Redeemer OC Podcast

The open ocean, horizon to horizon nothing but endless water. The desert, arid featureless wilderness for as far as you can see. No GPS. No cell phone reception. How do you navigate your way? How did the ancient Nabataeans make their way across the trackless desert? How did the ancient Phoenicians traverse the dark waters? How are we making our way through the circumstances we face? We may not be...

473,000,000 results in .51 seconds. This is how much we need a King. This Sunday, Palm Sunday, is the day we remember Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, riding over the palm branches and cloaks of those who cheered him on. It was the beginning of the last week of his life. Jesus the King rides into the heart of the storm, Jerusalem. He knows he will not come out alive. He knows he entered Jeru...

Do you ever feel distant from God? Do you ever feel insecure? I do. This sermon is for us. The current series of sermons is all about confronting our “Ricky-Bobby” Jesus, our small, truncated, safe mental versions of Jesus, with the real Jesus, powerful, dangerous, but good and life giving. Everybody has a “Ricky-Bobby” Jesus. Do you know yours? Last week we saw that Jesus is the great prophet who...

Silence. It’s terrifying. Well, yes. After a long day some silence might be nice. But relational silence, silence that screams we are being ignored, or that we have been rejected, or worse that no one is there at all to respond, that kind of silence is the dread under all of our anxiety and fear. This Sunday we start a sermon series that will help us prepare for Easter. Jesus has always been a con...

Do you know the deep joy of being genuinely welcomed and wanted? Do you know how to offer this life giving experience to others? When we throw a party or have guests over we often conflate hospitality and entertaining. Are they really the same? This Sunday we will be studying Luke 14 and Jesus’ teaching on hospitality. Read the chapter out loud with friends and family. Ask yourselves, “What are th...

In words of Abraham Heschel, “Labor is a craft, but rest is an art.” This Sunday we have the honor of listening to a sermon on the gift of rest from Dr. Karl Johnson. Dr. Johnson is this year’s Men’s Retreat speaker and will be concluding his weekend with Redeemer by preaching at church on Sunday morning from Psalm 84. Dr. Johnson is the Executive Director of Chesterton House, a center for Christi...

Are you ready to pursue your future spouse? I am not talking only to the unmarried and the answer is not Jesus. No simple Sunday school answers please. This Sunday is the last sermon in our current series on marriage. For the married, what is God doing right now in the life of your spouse? For the unmarried, above all else what key quality should you look for in someone to marry? In preparation fo...

Divorce is devastating and tragically we have all been touched by it in some fashion. Over the last weeks we have been looking at the biblical vision of marriage. It is beautiful. This Sunday we turn to the biblical view of divorce. Is it ever allowed? In what situations? How does God feel about divorce? What hope does he offer if we have been divorced or are even contemplating it right now? Wheth...

And they lived happily ever after. Really? We all want to be happy and marriage can produce such happiness, but it can also do exactly the opposite. This is the question for the sermon this Sunday: How do we find happiness in our marriage when the source of our greatest unhappiness can often be our marriage? Jesus is not far from our difficulty and he is more committed to our flourishing than we c...

Who is marriage for? Is marriage a blessing or a curse? If we know who marriage is for and we learn to live out that vision, then marriage is a blessing to us and all connected to us. However, if we misunderstand or resist who marriage is really for, then marriage becomes a crushing burden and a curse. Let’s not get this question wrong. Thankfully God makes clear in the bible his design and intent...

Marriage is hard. Marriage is a good gift from a God committed to the flourishing of his creation. However, like anything with significant power, marriage has the potential to not only produce tremendous life and joy, but also pain and even despair. If marriage is such a blessing why does it often feel like such a curse? Many of you have asked for a sermon series on marriage, and many of you have...

Happy Epiphany! January 6th was the Feast of Epiphany, and now we have entered into the season of Epiphany until we arrive at Lent. Sometimes we can feel a “let down” after the season of Advent and Christmas. However, in terms of the significance of the church calendar, Epiphany has a huge importance in the drama of our year. Epiphany is a season which celebrates the revelation of Jesus as the lig...

Happy New Year! 2015 has arrived and we are excited for what God has in store for Redeemer in this year ahead. It may be 2015, but the 12 days of Christmas are still in full force. On this second Sunday after Christmas we will joyfully sing our last round of Christmas carols before the season of Epiphany. We also have the honor of having Rev. David Rapp from Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Temple,...

I hope you all had a very merry Christmas and are still able to celebrate the birth of Christ with family and friends during these 12 days of Christmas. On this first Sunday after Christmas, we have the honor of having Dr. Darian Lockett, Associate Professor of Biblical & Theological Studies at Biola University, preach a sermon from Isaiah 11 on the topic of hope. To best prepare for the sermon, a...

Join Redeemer for our annual Lessons and Carols Christmas Eve service. We will sing the great Christmas songs interspersed with readings from Scripture, and a short Christmas message. Edward White Benson, Archbishop of Canterbury, first created the Nine Lessons and Carols service in 1880. The best know version is broadcast from King’s College, Cambridge, each Christmas Eve where they have been cel...

Christmas is not what we think it is, but its secret is hidden in a long list of names hard to pronounce. Our culture is saturated with a version of Christmas awash with sentimentality. It gags and chokes and leaves us sputtering for breath. True Christmas offers refreshment and hope and life. This Sunday we will pan back and look at Christmas from high above. The view is breathtakingly beautiful....

Two options. Resist or rejoice. God is on the move. He is at work unfolding his plan of renewal. During this season of Advent we look back to what God accomplished in the first coming of Jesus, and we remember that for generations God’s people had to wait for that first advent. Also during this season we also look forward to the second and final advent of Jesus, and now we are those who wait. But...

Is that the right baby? Christmas is about the coming of a baby, but if you read the Christmas story in the Gospel of Luke he starts with the wrong baby. The birth of John the Baptist is told first. This is consistent in all the Gospel accounts. John the Baptist comes before Jesus. Why? How is John’s advent, his coming, connected to the advent of Jesus? When we answer those questions we will see w...

This Sunday is the first Sunday of Advent, a four week season that marks the beginning of the Christian year. It is a time of anticipation, of longing, of waiting for the coming of Christ. Over the next four weeks we will be looking at the significance of this season through the eyes of four people: this Sunday Simeon, then John the Baptist, next Mary the mother of Jesus, and finally God himself....

In less than a week most of us are going to enjoy one of the most lavishly set tables of the year in the company of friends and family. Even thinking about your Thanksgiving feast and the drippings from your turkey or ham may make your mouth water. This Sunday we are going to open up the Scriptures to Isaiah 55 and read a passage about a lavishly set table that rivals your most elaborate Thanksgiv...

On average, in a given day, an American spends roughly 9 hours working and commuting, just under 8 hours sleeping, almost 3 hours in leisure activities, nearly 2 hour eating, drinking, cooking and cleaning, and almost an hour grooming. Most of our days are filled with pretty normal stuff. I guess that’s the definition of normal, the stuff we do everyday. We tend to count our success and significan...

You have more power and influence than you realize. Yes, others might have more than you, but don’t let that minimize the significance of the power and position you do have. In preparation for this Sunday spend some time thinking about the areas where you have the greatest influence. Whether large or small, where do you have the ability to shape someone else’s life? The nature of power is to effec...

The ancient church in Thessalonica was a picture of strength. Persecuted, afflicted, and suffering in many ways. Yet, they were known for their joy. They were not just surviving their difficulty. They were thriving. Second Thessalonians 1:3-4 “We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of every one of you for one ano...

This Sunday we are pleased to hear from Dr. Darian Lockett, Associate Professor of Biblical and Theological Studies at Biola University. Dr. Lockett will be preaching on Luke 7.