Sermons

The gospel calls for a response: Will you repent of your sin and trust in Christ, or will you reject His call and remain in your sin? Many who choose the latter cite a perceived lack of evidence or demand a clearer sign. In Luke 11:29–32, Jesus confronts this challenge and declares that His own life is the ultimate sign and the decisive evidence of the truthfulness of His claims. In the words of Christ and the facts of His life, we have all we need to accept, submit to, and boldly proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ.

The fact that the Bible has so many different words for sin is a good indication that God takes it quite seriously. Not only that, such a comprehensive list of words helps us understand the breadth and depth of our offences. Rarely does a person appreciate the cure until they realize the extent of the disease. A deep dive into the sinfulness of sin should make our hearts sing with hope in the Saviour of sinners!

Every person in the world has a representative before God. It is either Adam (the first man), or Jesus Christ (God’s Son). Your eternal destiny hangs upon which of these two men represents you. You were born with Adam as your representative. You must be born again to procure Jesus Christ as your new representative. Only one of them will lead you to eternal life.

There are parts of your Bible that are not impossible to understand, but are easy to misunderstand or just breeze over. Romans 5:12-14 is one of those little paragraphs, but it sets up a vital foundation for what follows in the rest of this chapter. Most of us love the idea of Jesus becoming our representative before God. Where we struggle is in believing that we were born with Adam representing us, without any input from us whatsoever. Why all this representation and why must you have both or none?

Every good pilot follows a pre-flight checklist where he or she makes final preparations of their airplane and the way in which it will be flown. Even though these things are simple and routine, a failure to do them might result in catastrophic outcomes. So the Christian’s walk through this world of delighting in God must be maintained by certain choices and disciplines. None of them are all that startling, but the absence of any will greatly reduce our delight.

Delighting in God is the essence of the Christian life, but cannot be assumed. If we are not careful, we will replace delight with duty, rejoicing with works, and exultation with exhaustion. This series has aimed to refocus our lives on finding our greatest delight in the Person of God. It is something which every Christian needs regular reminders of and every unbeliever regular invitation to.

One of the keys to delighting in God is simply loving Him for who He is. This may sound obvious, but think about how much you love God. Do you often tell Him you love Him? And what do your day to day actions say about your love? God commands us to love Him, but also tells us a failure to love others means we have not loved Him. True love for God will always result in love for others, even our enemies.

There is a thread of truth running through your entire Bible that is easily missed. God desires that we delight in Him. From the first days in Genesis to the last days described in the Revelation, God is inviting the people He made to enjoy Him forever. As the greatest good in the Universe, this makes sense. True joy has its source in God alone. David knew this and writes in this Psalm of how to find that happiness in God even in the worst of circumstances.

With so much going on in our churches, it's easy to forget the importance of praying together. This morning, let’s look at five reasons from Scripture that answer the question: Why should we commit to corporate prayer?

God had promised the Apostle Paul that he would deliver him safely to Rome so he could testify about Jesus before Caesar. Along the way, Paul and his companions encountered a terrible storm that threatened to take their lives. Yet Paul continued to trust in God’s promises and to live like they were true. He continued to trust in God through the fiercest of storms.

It is not easy to trust God, especially in the midst of our trials and sufferings. So praise God someone perfectly trusted God for every single Christian. Because of him, the Christian’s suffering will one day end, and it will end forever. To him be all the glory both now and forever.

We have slowed down in Romans 5:1-11 to make sure we are grasping the amazing benefits that belong to every single Christian. Maybe your credit card comes with free travel insurance. That will do you no good unless you know about it. Too many Christians live like these blessings are not theirs. It is quite possible Paul has put them into a kind of escalating order, saving the best for last.

The relationship between strength and weakness so often goes terribly wrong with the strong taking advantage of the weak to harm or oppress them. In this passage we see how one man addresses and corrects this relationship so we can learn from him and imitate him.

Faith is trusting what God says is true. And we show our trust by how we act. So, when God says that He has rescued His children from hell by the death of His Son, these new friends of God not only need to believe that future, but live in the present like it were true. God loves His people so much that He has done everything they need to enjoy an eternity of fellowship with Him.

Love can be risky. At least between humans. Not only are we experts at violating love, we often have all the wrong ideas about it to start with. We think it has everything to do with how others make us feel, as opposed to how we serve them. We should delight in the fact that God is love. He never gets it wrong. And the proof of that love (as if we needed that!) is the death of His Son for His people.

Trials and difficulties are a key component of the Christian life. As much as they may be uncomfortable and unfortunate in the moment, they cannot be avoided, and there's a good reason why this is so: God purposes hardships for the spiritual good of Christians. Like a bitter, but effective medicine, sufferings, though painful, are good for the Believer's soul.

God is who he says he is. He does what he says he’ll do. In this Psalm we see a contrast between two people. One trusts in God and one does not; and their futures couldn’t be more different. One is glorious. One is not. Do you trust in God? And, if so, will you continue to trust in him no matter what?

There are times we get things backwards in the Christian life. Sometimes we think the worst thing that could happen to us is another trouble or trial. In reality, that difficulty or resistance may be a gift from God to grow our faith and experience more of His love. Wise Christians learn to stop resisting His providence and start increasing their hope.