Thinking about church growth

Several people have recently mentioned a desire to continue to grow as a church and asked about how we can go about this. This is a good desire, one that I share, and I am encouraged to hear such talk. This is something that has been on my mind more and more and...

Year one in review

This past week we celebrated our first birthday as a church, having launched services April 23, 2017. So much has happened in this past year that I never could have seen and that is clearly God’s doing. Here are a few of the ways I see God’s hand working, and for...

God’s reverberating words

This past Sunday, we considered what preaching is and why we do it. We believe that the essential task of preaching is to expose God’s word and bring it to bear upon a church. And we believe this because God has ordained to both bring people to saving faith and build...

The dividing line of the gospel

For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. –1 Corinthians 1:18 Everyone judges. We can’t help it. It doesn’t matter if you’re religious or not, everyone is judging other people and making...

The gospel doesn’t need our hype

“What has the power to attract and change people?”  If you’ve been part of a church, you’ve probably asked yourself this question at some point. I certainly have. But I am increasingly concerned with the answers we as the church are giving to this question. Not the...

2018 State of the Church

The beginning of a new calendar year provides a good time to look back and consider what God has done, and also look forward and consider how to live out the calling and meet the opportunities God has given us as a church. God is always working, and He has graciously...

6 factors for understanding biblical holy war

The biblical passage for this past Sunday’s sermon included the following: “And we devoted them to destruction, as we did to Sihon the king of Heshbon, devoting to destruction every city, men, women, and children.” (Deuteronomy 3:6) The topic of biblical holy war,...

Love and wrath

This past week’s sermon was largely on the topic of God’s wrath and judgment. These are difficult topics. They are difficult doctrines to grasp, both emotionally and intellectually. And that’s okay. It’s no surprise that when sinful, finite human beings try to...

Your heart is complicated

The gospel is a very simple message: “God saves sinners” (as J.I. Packer puts it). And in one sense, our response to the gospel is also a very simple thing: confess your sins and your need for a Savior and embrace Jesus as your sufficient Savior. This isn’t...

Self-care and biblical truth

In preparation for a recent sermon, I did some reading up on the self-care movement. As with many movements, there is good and there is bad. To that end, I thought I’d take some of the advice or sayings of this movement and hold them up to the light of biblical truth....