The Heights Baptist Church

We live in a culture that questions if family, if marriage really gives us any more chance at love, for it is marriage and family that seems to be a big source for so much hurt. So why do it? Why trap ourselves in those bond? Well we saw last week that trapped in those bonds just might be our greatest opportunity to learn love. Marriage and family has not failed us, as much as we have failed to un...

How is it that the home can have our most meaningful moments and our worst? How do we experience the most hurt and disappointment with the people that love us the most? I think the home will always be our greatest opportunity to experience both love and hurt. Why? Because the home houses the sinners we cant easily get away from.

Happy Easter! We are so glad you are here to join us and a billion or so people around the world in remembering and celebrating the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And in that vain, let us refresh ourselves with the story. Ill read portions of the story as told by the Gospel of Mark beginning in 15:22-27; 33-39; 16:1-6.

We are in our 3rd and final week of a short series on Ordinances or Sacraments. In our tradition that is baptism and the Lords Supper. Last week we saw in baptism, we rally to the commitment to be followers of Jesus. We are all the same in that we started following Him in the same place, the waters of baptism. Now today we come to the Lords Supper where I have come to the realization that on a top...

We have begun a short series on Ordinances, also referred to as Sacraments, which in our tradition is baptism and Lord’s Supper. We heard a definition from Augustine describing these as an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual reality. Today we are going to look at baptism. We’ll start with understanding baptism and I think that will help us look at the inner reality; and then we wil...

We are beginning today a short series on Ordinances or Sacraments. Today I just want to do a bit of an introduction, understand these words, ideas, and then the next two weeks we will take a week each with baptism and then the Lords Supper.

Ephesians 2:11-20 calls our attention to 1) the story of connection, 2) the cost of connection, and 3) the means of connection. Most importantly, we see that Jesus has paid all of the costs and recouped all of the losses that are needed to make for peace.

As the church, we have been entrusted to carry the gospel to our community and world. It is actually the last thing Jesus said to us. We are a witness to our family and friends, to a watching society; and part of doing this is using our resources for doing good, for advancing the gospel. We've been entrusted with resources and entrusted to use them for good things. Good things biblically includes...

You know where Gods heart is on this Valentines Day. It is on you, this day and every day. The story of the Bible, the message of the gospel is Gods love for you. Probably the best known verse in the entire Bible is, 'For God so loved, He gave'.

There is something we cant lose, and it is a lot more important than our keys, or even the Super Bowl: Gods love and salvation. It is referred to as eternal security, or maybe more well known as, 'once saved, always saved'.

When we are born again, we are a part of family. We are connected. We follow Christ together. We are to place ourselves in a relationship with other followers where we can stir and be stirred to do two things: love and good deeds. That is relationship and that is ministry.

We would like to invite you to join our Senior Pastor from his home as he shares a special message from his home entitled 'To Fear or Not to Fear'.

Life is better when your life is fully connected in the life of the church. I want that statement so bad to rock your world, change your agenda, calendar and priorities. I want it to touch every relationship you have and all you are about. I am guessing it doesn't. What if its true? What if it is what God said?

I want to explain a story that is told in Genesis 3 and John 3. The opening pages of the Bible give us Paradise. And indeed it is the beauty of nature. Nature that is untainted, absolutely pure. We cant imagine. In Gods paradise, not only is there all this beauty, with no garbage, but there is never conflict. Adam relates with all of the animals as he names them. Adam and Eve are one, naked and un...

Today I would like to suggest 10 Commitments for 10 Weeks. These ten commitments are not just ten things to do, but they are ten things God promises to bless. These aren't resolutions. We already know we don't keep those. This is obedience as a way to find the life you want, and while obedience is a way of life, I am suggesting ten weeks to make commitment bite-sized, to give it a trial run.

This time of year we think about goals for the following year. Those goals are what we believe is the 'best we can do', and they are based off of our assumptions about what the 'good life' is. This morning I would like to suggest that the good life is 'knowing God', and the best we can do this year is to 'walk with Him'.

God is going to be with us for Christmas. What would be on your to do list if God was coming to your house for Christmas: couple dozen more cookies, another Amazon gift card, make up another bed or do you put God on the couch? What do you do to prepare? Is that an unnerving thought?

Today I am calling Joseph the quiet hero in the story. According to Websters Dictionary a hero is a person of exceptional quality who wins admiration for noble deeds, especially deeds of courage. While that is a modern day definition, I think hero today is more often applied to a deed of courage, isn't it, and whether or not they are a person of exceptional quality is really not the focus. Joseph...

Walking worthy of the Lord is entirely related to what we are with one another, for one another and to one another. The result of being at this table today is that we walk away more like Jesus, and when that happens, it is the people around us who loved, served, and blessed.

I love Thanksgiving. It contains a lot of the same stuff of Christmas without the cost and the stress; right? Same food, family, and football without all the effort. But I love this holiday because it challenges us at a biblical discipline that may shape your understanding of God and life more than anything else. Your gratitude shapes your attitude and that determines the life you experience.

Today concludes our 2015 Global Impact Conference where we here our church members, David and Sheila Johnson, share about their call to missions.

There is no greater and more consistent force for good in the world, past and present, than the Christian Church. Be proud of the Church. Don't be bullied into believing the misinformation and lies. But I would also have to say, *Dont expect any thanks from the world.* They want the lie. They want to hold onto any place we have messed up in a community or in the world, and that is not going to cha...

The vision of The Heights Baptist is to impact our community and world for Christ. That is what we want to be and do together. In making this impact for Christ we must have a vision toward where we live and a vision for the world for that is what Jesus calls us to do.

Patience has always been difficult, but it has to be harder for a person in the modern world with instant everything at our finger tips: from the Microwave to Google. Maybe the hardest thing to wait for is justice. Waiting for wrongs to be made right. Waiting for a person to stop doing the harm they are doing. Waiting for God to come fix things. That can be an awful, painful waiting. And that is a...

Maybe when asking for something…you don’t usually forget to say please. That might not be an issue for you. But I do believe that there are two other words…that we don’t say enough…and that if we would say more often…these words…or I should say…the attitude that these words convey… boy that would make a huge difference in our lives. The words are simply, Thank you. Thank you.