September 7- November 23, 2025

7 September 2025     

The Gospel of Mark moves along quickly. If you pause for a moment and take some consideration, you could easily be left behind. Following Jesus is not a philosophical quest, or even academic. Instead, it is relational and is made of simple and spontaneous acts of obedience. Let’s introduce Mark with a call to follow quickly.

Jesus did not come to receive- but rather to give. In today’s passage we will learn to look beyond the excitement of miracles and see the life changing gifts of Jesus. Through faith in Jesus we can live lives of total forgiveness, fulfillment and freedom! 

We may want to stay at the surface of Christianity with all its excitement (The Shallow), or join the chorus of criticism (The Critic), but to be a discipler of disciples is what following Jesus has always been about (The Follower).

In the midst of a real, life-threatening challenge, the disciples turned to Jesus for help. Yet, Jesus responded by gently rebuking their lack of faith. This morning we will move quickly from a concept to practical application. 

 By way of Jesus’ feeding the five thousand, I want us to be challenged to give all that we have to Jesus to be used for his service.

12 October 2025 

This is a special Sunday. Pastor Bob has traveled to Israel nearly countless times and will speak to the subject "Will there ever be lasting peace in Israel?"

 In this unusual exchange between Jesus and a woman he refers to her as a dog, we learn an exceptional lesson on faith. She was never offended and yet she kept up extremely well with the conversation. Charles Spurgeon said of this story that “Our Lord had a very quick eye for spying faith…”, and we can learn a whole lot from it.

In some ways, at some times in various settings, we all lead. Even followers find themselves in settings at work, home or school, where they are called upon to lead. This morning we’ll explore areas of persistence in the leader’s life. We’ll discuss those times where you must find deep within yourself endurance in a task that only you can do.  

  We have opportunities to care for people all around us, just like Jesus. The tricky part is that the opportunities are often completely unrelated and at different levels of engagement. And we can switch between them in an instant if only we remain aware. Let’s take a look at this commonly told story of Jesus and all become more aware of the varying needs of people around us.  

Due to technical issues, there will be no video posted this week. We apologize for this inconvenience.

There are many programs, gimmicks and strategies to build our self worth.  Well, tucked away in the brilliant teachings of Jesus is the path to real self-esteem. Let’s think through the simple process as building blocks as we discover God’s strategy of raising our view of ourselves and see how it affects those around us. 

16 November 2025

In one of the more intriguing passages in the Gospels, Jesus makes mention of some very dramatic future events. As exciting as it is to predict the future and lay out a timeline of happenings, I think we would miss the point in doing so. So, this morning let’s take this otherwise theologically heavy passage and make our way down to the clear point of it all, how we are to live today in the last days.

23 November 2025  

A follower of Jesus gives faithfully to their church, a local ministry, to family and friends, and even to strangers. Followers of Jesus even give when it seems an awkward thing to do. Let’s expand our understanding of giving and produce a little awkwardness ourselves.