Soma Spokane Sermons

After 40 days in the wilderness doing battle with the devil, Jesus launches his public ministry. He takes Isaiah 61 as his personal mission statement — “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor” — a remarkable passage to claim as his own! But when Jesus begins to explain what he means by it — that he’s come to bring God’s kingdom to outsiders,...

The goal of Luke's Gospel is to give us Jesus - the real deal, in all his goodness, might, and humility. In response, we say: “Jesus, you are the only hope of the world — you are my only hope. I admit my share in the responsibility for the world as it is. Forgive my injustice. Burn out my idolatrous self-reliance. Make me whole. Make me new. You alone are my salvation, and I give my entire allegia...

Our desire is to continue year after year to return to the key aspects of following Jesus with an intention to wrap our heads, hearts, and lives around him and his work in the world. 1 Peter is written to “elect exiles,” disciples of Jesus who are scattered all around the Roman Empire, trying to figure out how to follow Jesus in a world radically opposed to Him and His way. He writes to remind the...

Almost every September we do a short series together on Sundays and in our Communities around our Core Priorities: Gospel Formation, Life in Community, and Everyday Mission. Our desire is to continue year after year to return to the key aspects of following Jesus with an intention to wrap our heads, hearts, and lives around him and his work in the world. 1 Peter is written to “elect exiles,” disci...

Almost every September we do a short series together on Sundays and in our Communities around our Core Priorities: Gospel Formation, Life in Community, and Everyday Mission. Our desire is to continue year after year to return to the key aspects of following Jesus with an intention to wrap our heads, hearts, and lives around him and his work in the world. 1 Peter is written to “elect exiles,” disci...

Through the summer we have been slowing down to spend time in 8 different Psalms, looking a the 8 core emotions. The Psalms invite us into raw, passionate, and emotive life with God. The psalmists regularly expose the truth of their feelings before God, even in ways that may seem taboo in our lives. Many of us have believed that feelings are bad and can not be trusted. We've believed that feelings...

Through the summer we have been slowing down to spend time in 8 different Psalms, looking a the 8 core emotions. The Psalms invite us into raw, passionate, and emotive life with God. The psalmists regularly expose the truth of their feelings before God, even in ways that may seem taboo in our lives. Many of us have believed that feelings are bad and can not be trusted. We've believed that feelings...

Over the next several weeks we will slow down to spend time in 8 different Psalms, looking a the 8 core emotions. The Psalms invite us into raw, passionate, and emotive life with God. The psalmists regularly expose the truth of their feelings before God, even in ways that may seem taboo in our lives. Many of us have believed that feelings are bad and can not be trusted. We've believed that feeling...

Through the summer we have been slowing down to spend time in 8 different Psalms, looking a the 8 core emotions. The Psalms invite us into raw, passionate, and emotive life with God. The psalmists regularly expose the truth of their feelings before God, even in ways that may seem taboo in our lives. Many of us have believed that feelings are bad and can not be trusted. We've believed that feelings...

Over the next several weeks we will slow down to spend time in 8 different Psalms, looking a the 8 core emotions. The Psalms invite us into raw, passionate, and emotive life with God. The psalmists regularly expose the truth of their feelings before God, even in ways that may seem taboo in our lives. Many of us have believed that feelings are bad and can not be trusted. We've believed that feeling...

The Psalms invite us into raw, passionate, and emotive life with God. The psalmists regularly expose the truth of their feelings before God, even in ways that may seem taboo in our lives. Many of us have believed that feelings are bad and can not be trusted. We've believed that feelings are poor guides, untrustworthy, and will ultimately lead us astray. The truth is, God gave us our emotions. Each...

The Psalms invite us into raw, passionate, and emotive life with God. The psalmists regularly expose the truth of their feelings before God, even in ways that may seem taboo in our lives. Many of us have believed that feelings are bad and can not be trusted. We've believed that feelings are poor guides, untrustworthy, and will ultimately lead us astray. The truth is, God gave us our emotions. Each...

On Politics and Power: We affirm the need for Christian civic and political involvement to be marked by a thoughtful, intentional, and theologically-informed cultivation of good citizenship. While our primarily allegiance is to Jesus and His Kingdom, we believe we are called to honor our political leaders as servants of God. We are to be marked by reasonableness, gentleness, and common courtesy, r...

On Sexuality and Gender: We affirm a historic Christian view of the goodness of the human body, the purposeful creation of humans as male or female, and the sacredness of the marriage covenant between a man and a woman, designed by God to signify the relationship between Christ and his Church. Sexual intimacy is intended by God to enjoyed within that covenant. We believe sin has impacted every asp...

Complementarian: We are deeply committed to the equality of men and women, to the shared identity of brothers and sisters in Christ, and to the complementary roles of men and women in marriage and the church. Both men and women are created in the image of God and are therefore equal before God as persons, possessing the same moral dignity and value, and have equal access to God through faith in Ch...

Spirit-Led: We recognize and rest upon the necessity of the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit for all of life and ministry. The Holy Spirit is fully God, equal with the Father and Son, whose primary ministry is to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ. He also convicts unbelievers of their need for Christ and imparts spiritual life through regeneration (the new birth). The Spirit permanently indwells...

Reformed: We celebrate the sovereignty of God and his grace in saving sinners, through faith alone, in Christ alone, to the glory of God alone. We affirm that God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world, not on the basis of foreseen faith but unconditionally, according to his sovereign good pleasure and will. We believe that through the work of the Holy Spirit, God will draw the elec...

Missional: We embrace a missionary understanding of the local church and its role as the primary means by which God establishes his kingdom. The Scriptures reveal a God on mission, sending his Son to seek and save what has been lost, and then sending his Spirit to empower his people to carry on his mission. In the life and ministry of Jesus, and through his death and resurrection, the Kingdom of G...

The gospel is the good news of what God has graciously accomplished for sinners through the sinless life, sacrificial death, and bodily resurrection and soon return of his Son, our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ — namely, our forgiveness from sin and complete justification before God resulting in our adoption as his sons and daughters. This gospel is also the foundation for our confidence in the ul...

Psalm 44 is likely a Psalm written during or near the end of Israel's exile, and moves from an encouraging reminder of God's historical faithfulness to an impassioned cry for God to show his saving power again. The first 3 verses have been one of the texts we've leaned on over the last 3 years as we've asked God to continue to grow us into a long-term, disciple-making presence in our region and be...

Who appears to be stronger? Jesus or Caesar? Who would you follow? Who would you bet on? In this moment, Caesar looks strong and Jesus looks weak. But through this weakness, Jesus will conquer the world. Caesar ruled by conquering lands and subjugating people. Jesus ruled by conquering sin, death, and the grave and freeing people. This King bore the full weight of God’s anger and judgment towards...

We’ve seen so much goodness in Daniel and the Boys, watching and learning from them how to navigate life in a world that is not our home. They’ve modeled a kind of faithful presence — in the city, for the city, but not of the city — that might be one of the most helpful biblical pictures for disciples in our current cultural context. This week we look back over the lessons we’ve learned, taking no...

Another chapter brings another new king for Daniel to get to know, with another new set of rules to follow. While the satraps and officials play dirty, Daniel does the same thing he has always done: he gets down on his knees to pray. Conflict with the empire seems to be the norm for Daniel, as it is for every person living a life of “faithful presence”, but he has learned how to abide in the midst...

One of the main themes of our Exiles series has been the sovereign working of God behind the scenes even when godless Babylon seems to be prospering unhindered, and in Daniel 5 Babylon’s self-glorying comes to a crescendo. Belshazzar throws himself a great drunken feast in mockery of God and his people. But it is the last straw, and God brings the king trembling to his knees. Daniel has been off-s...