophets, their lack of care fo...

Today we’ll finish our look at Jesus’ bible - the Tanakh of Hebrew Scripture, comprised of Torah (Law/Instruction) Nevi’ im (Prophets) and Ketuvim (Writings). Today, we’ll see how the Writings (Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Song of Solomon, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, Esther, Daniel, Ezrah-Nehemiah [one book in Tanakh)] and Chronicles) bear witness to God's faithfulness in creative, powerful,...

In this episode, we look deeper into The Prophets and the role they play both in God’s big story and in our lives. We are all called to a righteousness that isn’t based on religious performance, but on how we treat the least among us: the widow, orphan, and immigrant, just as the prophets instructed the people of Israel years ago. We are reminded that we are created in God’s image, and to reflect...

Fourteenth (!) in a series on what's going on at church (if we're paying attention) and third in a series on the scriptures, we take a brief look at the role of the Law given God's people at Sinai. They're coming out of generations of slavery and headed into a new land filled with peoples whose ways they are not supposed to adopt. God's law shows His children how to look l...

We survey the metanarrative of the Old Testament while noticing things we've probably taken for granted in our use of scripture. For one thing, the printing press is a very recent development in terms of our having our own copies of the sacred text - often multiples - on our shelves, not to mention the infinite number of options on our tablets and phones! Scripture was experienced far differe...

The Book of Acts tells us that the first Christ-followers "devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to prayer" ( Acts 2:41-47 ). As we continue to unpack all (honestly, "all" is impossible - let's just say we're trying to cover "most") of what happens in times of worship together - be it in person or...

On this day we complete a series of 7 sermons focused on communion, and the day's communion service includes several themes from the series, including a focus on one another instead of shutting ourselves up in an emotional corner all by ourselves and dwelling on our personal issues. We reinforce the fact that Jesus plays the role of host (as in head of the table, not transubstantiated wafer),...

Today we conclude our series (on the table) within a series (on what goes on "in church") with the seventh and final sermon centered on the table. We see in the New Testament a clear pattern of communion ALWAYS being incorporated into a full evening meal. We see this reinforced in an important early church document, the Didache , and we mark the historical progression that decays the pra...

TENTH in our Going to Church series – SIXTH focused on the table – looks at similarities between the first century church in Corinth and the 21st century church today, the good, the bad, and the not so good. The apostle Paul (and Jesus) call us to unity and love around the table, a table at which HE HIMSELF joins us, week after week. Let it never become ordinary or commonplace! At every table, we...