The City Gates Church

Make seeking God the greatest priority in your life and everything else that is important will fall into place.

Christians should give, pray, and fast for God, but this is only possible when our aspirations, attention, and affections are focused on Him instead of on others or ourselves.

Jesus teaches us to declare dependency on our Heavenly Father for provision, pardon, and protection. Matthew 6:5-15

Every day of our lives there is a competition between autonomy and making our own independent decisions and authority and accepting the need to submit to another, to be regulated by someone other than me. This battle between authority and autonomy is a test of our allegiance: when push comes to shove, will I choose me or bend the knee? Our allegiance is tested every day in significant as well as t...

Christian prayer is communication with a Holy Father who knows our needs; understanding this affects our expectations of, and approach to, prayer.

It is possible to do religious things like giving, praying, or fasting for the wrong reasons, so Jesus confronts the issue and offers a corrective.

Jesus commends a life full of discrete giving that benefits others, glorifies God, and results in personal reward.

We human beings have this tendency to take the things God says and twist them to suit our own interests, desires, or tendencies. We often make excuses for ourselves, let ourselves off the hook, and generally see ourselves as better than we really are. So , Jesus comes along, pushes our ideas aside and goes after our heart. As we've said so many times, He goes after the source of our disease instea...

This morning we find Jesus talking about the institution of marriage and the habit some people have of swearing oaths. We’ll cover some very interesting stuff this morning, but let me give away the surprise before we even get started, this really isn’t about divorce and marriage and what you can and can’t say, it’s an attempt to expose what’s going on in your heart that would lead to these outcome...

Christmas Eve Celebration at the City Gates Church in word and song

God is concerned with our desires, not just our deeds, and encourages a radical response to causes of sin.

Jesus wants us to know that murder is actually just one symptom, one expression, of a deeper and wider disease. Murder is just the ugly offspring of anger. No one ever said, I'm so grateful and thankful and appreciative for you, I just can't wait to hurt you. So what you really need to do is go after the anger that produces murder and that anger lives in each of us.

This morning we continue our study in the gospel of Matthew and the sermon on the Mount. Until this point Jesus’ Sermon has been primarily centered on us individually. You are blessed with the blessings. The behaviors are manifested in your life. Now we begin to see how the presence of these behaviors and blessings in your life has an essential impact on the world around you.

This morning we continue our study in the gospel of Matthew. We've been looking at the Sermon on the Mount, the longest sermon by Jesus on record. This morning we finish the introductory section known as the Beatitudes.

We continue our study through the Gospel of Matthew. We're in the Sermon on the Mount, the most famous teaching of Jesus. And specifically, we're in the opening section known as the Beatitudes, from the Latin word beatus for blessed, because it's a list of eight behaviors and attitudes specially blessed by God.

We continue our study in the gospel of Matthew. We've come to the Sermon on the Mount, and we're looking at the opening passage, called the Beatitudes, where Jesus tells us about the behaviors and blessings that characterize those who are devoted to Him.

I want you to consider something rather obvious about this: God takes it for granted that you will mourn. God doesn't promise your life on earth willbe nothing but unicorns and rainbows, puppy dogs and cotton candy, beautiful beaches with a gentle breeze. He expects that you are going to mourn. That's not odd to Him. That's not bizarre. It's normal.

We continue our study of the Sermon on the Mount this morning, Jesus' most famous sermon. If you take what you find here seriously, and you should, it will challenge the way you live your day to day life.

If you have come in here this morning, and you are at the end of your rope, if you are exhausted and spent, tired and frustrated, I want you to know: you're in the right place. We 're going to hear Jesus speak in the Sermon on the Mount, His most famous sermon, and we're going to find a message of encouragement and blessing for those who are willing to receive it.

People from the capital and all around Israel went out to hear what John had to say and see what God was doing through him. People were broken by what they heard and saw. God was on the move, convicting people, showing them sin they needed to confess, areas that needed to change in their life, and they responded by saying, “Yes, that’s me. I need to change.

What often happens after you make a declaration that you want to live for God? Things get hard. Your change, your choice, and your commitment is challenged. And that's what we see happen with Jesus this morning.

So far, on our journey through Matthew's gospel we have seen Jesus' family tree and heard the story of His rather unusual birth to a virgin mom and adopted dad. This morning, the story moves ahead almost 30 years and we find Jesus as a grown man about to begin His ministry.

When Jesus is born, different people respond in different ways - which best represents you?

Matthew's life was turned upside down by Jesus, is it any wonder he would show us that Jesus' family tree was full of people you wouldn't expect?