Pursuing God with Gene Appel

By God’s grace, we are no longer enemies. Instead, we have been adopted into His family. By God’s grace, He has placed His Spirit within us, so you can be you at your best. No wonder the Old Testament prophet Isaiah said Jesus would be called the Prince of Peace. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shap...

“Who is this man that even the wind and waves obey Him?”  He’s the one who can bring peace into your life, even in the midst of your storms. He’s the one the Bible refers to as the Prince of Peace. His name is Jesus. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is...

When you have a relationship with God through your faith in a Risen Savior, the Holy Spirit reminds you that not only do you have love beyond reason, purpose beyond your vocation, and hope beyond death, but you also have joy beyond your difficulties. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastsid...

Your value has been determined by the price the God of the universe has been willing to pay for you. Jesus showed us how to measure love in John 15:13 (NLT), “And here is how to measure it—the greatest love is shown when people lay down their lives for their friends.” That’s exactly what Jesus did for you. When that fact is deeply anchored within you, you’ll find yourself being struck with the awe...

When Jesus talked about His joy filling us, He was talking about what happens when we’re authentically connected with God through our relationship with Him. He was saying, “Only as you walk closely with Me, and experience Me, can you be full of joy.” He wants those who follow Him to overflow with that joy! Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleas...

God is a God of joy who wants to infuse our lives with joy. When we make love our highest goal, joy follows. If you want to find joy in your life, you need to love and be loved. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you...

Sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do is, like Jesus did throughout his ministry, make time for rest and the replenishment of your physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual tanks. It’s important for you to prioritize time for those things that recharge you emotionally. You will need every ounce of your physical, emotional, and spiritual energy to consistently love others deeply and become...

Do you want to become the kind of person who loves more deeply? Jesus would say to test your love quotient according to Philippians 2:3, “Consider others better than yourselves.” Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites yo...

You have a God who is waiting to catch you. You may be hearing voices of the Deceiver that says, “Hang on! Don’t let go. You have to hold on to everything you can.” But friend, God’s voice is saying “Trust Me. Let go.” You will never know that God can catch you until you let go and completely trust Him.  Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash...

I believe the entire story of Jesus can be summed up with these 2 words…  LET GO. Allow me to paraphrase John 3:16:  “For God so loved the world that he let go  of his one and only son, so that whoever will let go and let God love them, will not perish, but have everlasting life.” Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in...

Jesus had a lot to say about money and taught about it often. It wasn’t because He was trying to get your money, but he was trying to keep your money from getting you!  He knew that where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Wherever your money goes, your heart goes. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Sc...

The love of money leads to harmful desires. It causes the poor to live a life ruined by envy. It causes the middle class to break their backs, break their marriages and families, and break their health to move one more step up the financial ladder. It causes the wealthy to spend their wealth so frivolously that they live out a pattern of self-indulgence. Or they cling to every dollar so tightly th...

The Bible never says money is the root of all evil. It’s the LOVE of money that causes people to lie, cheat, steal, and betray. We need to heed the Apostle Paul’s warning not to fall into this temptation. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyon...

Pilot gives the order for Jesus to be crucified. After hours of suffering, Jesus declares ‘It is finished.’ He paid the price for us so we don’t have to experience death. He is worthy of our worship. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, ea...

The courtyard outside the house of Caiaphas is the place where Peter denies Jesus three times. Meanwhile Jesus is held in a cell deep below the house, knowing what has happened above. He endured suffering and abandonment so we don’t have to. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s convi...

The word ‘Gethsemane’ means ‘The place of crushing.’ Jesus prays here, knowing He is going to be crushed by taking on the sins of the world. If Jesus can pray in a place of crushing, so can we. Bring your burdens to the Lord. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s...

Jesus eagerly waited to celebrate the Passover meal with his disciples in the upper room, despite knowing He would be betrayed and denied by his closest friends. But the upper room was a place of radical acceptance - for anyone and everyone who has sinned. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by E...

During this last week of Jesus’ life, he experienced many finals - His final time with his disciples, His final meal, His final Passover. Let’s walk with Jesus through this last week. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invit...

True freedom is found not in the absence of all restraints, but in a humble, genuine surrender to the leadership of Jesus in your life. He can set you free to grow, to love, to serve, and to become the kind of person He created you to be. That kind of freedom is available to everyone.  Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounde...

Friends, if you really want to have freedom and if you really want to have fun, and if you really want to have fulfillment in life, I challenge you to look carefully and deeply into what the Bible has to say about how much God is a giver. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s convicti...

God penalizes those deserving of penalty, but He rewards those deserving reward. He is absolutely impartial and incapable of being corrupted. Hallelujah! That is the kind of God we serve! Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode i...

The late theologian R.C. Sproul wrote, “If God did not punish sin, He would not be just. And if He were not just, He would not be God.” We can take great comfort in knowing that God is just and ultimately will make things right. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that Go...

Jesus told a parable in Matthew 21 that plays to our desire for justice. Listen this week for the powerful application of this story. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in...

It doesn’t matter what’s on your list of sins, everything you’ve done wrong has been nailed to the cross. When you surrender your life to Jesus, the One who endured the penalty of your sin, God is willing to have your entire debt paid in full by applying Jesus' death to your burden of past sins. Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash comp...

On our own, our moral debt is so enormous that we are helpless and hopelessly unable to pay for what we owe. But God completely forgives us through Jesus and His death on the cross to pay that debt! Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, eac...