St. Paul's Church - Willington, CT

Today we continued our series on the Apostle's Creed with a line that proclaims a mystery at the heart of our faith: that Jesus was both fully God, and fully human. We considered how to respond to the main objections about the virgin birth, what it means for Jesus to be fully God and fully human, and why it matters.

This week we resumed our series on the Apostle's Creed with the first line about Jesus. The creed begins by confessing three things about him: he is (1) Christ, (2) God's only son, and (3) Lord. We considered how each one of these terms tells us something important about what Christians believe about Jesus.

This week we were joined by guest speaker Fritz Maurer from Regeneration Therapy. Fritz helped us to reflect on Jesus' "first and second greatest commandments." We considered the relationship between loving God, loving others, and loving ourselves.

This week we took a break from our Apostle’s Creed series and learned about the importance of having an inner circle of people that reflect the values that are important to Jesus, and that we want to see in ourselves.

We continued our series on the Apostle's Creed this week with the next line: I believe in God...creator of heaven and earth. What is meant by "heaven and earth"? What does it mean to call God "creator"? Most of us have an intuition that there is a Creator, but what if we've come to doubt that intuition? We considered some reasons to embrace what we tend to know in our bones: that the world is not...

This morning we started a new series, The Creed, where we're looking at an ancient summary of the core beliefs of the Christian faith. This Fall, we're figuring out what it means for us as a church community to affirm these core truths and live our lives in light of them. This week the first line: "I believe in God the Father Almighty," led us to a lot of subjects: Rollercoasters. God's pronouns....

This Sunday we were joined via a video message by Mike Distefano from Amirah, Inc. Mike helped us to recognize both the scope of the brokenness of the world, and the reasons for great hope in the midst of it.

This week we finished our series on Ephesians by looking at Paul's final exhortations to put on "the armor of God." What does it mean to do that?

Today we continued our series in Ephesians with a passage that might sound offensive to our modern sensibilities, with lines like: "Wives, submit to your husbands" and "Slaves, submit to your masters." We considered how seeing the passage in its historical context reveals it to be more a call to love and mutuality in our relationships than authority and hierarchy.

In chapter 5, Paul continues to explain what it looks like when we "live lives worthy of the calling we have received."

This Sunday we took a break from our Ephesians series for a special message from our worship director, Steve Bell. With candor and vulnerability, Steve told the story of his faith journey and how Jesus has worked in his life.

In the second half of Ephesians chapter 4, Paul continues to describe what it looks like for us to "live lives worthy of the calling we've received." He insists that we "no longer live like the Gentiles do." We explored what that means.

After spending half the letter talking about who we are in Christ, the Apostle Paul shifts in chapter 4 to talking about how we should live. We considered what it looks like "to live lives worthy of the calling we've received."

This week we examined what Paul prayed for the Ephesians. He prayed for things we all need prayer for, although they aren't the most common prayer requests. We considered the meaning of Paul's requests, and how they should should shape our perspective and focus.

This week we took a break from our Ephesians series to hear from one of our missionary partners, Evan Burgess. Evan addressed a question most of us struggle with throughout our lives: "What is my calling?" Evan explored how the Gospel helps us to answer that question. (NOTE: Because the wi-fi at the church dropped out during Evan's message, part of it was lost. The cut out happens around 6:33. If...

This week we continued our Ephesians series by looking at a passage where Paul reveals a fascinating (and often forgotten) plot point about the purpose of the church in God's story.

This week guest speaker John Vampatella continued our series in Ephesians. Paul said that "a mystery had been made known to him." We identified what that mystery was, and what it means for us today.

The letter to the Ephesians tells us that God created "a new humanity" through Jesus. We identified what defines "the new humanity"...and what doesn't.

This week we continued our series on Ephesians. We considered what Paul meant when he said that "we have been seated with Christ in the heavenly realms." This podcast begins with a prayer inspired by the recent mass shootings in Uvalde and Buffalo.

This week we began our new series on the Book of Ephesians. Paul begins his letter with an outpouring of praise for the spiritual blessings we have through Christ. We identified what these spiritual blessings are. We also considered what it means that we are "predestined" and "chosen before the creation of the world."

This week we were joined by Pastor Phillip Beatty from Hartford City Church. Phil helped us to see the significance of a special interaction between Jesus and Peter at the end of the Gospel of John.

This morning we were joined by Kyler Barr from Walnut Hill Community Church. Kyler showed us how Psalm 73 and the Book of Habbakuk can provide comfort and direction when we fact disappointment and injustice.

Data suggests that over the last 10 years, people in our culture have grown more skeptical of the truth and usefulness of faith in Christ. This Sunday we considered a story from the Gospel of Mark (9:14-29) that can help give us perspective.

This week we looked at Jesus's longest recorded prayer in the Bible, the prayer he offered right before his arrest. Since honest prayers are a window into a person's deepest desires, we considered what this prayer reveals about what Jesus wants: for himself, for the world, and (especially) for his followers.

This Easter, we considered what three stories in the resurrection accounts reveal about how we come to realize that Jesus is risen.