Public Church

God has immeasurably more planned for us, yet so often we get in our way. In Philippians 4:11-13, Paul gives us the secret to being content, to be unchanged by our circumstances. Through his words, we can stop wasting so much time trying to control what is “uncontrolable” and begin to get out of our own way.

Have you ever felt disappointed by Jesus? Have you felt let down by him? To address our feelings, Jesus wants to lead us to a paradigm shift where we realize that following Jesus is more than a moment…it’s actually every moment. Ephesians 3:14-21 is a prayer of invasion, a prayer inviting Jesus to invade every moment of our lives. Will we be daring enough to pray this prayer?

As we begin a new series, immeasurably more sounds incredible but unattainable. Romans 7:14-8:3, we discover the problem to immeasurably more and the solution.

God promises a harvest. Have you stayed long enough to plant a seed? Maybe the problem is not with where you’re building - but how long you’ve been building. It’s time to build the boat.

In this talk, we look at the first talk given at the first church in Acts 2:22-41. Peter confronts all who listen confronting them with their own sin. But, he then offers them the beautiful hope of redemption through Jesus.

Waiting and joy don’t seem to go together because waiting prolongs everything, including our search for joy. However, Christmas is one big waiting game, and we are reminded that some things are worth the wait as we see the joy on people’s faces as they open gifts. As we discuss our main character, Simeon, we discover that he experienced joy in the waiting and determined that God is worth the wait....

In times of adversity we can still experience joy. Looking at the life of Joseph, who seemed to be surrounded by adversity and could have taken the easy way out, we see that joy comes from choosing obedience over logic. Our adversity gives us the opportunity to experience God’s healing in a way that we may not have been able to experience otherwise.

Jesus’ birth was announced in Luke 2:10 as bringing great joy to all people, so why do we struggle with joy around Christmas? Why do we seem to be exempt from the “all people” who receive great joy? As we wrestle with how to find joy, we see a rhythm displayed by the shepherds and Mary that can help us find joy in Jesus’ presence.

As we kick off the Christmas season, we read the Christmas story from Luke 2 with our children, which is so special and provides some laughs. For both our children and adults, we have a Jesus connection that ties in the whole Gathering and challenges our approach to the holidays.

As we close our series, we discuss a statement made by Paul in Philippians 2:17 that many in his original audience would have to considered crazy. By examining Paul’s supreme value, we see that he isn’t crazy, but he is an example to learn from.

Remembering that we are people who serve people not a place, this 'Poured Out' series is a lifestyle marker for our gathering as we are reminded of WHO put this place together and WHY we are here. We will dig into Luke 9:10-17 as we look to Jesus as the example and source for what a poured out life looks like. To live a poured out life, we must place ourselves in position to be poured in and to be...

As we begin our annual series, we take a trip down memory lane to see the power of prayer in the lives of families who we prayed for last year. We celebrate miracles of Jesus putting families together through adoption and foster care! We also discuss John’s insights into a poured out life in 1 John 3:16-18.

Sexual sin wounds far more than we realize. In this talk, we study 1 Thessalonians 4:1-8 and search for freedom from sexual immorality.

Tonight’s 5:30 Gathering is our Worship Night, so we discussed the power of worship to prepare us for this special night. Through Paul’s and Silas’ story in Acts 16:23-34, we see how Jesus can use our worship as a liberating weapon in our lives and the lives of others.

As we conclude our series, children from Sprouts & Roots join us at the beginning for a special story time with them. Then we are challenged by Paul’s actions in Acts 17 as he exemplifies what it means to be a Public Church by taking the story of Jesus and his resurrection to the marketplace.

The context of the story of Amos is very similar to the U.S.A. in 2018 because Israel was a experiencing peace, prosperity, and even some international prestige. With blessing, comes responsibility to care for those who have less, especially if we claim to follow Jesus. Amos challenges his original audience and us to consider whether our actions crush or come alongside those with material needs.

Today was very special as Todd Humbert, the lead pastor of the Greenhouse Church in Athens--a church that Public Church helped plant and continues to support--came to share the story of the Greenhouse. Then Todd Stevison led us to explore the story of Jonathan in 1 Samuel. In both these stories, we see people who chose to serve God’s dreams in others. Will we follow their pattern?

What have you made your mind up about? Our guest speaker, Matt Moore, challenges us with this question because we often act like we know how the story ends. However, God is writing a story with unexpected twists and turns, so will we accept something new?

During week 2 of our series, we dive into the story of Abraham and discover a tension between us and God: he is the God of the journey, but we are destination people. God invited Abraham, and he invites us to embrace the journey, so will we step away from our destination mindset to follow him?

In the beginning…what an epic start to the Bible! To kick off our series, we discuss this story that was counter-cultural and paradigm-shifting to its original audience. In so doing, we rediscover the wonder of creation and see Jesus as the main character who creates and then recreates what is broken.

At Team Night, our special guest, Matt Moore, challenged us to embrace the position God has placed us in. Too often we want to make ourselves more like Jesus through our effort. However, God positions us in a place to serve and speak words of life, which is such a powerful and needed challenge for all of us as we serve through our Teams.

John 3:16 is the most famous Bible verse, and Jesus chose to give this truth in a conversation, not a talk. As we look at the context of this conversation and it’s impact on Nicodemus, we see that Gatherings are great but not enough. We also need Community Groups as environments where we can have uninterrupted conversations and ask the questions on our hearts.

In part 2 of our series, we focus on the question, “Where are we going FOR our community?” We learn from Tabitha in Acts 9:36-42 about a lifestyle of serving flowing from her identity as a servant. If we will practice and commit to partnerships, then our community will know we are for them.

Why is Public Church here? Where are we going? These two questions drive the start of our new series as we look to the future and discuss Ephesians 3:20-21. In these verses, we discover that God has plans that are immeasurably more than we could ever imagine. He sees no limits in our future.

Evie West delivers a powerful talk from John 5:1-17 that revolves around this question: is it well with you? This talk was for the ladies of Flourish but the challenge is relevant to men, too, as we listen and wrestle with this question.