Roots Student Ministry Podcast

We're not just affected by porn, we are all actually influenced by the culture of porn. The culture of porn is all around us in our music, TV shows, movies and other entertainment choices that we choose. But porn teaches us a fake education on God's intended plan for sex. In fact, studies have shown that porn can even damage your future sex life within marriage because of its false promises that i...

Talking about sex can be a little weird...until you notice that it is everywhere around us. Singers sing about it. Netflix shows don't avoid it. Magazines at the grocery stores talk about it on their covers. It's taught at school. It's joked about with friends. Because it is everywhere, we believe it is important for the church to talk about it too. This week we are starting a new series talking a...

We all mess up. None of us have lived up to what God's standard is. Peter was someone who messed up big time by denying Jesus right before Jesus was killed on a cross. But Jesus rose from the grave on the third day and then showed Peter that because of the resurrection, Peter didn't have to be defined by his mistake. He was forgiven because of the work of Jesus. We are also forgiven any mistakes t...

Have you ever felt unnoticed and unimportant? Maybe when you're at school you feel like everyone is watching you, but doesn't actually care about who you truly are. In this message, we see how Jesus shows that Mary Magdalene matters, where many overlooked and didn't think much of her. But after Jesus resurrected, He chose to appear before Mary first, showing her that she matters to Him. Just like...

Sometimes we can have incorrect views on God. We may think that God is a perfectionist and expects us to never mess up. Or that God is an angry God and will strike us down if we make a big mistake. Or maybe we think God is a distant God, being up in Heaven and all and doesn't care much about us here on earth. But because of Jesus and the resurrection, it proves that God loved us so much that He se...

One of Jesus' biggest commandments is to love others. Not just love our friends and hate our enemies, but to even love our enemies. We love others by serving others. When we truly learn to submit to God, He starts to transform our hearts to find ways to serve others in small ways and big ways. Thankfully He also provides a church family to serve alongside you so you don't have to do it alone. This...

Isn't it hard to deal with when someone says they will do something, but they end up doing the complete opposite? None of us like hanging around people who are hypocrites. We also don't want to be known as someone who is a hypocrite. Today, we look at when we do something that we know we shouldn't be doing, or don't do something that we should be doing, all stems from our hearts. Jesus talks a lot...

When we commit to Christ, we don't get a free pass to take advantage of His grace. We have died to our sin and are alive in Christ. We learn that it is only when we submit to Christ that we experience the true freedom that He talks about in the Gospel of John. Being alive in Christ may cost us something that we want and it may be a sacrifice. But thankfully, God is for us and will give us the desi...

Whatever emotions are inside of us are what is going to come out of us. If we are feeling a lot of guilt, then a lot of negative emotions are also going to come out of us. But Jesus has already taken care of our guilt. He took our guilt and our shame to the cross with Him so that sin no longer can have a hold on us. The Holy Spirit has set us free from guilt and shame. Because of Jesus, guilt does...

Fear can be a good thing and can keep us safe when we need to be, but fear can also stop us dead in our tracks. Teenagers especially can struggle the most with the fear of other people's opinions, which stop them from living the full life that God has for them. This message will look at the story in Matthew 8 where the disciples feared for their lives because their boat was being tossed and turned...

One of the hardest emotions to control is anger. When something doesn't go our way or when someone hurts us by talking behind our back, we want to throw some sort of fit. It may be an outburst, or it may even be a quiet treatment towards the person who hurt us. But, what if there was a better way to handle anger? What if we could hand over our anger to God and trust Him with it? When we are able t...

We are starting a new series where we talk about emotions. We all experience emotions, it's part of how God created us. In today's message, we look at how feeling emotions is not a bad thing unless we start to act out of those emotions. What defiles our witness for Christ is what comes out of our reactions to the emotions. Today, we learn that emotions do not have to control us and be the boss of...

In our final week of "It's Personal" we continue to take a look at the life of Zacchaeus. In this story we see how Jesus sees the potential in Zacchaeus when everyone else counted him out. Jesus is the same with us. He sees that we have potential to do great things, so we must also see that potential in others as well.

No matter what your past looks like or if you have shame for what you have done, Jesus still loves you. We continue to look at the life of Zacchaeus and how Jesus loves him even though his reputation was not favorable. We hope that through this story of Zacchaeus you can know that Jesus loves you no matter what.

We all have a story. No matter what your story looks like, whether it's been good or bad, Jesus understands it and welcomes you with open arms. This week, we continue to look at the story of Zacchaeus as our intern Jennifer Allen gives the message.

Jesus cares about what you care about. If we want to be personal with others, we need to care about what other people care about. When we do this, we can really become personal with others, just like how Jesus became personal with Zacchaeus.

An introduction to our theme "Prayer" for the weekend retreat.

Session #2: Saturday Morning

Sunday Morning: Session #4 (Note: Session #3 not recorded)

A time of reflection and testimonies on what God was doing over the weekend.

It's amazing that the God who made the universe also knows your name. How do we know that? We see it in the story of Zacchaeus which we will be looking at throughout this series called "It's Personal." In this series we will realize how much Jesus loves us and cares about us and gives us an example to live out for others.

Jesus gives an amazing example of a garden with vines. He explains why it's so important that we stay connected to the vine so that our spiritual lives can continue to bear fruit.

The reason why Jesus came to this earth was to help you know that you are not just invited to belong in the Kingdom, you also belong in the Kingdom. Remember that we celebrate Christmas because it was God's way of saying that we belong with Him.

Some things are so hard to believe, or just so crazy, that you just need to see it for yourself. This Christmas season, our challenge to you is to really get to know the Christmas story yourself. You won’t be disappointed.

Oftentimes we have expectations that aren't met - for our friends, our family, and even God. But no matter what our reality is, God is with us through it  all.