Russellville United Methodist Temple Sermons

Part of embracing the journey of evolution as the church is examining the behaviors of God such that our evolution makes us more like him. While the world finds innumerable ways to reject people, God is affirming at his core. Therefore, to become like him, we must learn what it truly means to be affirming.

The church is intentionally comprised of people of all kinds. While scripture only names a few different categories of diversity, the theme is clear: no person with a desire to follow Jesus is excluded from being a part of his people.

Part of being a part of the body of Christ is embracing change as a beautiful and essential part of growth. While every person resists change on some level in favor of stability and predictability, the Spirit calls us into a much deeper and broader experience of life.

While baptism is carried out by human hands, its deepest work is done by God. In baptism, we are adopted into God's family, given a new name and a new nature. We often lose sight of the love that invited us into this family, and when we remember our baptism, we can recommit to counting the cost of love so that we can truly live our new lives for his glory.

The world and God who made it offer very different wisdom. The wisdom of the world says to destroy threats to your power, while the wisdom of God calls us to lovingly, humbly surrender power in order to transform enemies into allies.

What ancient prophets foretold, a pair of prophets contemporary to Jesus’ time saw with their own eyes. Their responses of worship teach us the importance of devotion even in waiting for God’s promises to be fulfilled.

Jesus arrived as one of us during one of humanity's darkest times. Though pursued by darkness, he overcame it. As we reflect on Jesus' nature as light, we will consider what it means to truly embrace him and how to experience his power over the darkness in our lives and in the world.

The greatest source of our hope is God's presence. When we sense and believe that he is with us through his Spirit, remembering that he sent his very Son to be walk among us, we will have confidence in the love he has for us.

When hope begins to come to fruition, we experience the overflow of joy. This morning, we'll look for ways we can see God's work in our lives more clearly so that we can experience this joy even amidst seasons of drought.

Hope can only truly be found when we find peace with each other, but our nature is often to choose conflict. This morning, we learn how the presence of Jesus helps lay this warring nature to rest.

Hope is confidence that something good is coming, yet it is one of the most difficult things to internalize, especially in the chaos of our day and age. As we walk through Advent, remembering the anticipation of Jesus' first arrival, we look at how hope is only possible when we lay down our aggression toward each other and listen to the wisdom of God.

The end of the church is to be united with our king. When Christ returns to reign, he will bring to fruition the full purpose of the church. Rather than a disembodied ether or a church service in the sky, we will experience a new creation in the presence of God, always in immediate reach of his love as every wrong is made right.

Our greatest hope is that Christ is returning, and death will see its final defeat. More than this, God's living church will finally experience its fullest unity with him in the resurrection as what scripture calls the bride of Christ. How can we live in anticipation of this final, greatest act of God's love for us?

Living with grief in life, especially the passing of loved ones, leaves us caught in the tension between wanting heaven but being called to live on earth. Today, we'll ask ourselves how to live with that tension in such a way that brings reminds us of our hope and offers it to those around us.

Everything that has a beginning has an end. Especially on days like All Saints Day, when we remember the brevity and fragility of life, we examine the value of using every breath, including our last one, for the love of God and neighbor.

If the church is an organism that has been made alive with Christ, then it needs Christ to sustain it, too. As we've learned that grace is what keeps us alive, we must remember that the word of God is the source for our understanding of that grace, meaning that being in the word regularly will not only teach us about God but empower us to live well.

While we acknowledge that it is because of the death of Christ that we find life in him, it can often be difficult to accept the grace necessary for us to receive that life. It is only in letting go of our ability to save ourselves that we can truly experience the fullness of the salvation and life of Jesus.

Everything that lives also grows. When we are born again, alive in Christ both as individuals and as gathered believers, we also begin to grow, but into what? Scripture says that we are growing into Christ and into maturity that makes us more unified as people of faith.

In our modern form of the church, we often place emphasis on church "membership" as our relationship to the church. However, in scripture, we are described as members not of a lifeless organization but of the living body of Christ. When we are a part of something living, that's what makes "membership" meaningful.

Part of remembering that the church is a living, breathing organism is remembering the reason why we gather. Instead of getting lost in the programming, we need to remember that everything we do needs to be rooted in active love, and only living things can love.

For centuries, the church has been understood as an institution like many others in our society. While this is true, the church is more than that. The routines and practices we maintain, noble though they may be, can distract us from the reality that we are the living, breathing body of Christ.

The story of our faith ends with us overcoming the opposition and oppression of the world and Christ himself reigning in justice over all. The final book of scripture says that we overcome by the blood of Jesus and the word of our testimony. We'll conclude our series by taking a hard look at what it means to embrace the two most powerful forces in our lives to overcome every trial and declare...

When the gospel was spreading in the early days of Christianity, people were invited into faith and fellowship with one another. Yet in our time, it is far more common to invite people to attend church or an event. This difference, which may appear subtle, makes all the difference in how we share our stories in the world.

Much of the emphasis of ministry is on opening the doors for those in the lowest positions to enter the kingdom and experience the greatness of God's love. However, much of how we attempt to do this, especially regarding young people, actually pushes them further way. Today, we'll explore the intentional and unintentional ways the church alienates youth, and how we can treat them with the...

One of the most emphasized aspects of sharing our faith is to be able to give a defense for what we believe. However, too often, we become so defensive about our faith that we become offensive by failing to do so in a loving way. Today, we'll examine what it means to be unashamed of the gospel without losing sight of the life of love we're called to live.