Can You Trust God? 4/10/16

If you really are a child of God, if you really call God your Father, how is God loving you?

Many of us are tempted to think that God is holding out on us. We see that in the very beginning of Scripture when the serpent spoke to Eve.

In this message Rebecca shows how Jesus was tempted by this same devil to question his Father’s provision, power and timing. But the good news in Scripture is that Jesus, unlike us, does not bite into the apple. Instead, Jesus remains bound to God’s Word—not straying to the left or the right.

Jesus is obedient to God even to the point when his own life was going to be taken. In a garden, moments before he knew he would be arrested, tortured and crucified, he prayed saying that he will remain in what his Father knows is best. Jesus did what we could not FOR US.

In this message that Rebecca shared she shows us through Scripture what kind of child of God Jesus lived for us. Part of this living for us was to show us our Way. The question arises: “What child of God are we going to be?”

Will you trust in God even in the moments of doubt, when your own logic questions if God is trustworthy?

If we truly believe that God is our parent, how does this define and challenge how we should live?

Reclining With God 4/3/16

One of my favorite moments in the Bible is found after Jesus raises a man named Lazarus from death, and then later we find them "reclining" together at dinner. So cool. Lazarus could dip his bread into the same bowl as Jesus, the One who was touching him with God's love. The promises of Scripture were no longer abstract--they were sitting next to him!

Do you know God in a practical way?  Is the Bible abstract? Or is the Bible what you recognize being lived out practically in the midst of your surrounding life. This is what the church is all about! This is what CPPC needs to be all about.

In this message we engage Scripture to see Jesus as the practical form of God, and the church as that ongoing practical form now.

Hopeless to Standing Again 3/27/16

To get what you need requires death. Jesus gives you that death.

Scripture tells our story. God offered us the Way to find fulfillment of life. Instead of following this Way, we have all chosen the ways that lead to death and destruction. The ways that we all too often choose have lead to an inevitable end of death. This is hopeless.

There are many trying to hide their hopelessness behind a career, a hobby, a family, etc. They try to tell themselves that they do have hope in these areas. Yet they, like all of us, will find that these areas of our life can be excellent, and meaningful, but ultimately will not suffice in themselves to offer us the hope we need.

What Jesus has done is die your death. And in place of your inevitable death he gives you a new birth, a new life, and a new promise. He promises that just as he stood again, that just as he rose from death by resurrection, so you will stand again even though you die. And now, in this time you live on the Earth, you have been armed with this living hope that you will stand again. Death does not control your future.

This hope is meant for you to use as a weapon to combat the hardship and sense of hopelessness that this world tries to force at you. When your hope in Jesus Christ overcomes the hopelessness of the world then you prove the Christian faith and bring glory to God. The church, we as Canoga Park Pres, exists in order that we might live hope—that we might showcase living hope in Jesus’ death and resurrection. When our hope is found to overcome this world’s hopelessness then others will see where their true hope lies: Jesus’ empty tomb.

Living life in hopelessness is an option the church exists to eliminate!