God So Loved, He Gave
John 3:16–18
View the Sunday bulletin here.
Sermon Preview
This week, we’ll be looking closely at one of the most familiar passages in the Bible: John 3:16. "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” Familiarity with this passage can dull our response. God so loved, he gave! This isn’t just true when God sent Jesus into the world; God has always loved by giving. We saw two weeks ago from Genesis 1–2 that God loved Adam and Eve by creating a world filled with abundance and a garden for them to live in and enjoy God’s very- goodness.
Tragically, as we saw last week in Genesis 3, Adam and Eve were tempted by the Serpent to distrust God’s loving generosity on display for them and instead try to secure their own blessing through disobedience. Their disobedience had disastrous results. We left off with Adam and Eve cast out of the provision and presence of God in the garden with nothing but a promise that one day an offspring of the woman would crush the head of the Serpent. Going into Genesis 4 and beyond, we ask: “Whose story will they believe? The story of the God of the Gardens or the Story of the Serpent?” The outlook isn’t very hopeful.
This week, we’ll see that when hope seems lost, God does something surprising: he gives again. First to Noah, then to Abraham, then to Abraham’s descendants. All through the Old Testament, God so loved, he gave! God proves again and again and again the true story: He loves his image-bearers. He will care for them. He will bring them into a land filled with beauty and abundance again. He will one day give a Serpent-crushing Savior to his people.
How will his people respond to his loving generosity? Will they believe him or continue to believe the Serpent? That’s the story we’ll hear together this weekend. Join us at 10 am at the Skyline Plaza to worship together the God who gives!
Sunday Music
Thorns and Thistles
Genesis 3:1–24
View the Sunday bulletin here.
Sermon Preview
This weekend is week three of our advent series: “Delighting in the Generosity of God.” Last weekend, we saw from Genesis 1–2 that God created a world where everything was “very good” and planted a garden full of bounty and beauty. And he created Adam and Eve in his image and placed them in this garden to savor his gifts and spread his generosity throughout creation. Like Adam and Eve, we were created to live in and extend this garden as we enjoyed God’s generosity.
Looking around us in 2019, we can see something went terribly wrong. With even a cursory glance, we see a world around us filled with scarcity and brokenness; a world where there doesn’t seem to be enough and many people experience extreme lack. And we see others fight over and hoard what little there is. And if we look inside ourselves, we see our own disappointment with what we have and our desire for more. The story our world tells us now seems very different than the story we saw in Genesis 1–2. What went wrong? How did we go from bounty and beauty to thorns and thistles?
This is the story of Genesis 3. Because Adam and Eve believed the serpent’s false story of a god who hoards the best for himself, they ate of the forbidden fruit and unleashed an avalanche of destruction into God’s very good creation. This weekend, we’ll look at the story of Genesis 3 and trace the path from distrust to disobedience to disaster. But we’ll also see the true story of the generosity of God continue to bring light to darkness as God promises a descendant of the woman who will one day crush the head of the serpent. Would you join us this Sunday at 10 am at the Skyline Plaza as we hear this story together?
Sunday Music
All Things Bright and Beautiful
Genesis 1:1–2:3
View the Sunday bulletin here.
Sermon Preview
Last week, we began our advent series: “Delighting in the Generosity of God.” We saw from Luke 12 that whether we have plenty or lack, we are often preoccupied with “enoughness” rather than the God of more than enough. We see a world of scarcity around us and struggle to believe God is really generous. Our preoccupation with enoughness prevents us from enjoying God as a generous giver and from seeking his kingdom and imitating his generosity. We remain preoccupied with enough because we see a world full of scarcity and believe the wrong story.
Jesus’ solution is to look at God’s care for creation as evidence to point us to the true story—the Story of the God of the Gardens. This week, we will turn to the beginning of Genesis to look at the beginning of this story. We’ll see that in the beginning, God created a world filled with abundance and created us to live in this world, savoring and spreading his generosity. To see the world like Jesus saw the world and to live free from anxiety and in obedience to the Father as Jesus did, we need to see this story with fresh eyes and let it frame our thinking. Would you join us this Sunday at 10 am at the Skyline Plaza as we do that together?
Sunday Music
Birdwatchers and Botanists
Luke 12:13–34
View the Sunday bulletin here.
Sermon Preview
This Sunday, we begin our advent series “Delighting in the Generosity of God.” I’m really excited for this series because I often forget how generous God is. I bet many of you are the same. We desperately need to be reminded. Many of you are in the same boat. Whether you’ve received plenty and drift into forgetting the Giver or whether you have lack and doubt the generosity of the Giver, I’m confident that this sermon series will stir your heart to delight in God’s generosity towards you this Christmas season.
We'll start by looking at Luke 12. We'll see how our preoccupation with “enoughness” has caused us to forget the God of more than enough. Because we see scarcity all around us, we believe and live by the story that there is not enough. We think that by securing enough for us and ours we can be safe and satisfied.
But that’s not the story Jesus believes and lives by. He calls us to be birdwatchers and botanists as we consider the generosity of the God of the Garden. Jesus wants us to pay attention to His story—the story of a God who gave and still gives. And Jesus wants us to live like we believe it by casting aside anxious worry and mimicking the generosity of our creator.
We’ll start unpacking this story this weekend and continue through the advent season. Would you join us this Sunday at 10 am? Let’s delight in the generosity of God together.
Sunday Music
Stand Firm Thus
Phil 4:1–9
Sermon Preview
How do we keep following Jesus in a world full of temptation and trials, distraction and division, sorrow and suffering? How do we stand firm in the Lord when our knees are shaking? This is Paul’s concern in Philippians 4.
After warning that perseverance is a matter of life and death (Phil 3:17–21), Paul writes, “Therefore, my brothers, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm thus in the Lord, my beloved” (Phil 4:1). Stand firm begins a series of imperatives all aimed at the goal that the saints in Philippi would keep following Jesus. Paul doesn’t tell the Philippians what to do so much as he tells the Philippians how to think. In other words, they stand firm not by doing a series of tasks but by adopting certain attitudes. They stand firm by resolving by grace to think like Jesus. Join us this Sunday at 10 am at the Skyline Plaza as we unpack these attitudes together. May the Lord stir our hearts to resolve by grace to think like Jesus.
Take Care Who You Are Imitating
Phil 3:17–21
Sermon Preview
We are all imitators. From infancy, we look at those around us and learn how to speak, how to walk, and even what to think. No one needs to tell us to imitate others, because God has created us this way. God created us to bear his image as we imitate his creative work by fulfilling the creation mandate (Gen 1:27–28). The burden on Paul’s mind, then—when he wrote his letter to the Philippians—was not that they would learn to be imitators, but that they would imitate the right people. This is the theme of Philippians 3:17–21, our text for this coming Sunday.
Paul writes, “Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us” (Phil 3:17). Paul has a certain pattern of life in mind when he says this. Since the end of chapter one, Paul has been holding up the pattern of life formed around Jesus and his cross-work, and calling the Philippians and us to follow that pattern. This weekend, we’ll look at this pattern of life once again and see the danger that comes not in rejecting the doctrines of the cross, but in rejecting a way of life conformed to the cross. Join us this Sunday at 10 am at the Skyline Plaza.
Sunday Music
Press on Like Paul
Phil 3:12–16
Sermon Preview
Paul writes in Philippians 3:8: ”Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ....” Last week, we saw that Paul gave up all claim to counterfeit confidence in either his pedigree or his performance because knowing Christ Jesus is of “surpassing worth”. Having lost everything, as he says in verse 8, in order to gain Christ, his readers might assume that Paul has now “arrived.” He knows Jesus and possess all the blessings in the heavenly places promised in Christ Jesus. But Paul continues and shows us that is not the case.
Paul has not arrived at his goal: “Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on...” (Phil 3:12). Even as Paul writes this letter toward the end of a long career of following Jesus, from a prison cell, awaiting possible execution, he recognizes his race is continuing. “I press on,” Paul writes, ”toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” But Paul isn’t telling us this just so we know what’s going on with him. Paul is calling us to press on with him toward the goal for the prize promised by God when he called us to follow Jesus (Phil 3:15–16).
Paul writes this paragraph so we don’t think he’s arrived or is sitting by the sidelines somewhere waiting for Jesus to return. And he writes this paragraph so we don’t do that either. This weekend, we’ll see why and how Paul presses on and we’ll hear Jesus’ voice through his Word calling us to press on too. Join us Sunday at 10 am at the Skyline Plaza as we press on together.
Sunday Music
Be Like Paul: Treasure Jesus
Philippians 3:1–11
Sunday Music
Return, O Faithless Children
Jeremiah 3:1–18
Sunday Music
A Life Worthy of God
Colossians 1:9–12
Sunday Music
Be Like Epaphroditus
Philippians 2:25-30
Sunday Music
Be Like Timothy
Philippians 2:19–24
Sermon Preview
Since chapter one of Philippians, Paul has been striking a singular chord with the Philippian church: walk in a manner worthy of the gospel by laying down your life to bring others to Jesus. In other words, be like Jesus. Paul knows our human tendency to let ourselves off the hook by arguing we are not Jesus and never could be. It is easy to make excuses for not doing something when it is abstract and theoretical.
But Paul wants to see the gospel grow and flourish in the Philippian church (and in us!) and so, he promises to sent Timothy. And that’s the beginning of our text this week: “I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon, so that I too may be cheered by news of you” (Phil 2:19). What does Paul’s plan to send Timothy to Philippi have to do with you and I living in southern MN in the 21st century? Paul gives some specific reasons for sending Timothy and by doing so, he is holding up Timothy as an example of Christ-likeness for the Philippian church and for us. This weekend we’ll look together at Timothy’s example and how striving to be like Timothy can ultimately make us more like Jesus. Would you join us at Sojourners Church at 10am in the Skyline plaza?
Sunday Music
We Work Because He Works
Phil 2:12–18
Sermon Preview
We believe the Bible teaches that we are justified by faith in Jesus Christ alone, through faith alone, as a gracious gift of God. What, then, are we to make of Paul’s command to the Philippian church in Philippians 2:12: ”...work out your own salvation with fear and trembling”?
What role does our obedience (“work out”) play in our salvation? We can come up with all sorts of confused answers. On the one hand, since there is nothing we can do to contribute to our salvation and since God has done all the work, we are tempted to coast with regard to our spiritual life. We expect the fruit of the Spirit to come easy. On the other hand, we can be tempted to think that with a little more effort and a little more obedience, we can make ourselves more worthy. We treat God like we can earn his favor with our obedience. Neither of these approaches is what Paul is talking about here.
So what does Paul mean that we “work out” our salvation? What should motivate us to obey this command? What hope do we have of obeying it successfully? These are the questions we’re going to wrestle with together on Sunday morning. Paul gives us a glorious promise and shows us the tremendous power that motivates and enables our obedience. Join us this Sunday in the Skyline Plaza at 8:45 am for Sunday school and 10 am for Sunday service, and we’ll explore Paul’s answers together.
Sunday Music
Christ Our Example
Philippians 2:5–11
Sunday Music
Gospel-Centered Unity
Philippians 2:1–4
Sermon Preview
“Hey you guys, get along back there!” How many of us have yelled that to kids in the back seat—or had our parents yell it at us? Getting along is not a distinctly Christian thing. We all desire the fruits of tolerating each other: peace, harmony, comfort, etc. But as a church, we’re called to more than just tolerating each other.
In Philippians, Paul writes to two Christian women, Euodia and Syntyche, “Get along ladies!” (Phil 4:2– 3). Unlike our appeal to kids in the back seat, Paul’s appeal to unity in the Philippian church is distinctly Christian. And he starts that appeal all the way back in chapter two.
Paul writes in Philippians 2:1–4, “So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.” What makes this appeal to unity distinctly Christian is the same thing that makes everything Paul writes distinctly Christian: Paul connects it to the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Paul could have skipped over verse 1 and gone straight to his appeal: “be of the same mind, have the same love, be in full accord and of one mind.” But he doesn’t. He grounds his appeal in the magnificent realities of the gospel. And this is where we should ground our striving for unity in the church. Too often, we skip straight to “How can we get along?” without looking at or connecting it to what Christ has done to unite us. This Sunday, we’re going to linger over these four verses and think deeply about the magnificent realities of the gospel and how they connect to Paul’s call for us as the church to walk in humble unity. My prayer is that our hearts would be stirred by the powerful realities of the gospel to humble ourselves as Jesus humbled himself and walk in Christ-exalting unity together. Would you pray that God would do that? And would you join us at 10am at the Skyline Plaza?
Sunday Music
Be a Good Citizen
Phil 1:27–30
Sermon Preview
This Sunday, we’re going to get political. In Phil 1:27, Paul writes, “Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ....” This statement might not seem political on the surface, but a little digging will show you what I mean.
The ESV includes a footnote which says "Greek ‘Only behave as citizens worthy’”. That’s because the Greek word Paul uses here (πολιτεύεσθε) doesn’t have an easy English equivalent (hence, “let your manner of life be....”) But, if we take a cue from the footnote and read the rest of Philippians with our ears open for citizenship language, we’ll find some in Philippians 3:20. “But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.” The sentences look unrelated in English, but are connected in Greek. If we poke around in Philippians 1:27–30 and 3:20–4:3, we see more shared vocabulary and concepts (stand firm, agree, strive/labor side by side, etc.). This means that Paul wrote Philippians 1:27–30 and 3:20–4:3 with similar themes in mind and we should read Philippians 1:27–30 with those themes in mind (especially citizenship).
The one thing, then, Paul wanted the Philippians to get was this: “Above all, you must live as citizens of heaven, conducting yourselves in a manner worthy of the Good News about Christ.” (Phil 1:27 NLT). This is how Paul summarizes the Christian life: “Be a good citizen.” This brings up a host of questions. How are we good citizens? What does it mean to be “worthy” of the gospel? Why did Paul think this was the most important thing for the Philippians (and us) to do? We’ll answer these questions and more this Sunday. Join us at 10am at the Skyline Plaza to marvel that our citizenship is in heaven and to learn what it means to be a good citizen of heaven here on earth.
Sunday Music
To Live Is Christ
Philippians 1:18–26
Sermon Preview
Jesus’ death and resurrection massively changed the equation of life and death for his followers. For everyone in Christ Jesus, no longer does “death = loss”. In Christ, “Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” (1 Cor 15:54–55). At the cross, Jesus “destroyed the one who has the power of death, that is the devil, and delivered all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery” (Heb 2:14–15). Our freedom from fear of death and our victory in Jesus’ resurrection are fundamental to our hope as Christians.
This glorious truth surely on Paul’s mind when he wrote in Philippians 1:21, “to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” These words have been a mixture of promise and inspiration for countless generations of Christians. We aspire to be like the missionary ideal: convinced that death is gain, we are ready to give anything and everything (even our life!) to bring the gospel of Jesus to a people who have never heard the good news. This verse challenges and inspires us.
Yet, as we look at this verse in context, we see that it’s even more challenging than we thought. For Paul, “to live is Christ and to die is gain” redefines not just death but life. Because “to live is Christ,” Paul finds joy even though he is momentarily denied the “better” (to depart and be with Christ) for the sake of the necessary (to remain with the Philippians for their progress and joy in the faith). In other words, since death is gain, Paul is able to joyfully live for Christ by denying his own desires and serving the good of the Philippian saints.
This Sunday, we’ll unpack this truth from the text of Philippians 1:18–26. Join us this Sunday as we rejoice together in the truth that Jesus died to bring us to God so that we could live to bring others to Jesus. I pray that we will be challenged to ask ourselves: “I am willing to die for Christ, but am I willing to live for others?”
Sunday Music
Unshakable Joy
Phil 1:12–18
Sermon Preview
Just shy of her 18th birthday, Joni Eareckson Tada dove into the Chesapeake Bay. The water was shallower than she realized and she hit her head, fracturing her spine. She has been paralyzed from the shoulders down ever since. This young woman with a bright future was now faced with a lifetime of apparent limitation and suffering. What would you expect her life to be like? How would you expect her to view her circumstances?
Fifty years later, in 2017, Joni wrote: “...affliction isn’t a killjoy; I don’t think you could find a happier follower of Jesus than me. The more my paralysis helps me get disentangled from sin, the more joy bubbles up from within. I can’t tell you how many nights I have lain in bed, unable to move, stiff with pain, and have whispered near tears, ‘Oh, Jesus, I’m so happy. So very happy in you!’ God shares his joy on his terms only, and those terms call for us to suffer, in some measure, like his Son. I’ll gladly take it.” (Reflections on the 50th Anniversary of My Diving Accident). This joy in Jesus has overflowed in Joni’s life and circumstances. Over the last fifty years, she wrote over 40 books on suffering and God’s sovereign goodness as well as established an organization, Joni and Friends, that has helped countless others wrestle through these same things and find joy in the midst of deep pain. How did this happen? How can Joni possibly say, “Jesus, I’m so happy!”, when her life is so painfully hard?
In God’s Hand in our Hardship, Joni writes, “The weaker I am, the harder I must lean on God's grace; the harder I lean on him, the stronger I discover him to be, and the bolder my testimony to his grace.” This is just another way of saying what Paul says in Philippians 1:12–18: “I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel.…and in that I rejoice.” For Paul, prison and suffering at the hands of the Romans had actually served to advance the gospel. For Joni, pain and suffering brought on by disability had actually served to advance the gospel (in her own life and in the lives of others).
Paul and Joni and countless other Christians throughout the centuries have been able to say in the midst of deep pain and hurt, “and in that I rejoice,” not because they love pain, but because they love Jesus. Because the advance of the gospel is the measure of their rejoicing, they’ve experienced unassailable joy in the midst of deep heartache. And that’s what we’ll be talking about this Sunday. Join us at 10am as we look at Philippians 1:12–18 and see how Paul’s gospel-centered thinking leads to joy and how the same kind of thinking can lead to joy for you and I.
Sunday Music
Partners In Grace
Philippians 1:3–11
Sermon Preview
Think about the the first members of the Philippian church (Acts 16): a successful business woman; a formerly demon-possessed slave girl; a jail guard. What do they have in common? Not much! Yet God, in his wisdom, gathered these and others together as a church—people from different backgrounds, different social classes, different jobs, different life circumstances, different ages—all gathered together under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. And when Paul wrote the letter of Philippians, he wrote to all of them (Phil 1:1).
It’s remarkable then, that Paul writes in our text for this weekend: ”I hold you in my heart...I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus” (Phil 1:7–8). Paul’s letter is full of affectionate language. In chapter four, he calls the Philippian saints "my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown...” (Phil 4:1). Paul clearly had deep care for the Philippians; they weren’t just his church plant, they were his friends!
In our culture, we often make friends based on things we have in common: we both like hunting, we both have kids in elementary school, we’re both farmers. And we often find it hard to “be friends” with those that are significantly different from us. I hear this sometimes as a pastor. “How can I relate to ____? We have nothing in common!” Jesus calls together and unites as a local church people remarkably different from each other. Sometimes all we have in common with someone at church is the gospel!
But we see from Paul that the gospel is enough. Paul was not able to talk tent-making with the Philippian jailer and the slave girl had no idea what Jewish practices in Jerusalem looked like. Yet, Paul considered them friends and was filled with gratitude and affection and stirred to pray for them. “It is right for me to feel this way about you all,” Paul writes, “because I hold you in my heart, for you are all partakers with me of grace…” (Phil 1:7). Through Paul’s example, we’ll see that the gospel is the key to joy-filled, Christ-exalting friendship. Join us this Sunday at 10am at the Skyline Plaza as we gather to see how gospel-centered thinking reshapes our friendship.