Boise Gospel Teaching

Even with the birth of Jesus, the world was and is! still dark and we are still waiting. So what are we waiting for? What was Simeon waiting for, and how can we learn from him?

Mary was the first person to learn about the incarnation, the method God's salvation plan, and the name Jesus. She was the first person to have faith in this message. She was the first Christian. So what did her faith look like? And does ours look like hers?

How can we learn from John the Baptist as we prepare, like he did, for the coming of our Lord Jesus?

He came once as a baby. He's coming again as a Creator, riding on the clouds. The Advent season is about remembering Jesus' first coming so that we an properly anticipate his return!

True gratitude is proven in generosity. Paul believed that Jesus makes Christians generous. So how do we think rightly about what we have, and live as truly cheerful givers?

When we believe the Gospel and receive God's Holy Spirit, we join the front lines of a cosmic battle. Our life and relationships become the new territories to be won for Christ. But the enemy is cunning and we're not strong enough. So how do we be strong like God? How do we put on God's strength?

Guest teacher, Don Straka, opens Psalm 77 with us and explores what it means to lament in the presence of God.

If the Christian life is a life of "submitting to one another" (5:21) then how does that submission show up in the unique and various roles and relationships that we find ourselves in?

As a family that imitates God and loves like Christ, what does it mean to walk together as children of light, as wise, and as filled with the Spirit?

In the midst of Paul's practical and ethical exhortations, he anchors Christian ethics in a simple description of what it means to be and live as a Christian. Being a Christian is all about imitation, love, and substitution.

JB provides a report from his trip to East Africa, and we ask the simple question; Why go? Aside from wanting to be obedient to Christ who sends us, what motivates and compels us to go either to Africa or to our neighbor with the Gospel?

As a church, united in the Spirit, under Christ, what do we do now? What does this life in the Spirit look like and how can we put off the old life and live in the new life we’ve received?

Guest teacher, Kirk Crager, explores the very practical and immensely important question; What is Jesus’ vision for the church?

God gives us the strength we need to endure, by giving us His own life and Holy Spirit. But strength from the Holy Spirit doesn't just that we have new kind of religious fortitude. The Spirit makes us strong, specifically by making Christ real to us, among us, and through us.

The Gospel reconciles us individually to God, but it's reach doesn't stop there. The Gospel simultaneously reconciles us to one another! Jesus has established peace for us with God, and by that same work has established peace for us with one another.

When we look around and see the mess and brokenness of this world, it is fair to wonder How is God going to bring any of these things, let alone, everything together in Christ? If Paul were answering that question, he’d start with verse 1 of Ephesians chapter 2. “Look at you,” he’d say. "You were no better, dead like the rest of them, but God made you alive."

Paul has just described the Gospel and God's redemption plan, and at the center is the church. So how does this Gospel shape what he does next? What is Paul's heart for us, the church, and how should the Gospel shape our hearts for God and for one another?

JB Van Hoogen :: Inheritance Secured Paul sums up his rant of praise with the conclusion that God's purposes and our redemption have culminated in our adoption and that we possess an inheritance that only He can give and that only He can guarantee.

JB Van Hoogen :: Redemption and Revelation. Paul describes the kind of grace that has been "lavished on us in the Beloved One (Christ!)" as both a redeeming grace and a revealing grace. What does it mean to "have redemption" and how does redemption result in new knowledge of God "with all wisdom and understanding?"

JB Van Hoogen :: Every Spiritual Bessing Paul begins his letter with the wild statement that God "has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavens in Christ." When, why, and how have we received something so eternally and unfathomably wonderful as "every spiritul blessing"?

JB Van Hoogen :: Ephesians: Everything Together in Christ. At the right time God was pleased to enact a cosmic plan to bring everything together in Christ. And at the center of that plan, is not an army or political revolution, but a church. The book of Ephesians is a beautiful letter from Paul, that reads like a sermon and explores the implications of God's plan for us and for the world in Ch...

JB Van Hoogen :: BGC Values series. The last installment in our 5-part series on BGC’s core values. We have responded to the simple invitation of Christ, and are called to contend for a "sincere and pure devotion to Christ" as Paul exhorts the Corinthian church. What does this sincerity and purity of devotion mean for our life as Christians and a church? It means a commitment to simplici...

JB Van Hoogen :: BGC Values series. The fourth in our 5-part series on BGC’s core values. As members of Christ's church, we've been set on a mission to realize God's vision for a whole world filled with His worshippers. Not only do we value Boise, the specific place where we’ve sent and planted, but we value the places BEYOND Boise, recognizing that God has always had a vision for the...

JB Van Hoogen :: BGC Values series. The third in our 5-part series on BGC’s core values. We are a sent people, and should carefully consider the answer to the question, “sent where?” We believe in real proximity and presence to people in the real places that we live and work. For our church, that is Boise. For us individually and as families, that is our neighborhoods, schools, and workplaces.

JB Van Hoogen :: An introduction to membership in this family. We know that you cannot truly get to know anyone or any church from a document, but we believe that the ability to practice unity begins by being clear about who we are, what we’re about, and then nodding to each other to say, “let’s do this.” If you are exploring or considering membership with BGC, the following document outlines the...