Episodes

Ruth 4. Experiencing God's loyal love through others has the power to move us to witness, redeem broken lives, and make our lives significant.

Ruth 3. The story of Ruth teaches us that God's extraordinary love is expressed through the actions of ordinary (and often the most unlikely) people. This is especially in times of suffering and cultural confusion. In this teaching, we consider Ruth's conversation with Boaz on the threshing floor and reflect on how Ruth's actions teach Boaz and Naomi about the extraordinary love of God.

Ruth 2. There's a mystery about where God's sovereignty intersects humanity's free will. We can experience this mystery through "as it turned out" moments when we trust God's providence while faithfully trying to find favor.

Ruth 1. To keep our faith while facing difficult trials, we must believe in God's providence (that He is in control) and God's promises (that He can be trusted). Circumstances don't tell us what God is like, but His promises do.

Matthew 7:24-29. Jesus ends his sermon by warning his readers about what happens to people who don't put to practice his teaching. His warning should cause us to evaluate what foundation we're building our lives upon and put his teachings into practice.

Matthew 7:13-23. Jesus invites us to follow his narrow and hard way that leads to life, and he warns us about the easy and wide way that leads to death - the way of religion and the world.

Matthew 7:12. Jesus summarizes the Sermon on the Mount with the Golden Rule. As much as we love the idea of the Golden Rule on paper, we often follow one of two unwritten rules of our own.

Matthew 7:7-11. Jesus teaches that we can pray with confidence when we ask God to help us become more like Jesus. We can pray confidently because we know it's what God wants for us, God can do it, and He's a good Father.

Jesus' command to not judge is one of our favorites to enforce in the lives of others, but when we try to live by it ourselves, we find it seemingly impossible. We will explore Jesus' position on the subject and its implications for those who want to follow him in this teaching.

Biblical hope is the joyful and confident expectation of what's to come based on something trustworthy. Jesus's resurrection is the trustworthy event that makes Christians have hope that everything will be made new.

I Corinthians 15:3-8. No one expected Jesus to rise from the men and women closest to him. Why did they document their unbelief, what caused them to change into those who proclaimed having seen Jesus risen, and what doe it mean for us today?

Philippians 2:8,9. Jesus's resurrection signaled the start of his restoration of the world, a restoration born through weakness, not power. Weakness is the way of God, the way to God, and the way we partner with God in restoring the world.

Matthew 6:33. Jesus announced the availability of the Kingdom of God to all people. In this teaching, we will unpack Jesus' gospel of the Kingdom and His expectation for those who would become His disciples.

Matthew 6:25-34. We worry because something is wrong in the world and something is wrong with our hearts. We can be free from worry when we believe that we're valuable to God and that he knows what we need and will provide.

Matthew 6:19-24. What we believe about God affects our entire lives, from the inside out. In this teaching, Jesus shows us how our vision of God influences our relationship to wealth, materiality, and the poor.

Matthew 6:16-18. We will practice fasting more regularly when we understand how our bodies affect our spirits and our spirits affect our bodies. We'll realize how fasting helps keep our minds on God when we do.

Matthew 6:5-13. Jesus teaches us how to pray and how not to pray. He promises great rewards for those who pray secretly and simply.

Matthew 6:1-4. Our Father notices us and wants to reward us for our good works, but if we do good works to look good to others, we'll miss out on God's reward.

Matthew 5:38-48. We can only break the cycle of Us vs. Them when we don't retaliate and overcome evil by doing good like praying for our enemies, serving them, and befriending them.

Matthew 5:33-37. Jesus teaches people to be those who keep their word. We keep our word because we were created to reflect God, the promise keeper, and called to love others, as God loves them.

Isaiah 58:6-11. The spiritual practice of fasting has benefits and dangers, so we need to ask what kind of fast God has chosen?

Isaiah 54:1-5. It's time to move from a survival mentality to a "thrival" mentality. We should expect great things from God and attempt great things for God.

Genesis 12:1-3. Why does God bless us? He blesses us because he is good, and he's up to something good. How should we respond to his blessings? By blessing God and blessing others.

II Corinthians 9:10-12. The generosity of one church leads to thanksgiving in another church and God being glorified in His Church.