Love Christ

 This new sermon series is all about science. There are a lot of different views and opinions about science in the Christian community, which is why I think it's important to look at it from a Biblical standpoint. From the start, I want to make it clear that I'm not telling you what you should and shouldn't believe, but I am showing you the truth in the Word of God.  The culture that we are living in has this idea that we can either believe in God or believe in science. God is the creator of science, which is why I think this idea is the total opposite of what is true. Science isn't something that should be bringing us farther away from God, but closer. Just like people can and have altered the Bible, people can and have altered science. Without God, how are we supposed to understand science? We can't fully grasp and wrap our heads around creation without God, and this is why it's been altered. Altered to the human mind, when the mind of an extraordinary God cre...

           This is the last part in this series of Hope and Hannah! In the previous part, we talked about the first two things that we can do to help someone when the feel hopeless, now I want to look at the last two.                                                                           3. Direct their hopes to the word It's really easy to put our hope into the things of this world: friendships, grades, or sports teams. When we do that, a lot of the times, it doesn't turn out the way that we had hoped. It's even worse when it does, it does, and then it doesn't. Then it lets you down and you don't know who you are anymore because you put all of your identity and all of your hope into that one thing. John 8:12 says, "I am the...

Hope: A feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen. The story of Hannah showed us what hope is and how we can lose hope. I want to give you four practical things to do when you or someone you know feels hopeless. Here are the first two! Know the person and what they are going through  I know that this may seem really simple, but we have to know someone to be able to speak to them and to help them in their walk with the Lord. We can’t expect someone to listen to us if we don’t know them. It says a lot when you take the time to get to know the person, their story and what they’re going through. I don’t think I would put my hope in what someone else was saying if they didn’t know who I was or what I was going through.  Give them a truth to grasp onto  Everyone’s truth may look different, which is why it’s so important to get to know the person first. For one person, their truth could be, God will never leave or forsake you, for someone else, the t...

                This new series is all about hope. What should we do with the feeling of hopelessness and how can we help others through it? This series goes through the story of Hannah and how hope is shown through her life. What is hope? Hope is, “A feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen.” At some point in our lives, we have all hoped for something. For most of us, we have been in a situation where the outcome wasn’t what we expected or wanted.  Hannah’s story: Hannah was married to a man named Elkanah, he had two wives: Hannah and Peninnah. There was one main difference between the two, Peninnah had children, Hannah did not.  In this culture, having children was seen as the blessing and favor of God.  Every year, when Elkanah would go to make his sacrifice, he would hand out portions to everyone in his family. When he did this, he gave Hannah a double portion of what he gave everyone else, even ...

There is one final story in Peter’s life that I want to dig deeper into. In this story, Peter thinks he knows how it’s going to end, but God ends up surprising him in the best way. “ Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus. He called out to them, ‘Friends, haven’t you any fish?’ ‘No,’ they answered. He said, ‘Throw your net on the right side of the boat and you will find some.’ When they did, they were unable to haul the net in because of the large number of fish. Then the disciple whom Jesus loves said to Peter, ‘It is the Lord!’ As soon as Simon Peter heard him say, ‘It is the Lord,’ he wrapped his outer garment around him (for he had taken it off) and jumped into the water the other disciples followed in the boat, towing the net full of fish, for they were not far from the shore, about a hundred yards. When they landed, they saw a fire of burning coals there with fish on it, and some bread. Jesus said to them, ‘Bring ...

What does it look like to have faith in the wrong thing? Peter had incredible faith, but it didn’t just happen one day, this was something that he built over time. He went through both ups and downs to get to the faith that we know him to have. There’s a story in the book of Matthew that shows a specific point in Peter’s life that I want to look at.  Matthew 16:21-25 “From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. ‘Never, Lord!’ he said. ‘This shall never happen to you!’ Jesus turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.’ Then Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up ...

  One of my least favorite parts about going to the doctor is having to do the eye exam. I know that I can see, but when you have me covering and uncovering my eyes, it makes it very difficult. At first when we look with both eyes, it’s pretty easy, we aren’t shocked by what we are seeing. Once we have to cover one of them, it gets a little harder to see, but we can still see pretty well. But, when we uncover the eye that was covered and try to see out of it, it is so hard, it’s blurry and blotchy, it becomes much harder to see. This is a great example of what our faith looks like.  When we are living a life with Jesus, there are going to be things that come to the surface. There are going to be habits, actions, and thoughts that we are compelled to change. When we walk through life without anything blinding us, it is pretty easy, but, at some point, there are going to be things that come in and mess with our vision. We can still move around and see pretty well with the th...