- SERMON ARCHIVE -

- 2024 -

FOLLOWING JESUS
SUSAN JEW - JAN 07, 2024

This week’s message from Susan Jew highlights steps Jesus calls us to take when we make the choice to follow him and encourages us with a look into how we can lean on each other while on our walk with Christ.

ARE YOU READY TO DO HARD THINGS?
RYNE PARRISH - JAN 14, 2024

Starting a new sermon series entitled Gird Thy Loins, Ryne begins to take us through some of the difficult things we must face when living a life of faith. This week’s message reminds us that we often do things because the challenge of them is rewarding, and emphasizes that Jesus does not call us to do things that aren’t worth doing.

FORGIVEN, FORGIVING
RYNE PARRISH - JAN 21, 2024

Continuing our sermon series on considering some of the hard things we are asked to do in our life of faith, Ryne’s lesson today is about forgiveness; not whether we must do it, but whether we should do it. With a reminder that Jesus does not call us to do things we cannot do and does not call us to do things that are not worth doing, Ryne encourages us to remember that because God has forgiven us, we are empowered to forgive others.

BECOMING AN APPRENTICE
RYNE PARRISH - JAN 28, 2024

Continuing our sermon series on considering some of the hard things we are asked to do in our life of faith, Ryne delivers a message that proclaims that the call to follow Jesus is not a checklist to get into Heaven, but rather a challenge to devote time, practice, repetition, and intentionality to becoming proficient at the skill of discipleship.

TRAINING, NOT TRYING
RYNE PARRISH - FEB 04, 2024

Continuing our Gird Thy Loins sermon series in which we consider some of the hard things we are asked to do in our life of faith, Ryne’s sermon today motivates us to train harder, not try harder, to be more like Jesus. With a reminder that being Christ-like is a culmination of effort over time, Ryne encourages us to keep going, to put that effort in, because becoming like Jesus is worth the hard work.

PRACTICING PRAYER
RYNE PARRISH - FEB 11, 2024

In this week’s sermon in our series on the difficult things we are asked to do during our life of faith, Ryne highlights prayer as being the most practical way for us to train for a life of walking with Jesus and issues a three-fold challenge that will help us in our attempts to exercise our muscles for discipleship.

SAYING NO TO SELF
RYNE PARRISH - FEB 18, 2024

Following last week’s emphasis on the importance of training in our faith, this week’s lesson points out that the life Jesus has called us to is inherently selfless, and we must therefore practice self-denial. Ryne suggests fasting as a way to practice self-denial and explains how fasting can extend to more than just food.

HIS PATIENCE IS LOVE
KAREN SEWELL - FEB 25, 2024

This week’s lesson from Karen Sewell frames God’s patience with us as part of his promise to us, as a sign of compassion, as being full of forgiveness for us, and reminds us that God’s patience for us will remain, even throughout all of our struggles to recognize how he shows up for us in our lives.

THE SELF-DENYING COMMUNITY
RYNE PARRISH - MAR 03, 2024

Ryne’s sermon this week, the next in our series of meditations on the hard calls that Jesus makes on our lives, frames self-denial as a crucial component of belonging to our community. When we value others above ourselves, we become linked by our commitment to what Christ has called us to do. Ryne’s lesson this week gives practical advice on how to be a community together.

CONFESSING SIN
RYNE PARRIS - MAR 10, 2024

In this week’s lesson in our sermon series reviewing some of the difficult things that Jesus calls us to do in our walk with him, Ryne reminds us that we are commanded to confess our sins, not only to God, but to each other, and that in doing so we not only establish fellowship with one another, but we are freed from the chains of sin and are given a renewal of the joy of baptism.

TAKE UP MY YOKE AND PULL WITH ME
RYNE PARRISH - MAR 17, 2024

In this week’s message in our sermon series on looking at some of the hard things we are called to do when living a life of faith, Ryne shines a light on what Jesus means and expects from us when he calls for us to take up his yoke. We are reminded that Jesus provides a way for us to lighten our burdens, that he will carry them with us, and that we can follow him in rhythms of work and rest.

WHO WILL ROLL AWAY THE STONE?
RYNE PARRISH - MAR 31, 2024

Ryne’s Easter Sunday message preaches the good news of the resurrection and declares that Jesus has released us from the locked doors that death traps us behind. The good news of Easter is that Jesus has conquered the grave, that he is victorious over death, and that just as we are wrapped in his death, so are we wrapped in his victory over the imprisonment of sin.

GETTING INTO GOD’S GROOVES
RYNE PARRISH - APR 07, 2024

This week’s lesson is Ryne’s final message from our Gird Thy Loins series. He wraps up the series with a message that invites us to examine how our habits and the things we spend our time doing shape us into who we are. Are we conforming to the world, finding ourselves in unintentional ruts, or are we being transformed more into the image of God, allowing ourselves to be guided in the grooves that lead to a life of following Jesus?

THE SOWER, THE SOIL, AND THE SOUL
RYNE PARRISH - APR 14, 2024

Beginning a new sermon series on preparing ourselves to bear the fruit of the message of Jesus, Ryne’s lesson today preaches intentionally cultivating our lives in order to promote the growth of the good news of Christ. Today’s message from the parable of the sower helps us understand the importance of preparing ourselves to allow the message of the gospel to spread from our words and deeds.

CULTIVATING SELF-CONTROL
RYNE PARRISH - APR 21, 2024

Continuing our series on cultivating our souls to bear the fruit of Jesus’ teachings, Ryne preaches about self-control and highlights how when we allow the Spirit to thrive within us we can cultivate a desire for something better than whatever might distract or control us.

CULTIVATING GENTLENESS
RYNE PARRISH - APR 28, 2024

Continuing our series on cultivating our souls to bear the fruit of the gospel, Ryne’s sermon today preaches about gentleness, a key feature of Jesus’ personality that allowed him to reach people, and one we are called to mirror despite the world’s constant refrain that we be tough, aggressive, and harsh.

WHERE DO YOU COME FROM?
STEVE THOMSEN - MAY 05, 2024

In this sermon, Steve encourages us with a message that spotlights mercy, patience, and peace, and reminds us that God gives us these things when we need them so that we can use each interaction as an opportunity to show Jesus to others.

CULTIVATING FAITHFULNESS
RYNE PARRISH - MAY 12, 2024

Continuing our series on cultivating our souls to bear the fruit of the gospel, Ryne’s lesson this week reminds us that Jesus is not a fair-weather savior—that he is faithful to us even in our humanity, and challenges us to examine what we are putting our trust in as we seek to transform ourselves to allow our loyalty to God to grow.

CULTIVATING GOODNESS
RYNE PARRISH - MAY 19, 2024

This week’s sermon is about God’s goodness and continues our series on cultivating the fruits of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Ryne’ message this week explains that the goodness in our lives does not come from us or from this world, but from God, whose inherent goodness can be put to work through us.

CULTIVATING KINDNESS
RYNE PARRISH - MAY 26, 2024

Continuing our sermon series on cultivating the fruits of the Holy Spirit, this week’s reflection on kindness reminds us that kindness is an action, something that we do, to reflect God’s own nature to others. Ryne’s sermon examine’s God’s kind character and highlights ways that kindness has shown itself in our lives.

CULTIVATING PATIENCE
RYNE PARRISH - JUN 02, 2024

Continuing our sermon series on cultivating the fruits of the Holy Spirit, Ryne’s message this week focuses on patience with a reminder that though the world tells us that the remedy to having to wait is to increase convenience and speed, we know that God’s remedy, patience, is justified because God keeps his promises and God’s promises are worth waiting for.

CULTIVATING PEACE
ABBY KAPLAN - JUN 09, 2024

As our sermon series on cultivating the fruits of the Holy Spirit continues, Abby brings us a sermon that preaches peace as the result of God’s people coming together, united in Jesus, not in agreement or uniformity, but in love for one another and for God, with the understanding that as we act toward living the gospel, God fills the space where there are gaps in what we agree on.

CULTIVATING JOY
RYNE PARRISH - JUN 16, 2024

This week in our series on cultivating the fruits of the Holy Spirit in our lives, Ryne’s lesson on joy highlights the link it shares with sorrow, and reminds us that when we suffer, we know that God has already taken action to secure our joy through the grand reversal performed by Jesus on our behalf—that we no longer have a future of sorrow and suffering, but that his sacrifice has secured for us a future of hope, and a joy that can’t be taken away.

CULTIVATING LOVE AS A GATHERING CHURCH
RYNE PARRISH - JUN 23, 2024

Bringing our series on cultivating the fruits of the spirit to a conclusion, Ryne’s message on love reminds us that love is not a feeling or a personal disposition, but an action of care, something that we do with and for each other. This lesson on love leads into our church’s discussion about the impact of cultivating love together, specifically as a church that gathers.

CULTIVATING LOVE AS A GIVING CHURCH
RYNE PARRISH - JUN 30, 2024

As we continue to consider what it means to cultivate love, particularly as a church, Ryne’s message today focuses on what we owe to each other. This lesson leads into our church’s discussion on cultivating love through giving, to each other and to our communities, and the spiritual and physical impact giving should have.

LOVE BETTER
KENT TURPIN - JUL 07, 2024

This week’s lesson from Kent Turpin focuses on what love looks like as an action. We live in a society that encourages us to be separate and individual, but God calls us to come together. Through Jesus’ example, we are reminded that loving others requires proximity and attention, something we can’t do if we avoid, reject, or discount the people in our lives.

KNOWN BY THEIR FRUIT
RYNE PARRISH - JUL 14, 2024

Continuing our consideration of what it means to cultivate love, Ryne’s message this week reminds us that if we follow Jesus we will be known to others by the way we live our lives, and holds up Jesus’ own sermon from Matthew as a guide to how we should live if our intent is to allow love to thrive within us.

CULTIVATING LOVE AS A GROWING CHURCH
RYNE PARRISH - JUL 21, 2024

In this final conversation in our examination of the love our church desires to cultivate, our message this week focuses on what it means for us to be a growing church. Growth is highlighted as the work of God, and our role is to tend to the ground, the seeds, and the watering. Today’s sermon and conversation remind us that our spiritual growth must be mature and healthy if we hope to experience physical growth as a church.

WORDS OF ENCOURAGEMENT FROM
1 THESSALONIANS
RYNE PARRISH - JUL 28, 2024

Beginning a new sermon series focused on Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, Ryne starts off with a message of encouragement that echos Paul’s sentiment to the church members he was addressing. We are reminded through these words that God has chosen us and that we can be encouraged in all of the ways that God has used us to his glory.

THE SPIDERMAN PRINCIPLE OF THE GOSPEL
RYNE PARRISH - AUG 04, 2024

Today’s encouragement from 1 Thessalonians comes from Paul’s reminder to the church that we have been entrusted with the Gospel, and that the weight of that power compels us to honor the responsibility to live as an example of God’s message.

THE GOSPEL OF IMITATION
RYNE PARRISH - AUG 11, 2024

Continuing our sermon series on hearing words of encouragement from 1 Thessalonians, Ryne reminds us in this lesson that we tend to become the communities around us, and that this often happens even without intent. If we want to live like Christ, we must be sure to surround ourselves with Christ’s community, so that even when we don’t mean to, we mirror the traits and characteristics of God’s people.

RISING TIDES, STRENGTHENED FAITH
RYNE PARRISH - AUG 18, 2024

This week’s sermon on encouragement from 1 Thessalonians is an expression of joy in the faith of other people. We have bonds to others, forged through Jesus Christ, and our faith connects us not only to God, but to others around us.

DO SO MORE AND MORE
RYNE PARRISH - AUG 25, 2024

Continuing our sermon series on encouragement from 1 Thessalonians, Ryne’s message this week is that God has called us to a life of repetition, not a life of novelty. Because God has shown us how to live, and how to love one another, we are called to follow that life, day in and day out, to love one another more and more.

GRIEVING WITH HOPE
RYNE PARRISH - SEPT 08, 2024

This week’s encouragement from 1 Thessalonians asks us to remember that we have hope, even in our grief, because our hope is based in the resurrection of Jesus, which has already happened. As we wait for what comes next, we have the memory of Jesus to lean on in our moments of mourning.

PEACE & SECURITY
RYNE PARRISH - SEPT 15, 2024

Today’s encouragement from 1 Thessalonians is that even though we do not know when Jesus will return to this earth, our faith calls us to confidence in the resolution of all things through Christ. We do not need to fear the surprise of that unpredictable day because God has destined us to salvation through Jesus, whether we are dead or alive when he returns.

MORE THAN CLICHE
RYNE PARRISH - SEPT 22, 2024

This week’s encouragement from 1 Thessalonians comes from words that are often a familiar message but are important enough for Paul to write down because they hold genuine wisdom—words whose importance makes the message they share from God anything but cliche.

CLOSING WITH GRACE
RYNE PARRISH - SEPT 29, 2024

As we close out our series on encouragement from 1 Thessalonians, Ryne’s message this week is that God’s grace changes us in multifaceted ways, that we are called to allow him to change us, and that he is presently and actively drawing us to him.

MY CONVICTION OF SERVICE
RAYMOND JEW - OCT 06, 2024

This week’s message is from Raymond Jew who shares with us what he discovered about Jesus’ purpose in life while searching for his own, and how that conviction has shaped his faith.

FEAR IS THE MIND-KILLER
RYNE PARRISH - OCT 13, 2024

Leaning into spooky season, we begin a new sermon series called Why Are You So Afraid. Ryne’s lesson this week takes a look at fear and examines Genesis 3 through a lens that highlights how fear can lead to the breakdown of rationality, but can be outweighed by God’s grace for us.

BLANKETS AGAINST THE BOOGEYMAN
RYNE PARRISH - OCT 20, 2024

Continuing our examination of fear through our Why Are You So Afraid sermon series, this week’s message is one that cautions us to be vigilant about where we are placing our trust and reminds us that Jesus is the only thing worthy of our hope.

THE UNDEFEATABLE GOD
RYNE PARRISH - OCT 27, 2024

Continuing our Why Are You So Afraid sermon series, this week Ryne brings us a spooky story from the book of 1 Samuel that warns against treating the living God as a meager idol and reminds us that God is not a mascot, but the power by which fear and evil are defeated.

HOW TO NOT BE CONTROLLED BY FEAR
RYNE PARRISH - NOV 03, 2024

Ryne’s lesson from our Why Are You So Afraid sermon series this week showcases the link between fear and idolatry and calls out some of our contemporary idols. We look at how Jesus gives us a way out of our fear by replacing it with hope in the living God.

FEAR, POWER, AND THE WAY OF THE CROSS
RYNE PARRISH - NOV 10, 2024

This week’s lesson in our Why Are You So Afraid sermon series emphasizes that we have no king but Christ and examines how a sincere belief, influenced by misguidance, led to fear that resulted in the rejection of the Messiah. We are reminded that worldly power will not help us accomplish heavenly goals, but that through the cross, God has empowered us to love our neighbor, and our enemy.

THE TEENS TEACH THANKFULNESS
KAREN SEWELL - NOV 17, 2024

This week’s lesson was created by the teens of Murray Park Church of Christ who wanted to share a message about thankfulness. Their message to us is an encouragement that a mindset of thankfulness is important, valuable, and possible, and that practicing thankfulness every day brings us closer to God.

THE FEAR OF THE LORD & THE COMFORT OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
RYNE PARRISH - NOV 24, 2024

Wrapping up our Why Are You So Afraid sermon series, Ryne describes the role that fearing God has in our lives. We are reminded that we are not supposed to fear God because of punishment we may receive, but because God wants us to safeguard our lives against harm to ourselves and to others.

THANKSGIVING FROM THE BELLY OF A FISH
RYNE PARRISH - DEC 01, 2024

In this week’s sermon, Ryne reiterates an idea already shared, that when thanksgiving is a habit, our perspective shifts and we are able to praise God for all of the ways he is working in this world, including the ways he is working through and for others around us.

PREPARE YE THE WAY
RYNE PARRISH - DEC 08, 2024

Beginning a new sermon series that focuses on our preparation for Jesus’ arrival, Ryne examines the time warp we exist in where we are preparing for something to happen that has already happened and is currently happening in the present, all at the same time.

HOME IN GLORY
RYNE PARRISH - DEC 15, 2024

Ryne’s lesson this week continues to walk us through the time warp of Jesus’ arrival that we find ourselves preparing for at this time of year with a reminder that while we prepare for Jesus to be present with us again, we celebrate God’s presence with us now.

PREPARE A ROOM FOR ME
RYNE PARRISH - DEC 22, 2024

As we continue to study through the time warp of Jesus’ arrival, Ryne’s message this week, highlighted through the example of Mary, is that when Jesus invites himself into our lives, we should remember that our only qualification for being involved in God’s plan is to prepare room for him in our lives.

For other sermons, visit our sermons page or our sermon archive.