Where do you take your shame, guilt, and fears for the things you’ve done? When you’re in “the depths,” where do you turn? When you sin, where do you go? Do you try to make up for it by doing more good than bad? Do you try to forget about it, drowning out the nagging imposter syndrome? We underestimate the severity of our sin, we underestimate what is necessary to forgive it.

The good news this morning is that God meets our pleas with plentiful redemption. God always hears, forgives, loves, and redeems. God is the only One who is completely honest about who you are, but completely loving at the same time.

Oftentimes persecution feels more present than God’s promises. All you can see is trouble. And it seems like it will never end, like the season will not pass. But there is good news this morning: trouble don’t last always! God will deliver the persecuted and shame the oppressor. This is the hope the writer of Psalm 129 gives us this morning.

If we’re not careful, we become idle or make work an idol. God gave us both work and rest as gifts. But, it’s just like our sinful flesh and the devil to take a good thing and twist it to evil purposes. Rest, that deep assurance that God is in control and not us–twisted to laziness; and meaningful work, what every one of us must do to feel fully alive–twisted to an idol.

What God shows us this morning is that when we receive God’s best, we can work from our rest. When work is a gift from God, and He is at the center of our lives, ordering all the pieces, then our souls are at rest. And we won’t make an idol of work. But we won’t remain idle either.

“I don’t know what tomorrow holds, but I know the One who holds tomorrow.”

Where does your hope of security lie? In whom do you trust? In a world so full of chaos, it’s hard to know where to turn. But when you don’t know what tomorrow holds, you can trust the one who holds tomorrow. Security in God is based on the character and nature of God in full view of the past, his activity in the present, and hope in the promise of the future.

Every one of us has struggled with going through the motions on Sunday mornings. We are so easily robbed of the the joy of worshiping together. But the truth we need to hear is that worshiping together creates supernatural joy, unity, and peace.

Martin Luther famously said, “All of life is repentance.” What does that mean, and is it as devastating as it sounds?

We often forget the needs of the person in front of us as we are consumed with today’s priorities. We forget that each person around us has questions and needs, many are hurting, and most of all that God has created us to meet them in these needs and be His hands and feet. We, like Jesus, have one commission: to seek and save the lost.

What if, when we imagined a future with more, we imagined more for others instead of ourselves? What if our first thought when we got more was not to say “What can I get with this,” but instead, “Who can I bless with this.” That is what a heart transformed by the grace of Jesus looks like. God’s generosity to us drives our generosity to others.

Our culture makes an idol of individual freedom. It says that true freedom is deciding what is true and right for yourself, and anyone who tries to limit that is stifling your freedom. But is that really freedom? Paul doesn’t think so. And in Galatians 5, he explains what true freedom in Christ looks like and what it ought to be used for.

We have a nearsighted view of the word “family.” We limit it to our biological relatives without giving much thought to what Jesus means when he calls his followers family. But Jesus’ words challenge our understanding of family, giving us a much more expansive view of what family truly is and what the church ought to look like.

It’s easier to retreat to the comforts of our past than it is to embrace the uncertainty of the future. But with great risk comes great reward. How do we follow Jesus and leave it all behind? The truth we’ll see is when Jesus is your greatest possession, you can joyfully leave everything else behind.

We all want to feel like we’re making progress. Whether it’s our health, finances, at our job, or in our spiritual lives, no one wants to be ineffective and unfruitful. The problem is, we want immediate success, a defining moment that gives us the breakthrough we’re looking for. But no lasting, meaningful change happens that way. Instead of single defining moments, it is day-in day-out faithfulness in the small things that leads to true change and lasting success.

To be human is to suffer. But why do we suffer? Is it our own fault? Is the Devil behind the bad circumstances in our lives? Is God punishing us?

It’s hard to hold out hope when it feels like God’s not there. Sometimes it feels like it got too hard for him and he’s just vanished, or that our sin has finally made him abandon us. Our prayers seem to go unanswered, like he’s not hearing us. And our hopes and expectations pass by unmet. It’s hard to hold out hope when it feels like God’s not there. The good news this season is that Jesus’ advent is God’s guarantee that he will always be with us

Wrong is called right. Truth is called lies. And everyone claims to have the same access and authority to say what’s right and true. My truth is mine and yours is yours, and that’s fine, as long as yours doesn’t infringe on mine. Our world tells us there is nothing concrete, nothing objective that sits behind any of our own competing interpretations of reality. And so, in a world that sits in darkness, how can we know what is good, what is right, what is true?

At Advent we celebrate Jesus’ identity as the Prince of Peace, and the truth that Jesus makes peace in a world of endless conflict. Jesus heals humanity’s divisions. He can make peace where war, division, and hatred seem inevitable

We all long for a hero to save us. To make everything better. It’s why we have so many superhero movies. But every superhero has a weakness and needs to rescue over and over. That’s because all our heroes are really just copies of the original, Jesus. Jesus is our Mighty Hero!

For most of us, our default approach to life is control. Especially when things feel chaotic. Whether that’s controlling ourselves or other people or both. Whatever situation it may be, when we feel out of control, our default response is to grasp for it. But there is something more powerful, attainable, and fulfilling than control: mercy. And the fact is mercy always triumphs over control.

Novelty is deeply threatening, especially when people have built their lives around the old way.” We’re constantly faced with the decision to reject the next innovation, the new model, etc. or to forgo our own comfort and way of doing things and accept the new. Nowhere is this truer than with Jesus and his kingdom. What we must realize this morning is that you cannot follow Jesus and cling to your old life.

Luke 5:17-26 by Ethan Seifried

We think forgiveness needs to be earned. But what Jesus shows us in healing the paralytic is that God’s forgiveness rests on His authority not our ability..