Redeemer Church of Waterford

Even as we plan our way, the Lord orders our steps to bring us to the gospel. Each of us must ask, "Who do I worship and what do I do with my sins?" The answer to those questions are found in stories of men and women in the Bible, some who experienced miraculous conversions and others who experienced mundane and ordinary conversions. Can you see your story in their stories?

The early Christians in the New Testament were not trying to imitate families. So far as they understood the gospel, they WERE a family. And in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus made the startling claim that God's family - the church - has priority over your biological family with the expectation that we will fold our families into the family of God, with the Church taking priority over every other sph...

In this inaugural sermon in the series "Devoted to God's Church" we consider the nature of our relationship to the church as given to us in Paul's Letter to the Ephesians: the prerequisites (believing and belonging) and the particulars (the body, the brood (family), the building, and the bride.

Why don't I feel like praying? Because when I pray, I say the same old things about the same old things. There is nothing wrong with praying ABOUT the same things. The issue is SAYING the same things about the same things. One remedy to our frustrated praying is to pray the Bible. Using Dr. Donald Whitney's method outlined in his book, "Praying the Bible," Pastor Paul presents this method in this...

When did it last cross your mind that Jesus was thinking about you? When did it actually cross your mind that Jesus wants you?

God made a promise at the beginning of the Bible which unfolds like a blooming flower throughout the Bible, finding its ultimate fulfillment in Revelation 21:3 "God himself shall be with them and be their God." Revelation 21:1-7 gives five specifics of what this promise means for us, as well as revealing how we come to be participants in it's blessings.

J. I Packer called the steps which the Son of God took down from heaven to earth to be incarnate in human flesh "the great stoop." In Philippians 2:5-11, using what is believed to be an early hymn of the church, the Apostle Paul traces those steps.

The Angel's startling announcement to a young virgin that she will bring forth the promised Messiah comes in two parts: what does this mean and how is it possible?

The Angel's startling announcement to a young virgin that she will bring forth the promised Messiah comes in two parts: what does this mean and how is it possible?

The story of Christmas does not begin in a manager, or with shepherds, or angelic messengers, or a star. The story of Christmas begins in eternity when God the Father and God the Son entered into an everlasting covenant to redeem Adam's fallen race. The promise of that covenant is made in the beginning of history, after Adam's rebellion, when God cursed the serpent and promised that through the se...

The objective of the Book of 1 Samuel is to reveal the kind of leader for whom God is seeking to be the shepherd king of His people. The people had chosen Saul, who turned out to be an unmitigated disaster. God chose David, whom we have watched grow from a young shepherd boy into a mighty warrior. But God isn't looking for a mighty warrior. He's looking for a humble, principled servant. And as we...

"So Saul died, and his three sons, and his armourbearer, and all his men, that same day together" (1 Samuel 31:6). On the same day David is routing the Amalekites and recovering his family and goods, winning a decisive victory over God's enemies (1 Samuel 30), God is using His enemies (the Philistines) to bring final judgment on Saul and those associated with the reign of Saul (1 Samuel 31). God h...

How can it cany any worse? All of us have asked this question when circumstances have overwhelmed us. Almost since our first meeting David in 1 Samuel 16, he has lived his life as a fugitive from Saul and the unrelenting object of Saul's wrath. And just when you think it can't get any worse, he loses everything.

When the Lord does not answer Saul's inquiry, Saul seeks out a woman with a familiar spirit to conjure Samuel from the dead. This episode in our Bibles raises some questions about the legitimacy of the occult, the ability of this woman to bring up Samuel from the dead, and whether it is actual Samuel who appears or a demonic apparition.

The running theme of 1 Samuel 28 is the silence of God. Saul is distressed to the point of a mental breakdown. The Lord is not responding to his inquiry about a coming battle with the Philistines. He has used every legitimate means in an attempt to get God's attention to no avail, so he turns to a woman who practices divination to conjure the prophet Samuel from the dead.

From the time David slew Goliath in 1 Samuel 17, have had a front row seat to the valor, courage, and integrity of David as he lived as a fugitive from Saul. We have come to love him, to respect him, to expect nothing but honorable behavior from him. And yet in our study today we come to a very disturbing story which reveals the depravity of David in murderous deceit. How did David fall to such a...

The details recorded in 1 Samuel 26 are almost a mirror image of the event that took place in 1 Samuel 24. In both chapters, Saul is told where David is hiding, Saul is vulnerable to David's revenge, David spares Saul, and Saul seems to be repentant. But in between 1 Samuel 24 and 1 Samuel 26 is 1 Samuel 25; and the word of God to David through Abigail in 1 Samuel 25 is critical to understanding w...

When the story of David and Nabal begins, David is prepared to repay with the violence the insult of Nabal by taking matters into his own hands, an action of vengeance that would have been a blot on his character for the rest of his life. God intervenes with preventive providence through Abigail to save Nabal and his men from David's violent vengeance, but in doing so, Abigail was God's instrument...

In this sermon from 1 Samuel 25:29, Pastor Paul explores some "seed thoughts" from the Abigail's poetic phrase: "The soul of my Lord (David) is bound in the bundle of life with the Lord thy God." Abigail's expression here is covenant language, grounded in God's everlasting promise to His people to secure them for eternity.

1 Samuel 25 introduces us to "a woman of good understanding" as an example to all of us of how to see God's unseen hand in the circumstances of our lives. Dale Ralph Davis says that "Abigail is the Lord's stop sign, mercifully placed in David's path." The Lord's providential intervention through Abigail restrains His chosen king from his own impulsive folly and wrong.

Having considered in the previous message the details of Abigail's counsel to David in 1 Samuel 25:18-31, we come back to consider how it illustrates "answering a fool" in Proverbs 26:4-5. David responds to Abigail's counsel with three blessings and a surprise proposal.

David and his men have been providing protection for Nabal and his possessions. When David sends his men to Nabal to request payment for services rendered, Nabal insults David. David's response reveals a surprising flaw in David's character which to this point in our studies of 1 Samuel we have never seen. There are lessons to be learned here about the restraining providence of God which kept Davi...

In a rather blunt and matter of fact way our narrator announces the death of Samuel. But God’s work in Israel did not end when Samuel died. God’s work never is dependent on only one man. In this sermon we reflect upon the life of the prophet Samuel.

David is the anointed king, but Saul is the reigning king. For years David has been waiting patiently for God to fulfill His promise to him while being unjustly pursued by Saul, fleeing for his life under continual distress. But now David is presented with an opportunity to seize the throne by force when Saul "happens" into a cave to relieve himself - the same cave where David and his 600 men are...

In this continuation of our study in 1 Samuel 24, Saul responds to David's restraint in sparing his life.