Seven Marks Church Messages

Every story has a beginning, including yours. But as individuals our story always begins in the middle of a much larger story than our own. We are born into God's story. Unfortunately, it often takes us a long time to figure that out.

This is a series about your story. But it's impossible to tell your story without the context of the larger story of God. So, no matter who you are or where you are in your faith journey, the invitation to all of us is to come further up and further in to experience life with God.

It had been 400 years since the Israelites had heard from any prophet concerning this Messiah. And then, Christmas came. God Himself became a man. He traded the throne of Heaven for a lowly throne in a manger. Love entered the world in a way that hadn't happened since the beginning of creation. At that moment, everything changed.

Peace isn't a feeling you can conjure up on your own or buy in a store. You can try, but what will you find? Flawed solutions. And why is that? True peace isn't something that can be found in any other place, thing, or person other than Jesus.

Jesus was born during the time of the Roman occupation in Israel. So, it wasn't a time of celebration, gladness, and joy. It was a time of oppression, sadness, cruelty, and grave violence. When the angels showed up to the shepherds and proclaimed, "We bring you good news of great joy…" there was a stark contrast between the message they delivered and the reality people were living in. Perhaps the...

Advent means 'arrival or coming,' and it is the season leading up to Christmas that encompasses the four Sundays before Christmas day. This advent season, we first want to invite you to dwell on the hope we have in Him and allow that hope to move you to holiness and devotion to Him.

How do you live when you know that no one sees you? The true test of a person's character is what they do when no one else is watching. And let's be honest, this can be a tricky question to answer, at least when it comes to ourselves. This is undoubtedly why Jesus had much to say about who we are in secret in his famous Sermon on the Mount.

We live in a culture that has been meticulously designed to make us believe that the quality and condition of our lives can be measured by our stuff. Our time, our money, our possessions, and our resources. But it doesn't have to be this way. The practice of simplicity from the way of Jesus has helped followers of Jesus avoid the trap and cultivate an 'open handed' lifestyle.

Is anxiety an inevitable feature of our lives? Do worry and fear need to have their way in our lives regularly? Well, according to the Apostle Paul, the answer is actually 'no.' For Paul, it didn't seem to matter whether he was having the worst day or the best day–every day was an opportunity to give thanks and be grateful.

In Romans 10 Paul shares that our ultimate responsibility is to know Jesus and to make Jesus known. God has gifted you and positioned you to make the name of Jesus known. People are in desperate need of the goodness and grace of Jesus. Pastor David Nelms shares how The Timothy Initiative is sharing the love of Jesus around the world.

Thriving is what happens when the person God created us to be is reflected in the way we spend our time, energy, and resources. In other words, thriving is the result of clarifying and living our unique calling in life.

We are in Week 6 of our series, You By Design, talking about the life-long project of growing up into your identity in Christ. In the project of becoming like Jesus, we all eventually discover that we need access to a less frequently needed or easily used tool: the power of community and the beauty of deep relationships with those around us.

Ask any church what they hope to see in their people. You will often hear metrics such as consistent weekend attendance, participation in community groups, helping with a serve team, and giving regularly. These are not bad things to want. These only become a problem when doing becomes the goal instead of a means to the goal of becoming like Jesus.

We all want our future to be better than the present, that's a given. But the tricky thing for many people is that we aren't sure how to reach our desired future. We get caught up in the moment, and we often struggle to see our present trajectory in direct opposition to our desired future. But the invitation extended by God to those who find their identity in Christ is to trust Him with their futu...

Distance running was one of Paul's favorite analogies in Scripture for describing what it looks like to follow Jesus faithfully for a lifetime. Following Jesus requires commitment, endurance, practice, pain, setbacks, goals, and time–just like running does. The Bible offers a wealth of wisdom to those who wish to run their race faithfully for a lifetime.

One thing is true of every follower of Jesus, regardless of how you discovered Jesus or when you started following him: We all have a past. Your past is a significant factor that helps explain the person you have become and the person you are becoming. It has an invaluable role in forming your new identity in Christ.

Things go better for us in just about every area of life when we have a design to follow. To God, human beings are a masterpiece of great worth and value – including you. God created you with intention, thought, care, and, above all, love. We believe it is essential to understand that your identity is found in Christ. It is the first of the seven marks of a disciple, and it is the project that wil...

God gave His people the practice of hospitality. The word means "love of the stranger or outsider." But hospitality is more than just a disconnected act. It's a posture of the heart that helps you see, feel, and act. You have no idea what that little gesture of hospitality will do in light of eternity.

In a highly individualistic society where we can be our own person and fight for independence from the time we learn to tie our shoes until it slips away from us in our old age, we often overlook the undeniable reality that everybody needs somebodies to live.

If prayer is communion with God, then we not only need to learn how to talk to Him, we must also learn how to listen to God. Listening begins when we recognize our need, know God's word, and approach through Jesus.

Prayer is a lifeline to life change. Unfortunately, many followers of Jesus struggle with this practice. But, as is so often the case, the practices that expose us initially are the same ones that change us eventually. You just have to keep practicing.

The church at Laodicea is typically recognized as the "lukewarm" church. Jesus had absolutely nothing good to say about them. And the crazy thing is that the church of Laodicea did not see themselves the same way Jesus saw them. Jesus was calling this church back to Him, and the same could be said about the church today. He desires His church to be effective, vibrant, and useful in expanding His k...

The church of Philadelphia stands out as different because Jesus has nothing negative to say about them. Jesus wanted the church to see its position differently. Through salvation, He held the keys to the eternal kingdom, dispensing his riches, grace, and love to everyone. As a result of the open door of salvation, the church of Philadelphia had the opportunity to bring the good news of Jesus to t...

The issue for the church at Sardis was spiritual apathy. They were coasting off their experiences of the past and had settled into a complacent place - not moving or sinking, simply existing. And it was killing them, whether they realized it or not.

Have you ever been in a fight or conflict knowing you are at fault? You may begin to excuse, justify, or try to craft a narrative in your head that you are right. In pursuing being "right," you often don't look for information but affirmation. And this is precisely what we see happening in the church of Thyatira in Revelation. The tendency that we have every day is to look for the voices that alig...