The Bridge Church Sermons

As we finish up the last message in our Jonah series, take a moment to ask yourself a hard question... Am I Jonah? Jonah only prayed to God when he was upset or needed something. - Do you? Jonah was self-righteous and believed he was better than the people he was called to help. - Do you? Jonah lost sight of God's mission and only focused on his own comfort. - Do you? Maybe today, God has put...

God loves everyone, even his enemies. We are called as the body of Christ to represent Him, so we need to learn to love like Him. Maybe we are most like God when we love our enemies.  We are taught in Jonah 3:1-10 that God's love is forgiving, patient, and compassionate. There are no exceptions.  To support this ministry and help us continue our God given mission, click here: http://bit.ly/2N...

When Jonah was in the belly of the fish, he was in the in-between, a frustrating spot called restlessness. Restlessness is the unsettled, irritated seasons where we are stuck in the present tense. These times are hard to be in, but often, they are where we are transformed! It is in the belly where we become the people God made us to be.  If you are in the belly right now, don’t run, but instead as...

There is NO ONE beyond the bounds of God's grace.  In the book of Jonah, we see that Jonah believed the people of Nineveh did not deserve God's grace. He let the hope for sinners to be punished surpass the joy over the sinners redeemed. This is NOT the heart of God.  Sometimes the path away from God is often the path into a storm. Jonah is the story in which we all find ourselves: we are...

Do you ever fall into the trap of gazing at Heaven so long that you forget that you’ve been called to bring Heaven to Earth? Or looking to wherever you “saw Jesus” last but not seeing where he is leading you next?  In Matthew 28, Jesus calls us to go and make disciples of all nations and baptize them in the name of the Father and the Holy Spirit.  Take a moment to reflect on how the wind of the Ho...

Is desire for comfort getting in the way of your calling? Comfort can be good, but it can become dangerous when gets in the way of the mission.  “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” - Matthew 16:24  What would your life look like if you decided to step out of your comfort and into your calling?  Support the show

“As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” – John 20:21 We’ve been sent to love the people in the places we inhabit, and we all long for connection and belonging—two needs that we, as Christ followers, are uniquely wired to meet. We are made in the image of a God of community; therefore, we’re designed for community built on the foundation of His love.  What would change in our world if we did...

Is it truly better to give than to receive? Consumerism is at the very core of our nature as human beings. Many of us approach the church as consumers as well, when God intends for us to be contributors. We can all grow our capacity to contribute by looking for opportunities to “do good” every day. What if we began to view our cities, neighborhoods, and communities not just as places to live, but...

If you put your hand over your heart, you feel your heart beating, and that means something powerful. It means that God still has a purpose for your life.  But that doesn't mean we won't experience the darkness of our world in ways that affect us physically, spiritually, and mentally. The statistics around Americans struggling with suicidal thoughts are staggering, and they're more...

Feeling depressed doesn’t mean you lack faith any more than being happy means you have it. Mental illness is not a sin, it’s an illness. It’s time we started talking about it as such. The Apostle Paul tells us that we are a body, and that “when one part suffers, every part suffers with it” (1 Corinthians 12:26). If you broke your arm, you would never cut it off just because it was broken or say, “...

Our minds are as much a part of our spiritual life as much as anything, but if there's one conversation we find confusing or overwhelming, it's the one about mental health.  Let's talk about anxiety. If we struggle with it, we often don't know how to talk about it; if we don't struggle with it, we often don't know how to help those who do.  First, we must understand t...

Apart from the resurrection, our faith in Jesus is meaningless. If the tomb had not been found empty on that first Easter morning, the hope of Jesus conquering sin and death would be dashed.  But the empty tomb means something life-changing: we don't have to live an empty life. And if you've ever looked for life in dead places, remember the question asked to the women who showed up to th...

Jesus didn't come as the king anyone expected, but he did come as the king we needed—humble, holy, and holding hope for the world.  As we enter into Holy Week, leading into the events of Good Friday and Easter, we take a look at who Jesus is and how that changes the way we can look forward and live in a broken world that's desperate for hope.  Support the show

We can’t evade pain. All of us, if we’re not right now, will walk through trouble and difficulty in this life—Scripture tells us so.  What we can evade is joy. We can allow the circumstances around us to dictate what is happening inside of us, and we’re especially susceptible to this when we don’t root our greatest joy in Jesus. Then, when trouble comes, we won’t know where to look to be content. ...

We are prone to forget—sometimes small things, often major things... major things like when God has been faithful.  Has it ever felt impossible to believe the goodness and faithfulness of God, especially when you stood in the face of difficulty or hopelessness? You might be there right now.  Things might not be going well... Yet God is still in control, He is still faithful and good, and He is nea...

“God, I don’t like your timing, and I don’t like your method.” Ever been there? Ever had the courage to tell God that? That’s what Habakkuk told God. But even though he was frustrated, instead of running away, he ran near to God, and waited. And the lesson Habakkuk learns in chapter 2 is just as relevant for us today: God is working in your waiting. It may not always make sense. And it may not be...

"How long, O Lord?” Even if we haven’t said those words exactly, we’ve likely all had a moment in our faith where we question God. Does he even care? When things are falling apart, is He going to do anything? Where is He, and what is He doing? Habakkuk wrestled with these very same questions—so much so that we have reason to believe from his account that God not only hears and is okay with it...

Ancient people would expect God to make a holy place. But instead, God makes a holy day — a day of Sabbath.  This day was far more than a day for rest, as good as that is. It's a day designed to grow our intimacy with Jesus, deepen our surrender, and reorient our lives toward God.  It's a day for WORSHIP. Have you thought of your Sabbath that way?  It changes everything as you think abou...

The Sabbath is an opportunity to refuel—physically, but we can't forget emotionally and spiritually, too. After our weeks filled with hard work of our hands, heads, and hearts, we need our souls to be recentered too, and that happens through delight.  We need to think of the Sabbath as a weekly pitstop where we fill our emotional fuel tank with JOY. And there isn't a person in the world...

Ever feel like you’re going 24/7 with no real rest? Like you’re a “human doing”, not a “human being? It's the cycle most of us get caught up in without realizing we are, or not knowing a way out.  God gave us a clear picture of who we are called to be and what we are called to do. Over time, distractions make this image blurry, but Scripture calls us back with the invitation to Sabbath.  The...

Here's a sobering question: If God sabbathed, who do we think we are to think we don't need to, too?  Stopping for one day of the week—completely stopping—is uncomfortable because we live in a culture wired to do everything opposite. In fact, of the 10 Commandments, we don't brag about breaking any except for when we brag about how busy we are, or how long it's been since our l...

Do we own our stuff, or does our stuff own us? When we look at all the things you own, are we any happier?  More than a quarter of Jesus' teachings were about wealth, materials, and possessions, and that's likely because we tend to try meeting the voids in our spirits by filling it with things that will make us happier. As time has gone on, it's only gotten worse collectively.  If w...

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Have you ever wished for things to look different in your life, but gone back to doing the same old things you’ve always done? We’ve all been there… many times over. The things we do in life always do something to us. If we look at our habits, we can often guess what our future will look like, and the question stands: Are we doing things that will lead to the life we want? There is a concept calle...

What is your view of God? It's one of the most defining relationships we'll ever have, so truly, how do you see Him? For many of us, we've viewed God for years through the distorted lenses of pain, loss, anger, rejection—we can each fill in the blank.  But it's often through the moments we're broken-hearted that we break through to see the real love of God. The story of th...