Garden City Church

This week we returned to our Prophets of the Kingdom series. It's time for our church to begin nominating people from within the church to take on the role of elder and join Garden City's spiritual leadership team. Pastor Dennis walked through a quick biblical theology of eldership starting in Exodus and ending in 1 Peter, and affirmed the inclusion and empowering of women to be elders. We then walked through the process we'll adhere to as a church community over the coming weeks as we seek to discern together the people who will become Serving Elders.Here are links to the two full-length sermons we taught several weeks ago outlining a robust biblical theology of eldership and women as co-equal leaders in the church.Shepherds of JusticeEqual and Empowered for Leadership

Easter isn't just about what happened to Jesus—it's about what's possible for us. This Easter, Pastor Dennis explores how resurrection invites us to remember who we are, rise to new life, and live like God's Kingdom is breaking in right now. The empty tomb means death doesn't get the final word—and neither do fear, shame, or injustice. We're called to be resurrection people who partner with God in His work to repair, restore, and rebuild what's broken, carrying hope into a world that desperately needs it. We must remember, so we can live resurrection lives with Jesus, for the sake of our neighbors and neighborhoods.

It's Palm Sunday and Jesus arrives in Jerusalem. The people are ready to inaugurate Him as Israel's conquering King, one who will overthrow Rome's oppressive rule, liberating them from their godless occupier. But, as Pastor Shaq Hager prophetically communicates, Jesus arrives in Jerusalem, sees the city, and weeps. He knows that the thing the people believe will bring them peace — political power, state violence, and religious dominance — won't actually set them free. Pilate is the one who enters the city on a warhorse, accompanied by the Roman military, declaring His presence while inspiring fear. Jesus enters on a donkey, a symbol of peace, accompanied by a crowd of worshippers shouting "Hosanna!" Palm Sunday is a protest against the powers that be, a declaration that they don't get the last word. Power, violence, and dominance are not the tools of the Kingdom. Peace, grace, mercy, righteousness, justice, forgiveness, and self-giving love are.

In the fifth week of our Lent series, Carrie Buckner talks about justice as a natural outgrowth of fasting, repentance, confession, and renewal. This week, we talked about the biblical call to justice and righteousness, emphasizing restorative justice, which involves uplifting the oppressed and vulnerable. Justice can be practiced on individual, community, and societal levels, encouraging empathy, service, and advocacy. Carrie also acknowledges the personal and societal challenges related to justice and offers practical steps for individuals to engage in justice work.

This week, Dennis Allan walks through the story of Jesus meeting a Samaritan woman at a well and how this woman's interaction with Jesus leads to her renewal. In and through Jesus her longings, desires, will, actions, and thoughts are made new. This story is the kind of story available to every person who professes faith in Jesus, yet so many Christians accept Jesus as their Savior and then never experience meaningful change or transformation in their lives. Why is it so hard for us to change? What do we need to do in order to have our lives reshaped and reformed into the image and likeness of Jesus? We need to make the choice to embrace a costly kind of discipleship that requires us to spend time with Jesus, become like Him, and do we He did.

Confession is more than words - it's about the posture of our hearts. In this sermon, Julia Allan walks through a story in Luke where a woman with a troubled past pours out her love at Jesus' feet. Through her actions, we see that true confession brings freedom, not condemnation, and that forgiveness leads to extravagant love. This message invites us to move past shame and embrace the ongoing grace of Jesus. When we come humbly before Him, we are forgiven -and we continue to be forgiven.*This sermon features the song "Malibu" by Mumford & Sons, which can be listened to on YouTube.

This week, Dennis Allan explores the transformative power of repentance through the lens of the Parable of the Prodigal Son. Repentance can often feel risky - what if we fail again? What if we're met with rejection? But Jesus teaches us that true repentance isn't about fear or shame, but about returning over and over to a Father whose grace is more outrageous than our sin and who's already waiting for us to come home to Him. Repentance is both beautiful and challenging, but because of the Father's character we can trust that our remarkable hope for forgiveness is always settled with an embrace.

This week, Pastor Shaq Hager begins our Lent series by talking through Isaiah 58 and the kind of fast that God desires. Many of us have been taught to engage the spiritual practice of fasting for the purpose of hearing God's voice or seeking an answer to prayer. Yet, the kind of fast God desires for His people is a fast that draws them deeper into His own heart and His own way of living and being in the world. When we fast we can be shaped into people who live God's mercy, compassion, and justice. We can be formed into people who are healers and prophets, who bind our neighbors' wounds. What if we started thinking about fasting as a practice with communal rather than only individual implications. *This sermon includes the song "Isaiah 58" by Urban Doxology featuring Amena Brown.

This week, Dennis Allan demonstrates how, from Genesis to the early church, Scripture reveals that God designed women as co-equal partners in His mission, and Jesus' ministry—far from restricting them—empowered and affirmed their leadership, calling us to do the same today. But what do we do with Paul's so-called “problem passages”? In this episode, we examine the biblical case for women in leadership, explore how God, ancient Israel, Jesus, and the early church empowered women, and unpack what Paul was really saying in 1 Timothy 2. If you've ever wrestled with this topic, this conversation will challenge, clarify, and encourage you to rethink how we interpret Scripture faithfully.

In this episode, we dive into the biblical and practical theology of elders, tracing their origins from ancient Near Eastern culture through the Old and New Testaments. The sermon highlights how God infused the culturally inherited role of elder with divine purpose, shaping it into a Spirit-empowered, justice-seeking, and servant-hearted role. We explore how the early church redeemed the role of elder from corruption, restoring it to reflect Jesus' character—marked by humility, integrity, and servant leadership. This foundational teaching sets the stage for next week's conversation on the inclusion of women as co-equal leaders in the church.

When life feels unstable and everything around us is shaking, where do we find the courage to stand firm? Drawing from Hebrews 12, this sermon explores the contrast between Mt. Sinai and Mt. Zion, reminding us that our hope is in God's unshakable kingdom. This week, Carrie Buckner shares the true story of a plane crash and it's survivors and, through that story, we'll see how faith and resilience shape our response to life's hardest moments. In the face of fear and uncertainty, we are called to fix our eyes on Jesus and walk forward with unshakable courage.

This week, Julia Allan walks through Hebrews 12:1-11 and discusses how we build perseverance. In fact, if we become people who consistently choose the path of least resistance, then we'll never become people who know how to endure hardship, struggle, frustration, or obstacles. We'll be people who, when things start to get tough and when it gets hard to keep believing, walk away from Jesus. But, the witness of the early church is that even when faced with very real threats of persecution, fidelity to Jesus is worth it because Jesus, Himself, is better than anything in this world. We need to be people - especially in a time such as this - who choose the narrow way of Jesus, and who choose that harder way of confronting and opposing evil and injustice with courage, conviction, and clarity. We must not be path of least resistance people.

This week, Pastor Shaq Hager talks through Hebrews 10:19-25, focusing on how difficult it can be for us to take hold of the new things Jesus wants to do in the world and in our lives because we keep trying to hold on to old ways of following Jesus. But, these old ways of following Jesus were less about Jesus and more about maintaining safety, security, and stability. In our world today, many people are trusting a political project - whether that's conservatism or progressivism - more than Jesus, Himself. The question becomes, who do we want to be individually and corporately? Let's be people who courageously trust in Jesus and follow Him, alone.

The people who first read Hebrews were women and men who likely comprised a house church in ancient Rome. Years prior, the entire Christian community had been expelled from Rome. Now, they live in the city subject to ridicule, threats, imprisonment, and poverty. Every day they're faced with the question, "Do you want Jesus and His Kingdom or a comfortable life in the empire?" We're asked a similar question every day as Kingdom citizens living within America. The lie inherent in some forms of American Christianity today is that we can have both. But, the experience of the early church demonstrates we cannot conform our faith in Jesus to the empire and still take hold of the Kingdom. So, what do we do when we're faced with this choice? The author of Hebrews encourages us to lift our eyes to heaven and remember God's promises. This week, Pastor Dennis Allan walks through Hebrews 8:7-13 and offers a prophetic sermon that speaks to Christians seeking to faithfully follow Jesus in America today.

Jesus is our great high priest who sits at God's right hand, who understands our weaknesses and frailties, who bears the scars of His own crucifixion in His body, and because of all this we can approach God's throne in prayer with confidence that we will be met with grace and mercy and receive the help we need. That's the promise of Hebrews 4:14-16. Pastor Dennis Allan walks through how the original audience of the letter would've been encouraged to know that despite all the accusations, threats, uncertainty, and insecurity they faced, they had a God who understood what they were enduring and wanted to help them. Through Jesus we have received the gift of being able to approach God's throne through prayer and know we'll be received, helped, and cared for no matter what our need might be.

This week, Pastor Shaq Hager guides us through Hebrews 3. There, the author of Hebrews reminds their audience to hold fast to their faith in Jesus, even in moments of uncertainty and doubt. Doubting Jesus isn't sinful. It's not a sign that our faith is weak. Thomas doubted and Jesus didn't scold him. Instead, Jesus showed Thomas His wounds, providing to Thomas the evidence he needed. For many of us life can feel overwhelming and it's easy to wonder if Jesus is real and if He'll show up for us. In these times, unbelief can creep in, leaving us wondering if we can trust God with our struggles. But Pastor Shaq encouraged us to remember that Jesus, our faithful High Priest, understands our pain and walks with us through it. And, when faith is hard to find, we're meant to rely on one another as we encourage and build each other up.

This week, Pastor Dennis Allan kicks-off our new series, Hold Fast. It's the new year and so many things are shifting and changing around us. A new president will soon be inaugurated, there are wars raging across the world, and in our own personal lives many of us are welcoming new babies, changing jobs, dealing with health issues, and walking through difficult seasons with parents, siblings, grandchildren, and friends. In the midst of all this, we're still trying to go to work, pay our bills, and maintain healthy relationships. As Jesus once said, the cares of this world loom large. So, how can we hold fast to Jesus when things feel unsteady and uncertain, and we feel anxious and fearful? The author of Hebrews starts their letter by focusing on Jesus. Because, when things are swirling all around us what we most need to do is fix our eyes on Jesus alone.

This Christmas Eve, Julia talks with the kids about the way God arrives into our world as a baby, born to simple parents in the middle of nowhere. And, not only that, but the first people God told about this baby were a bunch of nobody shepherds. But in His arrival, God made clear that He sees us, knows us, and loves us. That He will come for us and rescue us. Pastor Dennis, then, talks about the prophet Isaiah's foretelling of Jesus' arrival. How the prophet speaks of a coming hope, a rescuing power, who will turn darkness to light, war to peace, and corruption to justice. In Jesus, God's great reversal begins where the mighty are brought low and the low are lifted high. No matter how we find ourselves this Christmas, Jesus has come for us.

This week, Pastor Shaq discusses the Advent theme of love. Mary's Magnifcat is a call to every person who has been overlooked, margianlized, exploited, oppressed, or cast aside that the Messiah is coming. He will scatter the proud, bring down rulers from their thrones, lift up the humble, fill the hungry, send away the rich, and extend mercy to all who seek it. In Jesus' arrival, God's children will be welcomed home. They'll find unexpected community, where they'll experience God's love and care.

This week, Carrie Buckner continues our Advent series. The crowds are coming to John at the Jordan asking to be baptized. He warns the crowds to bear fruit in keeping with repentance, and when asked what they must do John replies by instructing them to do the work of justice. He tells them to set right things that have been made wrong. In essence, he foreshadows in Jesus' arrival the Year of Jubilee. God, in and through Jesus will deal with the oppressor, rescue the lame, and gather the exiles. He'll bring joy to those who mourn. This is also a vulnerable space for many people as joy can sometimes be difficult to experience, especially in the lead up to Christmas. Carrie demonstrates how Jesus meets us right where we are and loves us.

This week, Nick Ventresca, pastor of The Barn Community Church in Doylestown, PA visited to talk through the hope we can find and revel in through the Advent season. We talked through one of Jeremiah's prophecies to God's people - that one day hope would break-in to their world and deliver them from oppression. It's a prophecy that reminds us hope is hard won and fought for. It comes to us and for us in seasons that are challenging, difficult, dark, and troublesome. Yet, the promise is real and it's for everyone - God is coming for His people.

We don't lament enough. When people hurt us, when we experience distress, when we feel insecure or vulnerable, when we've been hurt, wounded, or discarded, when we experience abandonment, when we feel like we're surrounded by evil and see or experience oppression or exploitation, we're invited to turn to God and trust Him to do what only He can and should do. But, lament is not a practice we frequently engage. Instead, we oftentimes try to push through and solve whatever problem we're facing in our own strength and wisdom. But, Psalm 120, the first of the Psalms of Ascent, provides a framework for how we can lament in the face of difficult, frustrating, and trying times. We can turn to God, name our complaint, ask God to intervene, and choose to trust Him.

The Presidential election was this past Tuesday. It's true the election of Donald Trump as President for the second time will shape the context in which individual Christians and the church are to live out Jesus' mission in meaningful, tangible ways. Yet, the church's mission remains the same. The person who wields Presidential power doesn't have power over Jesus or the work Jesus' people do. This week, Pastor Dennis talked about how, through our homes and in our neighborhoods, we're still to build active Kingdom outposts that take on Jesus' work of reconciliation, repair, and renewal. It's work that is inefficient, slow, and oftentimes foolish, where sometimes only one good deed out of every thousand seems to make an impact. Yet, the slow work of repair and renewal is ours to do, day after day, week after week, year after year, until we return home to Jesus.

This week, Dennis Allan talks through the ways Jesus' "city on a hill" language has been co-opted by American political leaders, both Democrats and Republicans, to ascribe to America a divinely mandated role in the world similar to Old Testament Israel. But, Jesus wasn't talking about Israel, and he certainly wasn't talking about any modern nation-state, including America. He was talking to His closest followers, the disciples, about their individual and communal lives. He was talking about how they were to live out their faith in a way that every person could see. He was inviting them to live distinctive, counter-cultural, revolutionary lives rooted in the Kingdom's subversive ethics outlined in the Sermon on the Mount. We must never ascribe to America (or its political leaders) divine mandate Jesus never gave to it. Instead, it's the church who is now supposed to be like a "city on a hill" for all the world to see because Jesus is the hope of the world, not America.

This week Julia Allan walks us through why, as citizens of the Kingdom, we are to develop and hold a consistent ethic of life. This means we're invited by Jesus to value life at every moment and in every context. And it's a reminder that the value we place on every human life is too big, too robust, and too expansive to be contained within a political party or represented by a political leader. It's also a challenge to evaluate the effectiveness of our public witness through a different lens. We shouldn't only be thinking about the intent of our public and political actions, but also the fruit. If in an attempt to preserve vulnerable life we support, advocate for, or enact policies that increase death rates, then maybe those policies should be revisited and reimagined. Because Jesus valued every life, all of the time.

This week, Pastor Shaq Hager talks through the story of God's people beginning in Genesis, through the prophets, and into the New Testament to chart a biblical theology of seeing, caring for, and uplifting the vulnerable. To be people of the Kingdom, we must take the work of justice seriously, especially for the marginalized and oppressed. American society, more often than not, exploits the vulnerable and our political system offers promises, but rarely delivers. As followers of Jesus, we're not supposed to look to or wait on the political system to take up the work of justice. It's our work to do. It's Gospel work. It's Kingdom work. To become the church Jesus intended, we must reclaim Israel's ethic for caring for those in need and, to do so, we must take on the posture of being poor in spirit.

We're not supposed to be lovers of money, and we are supposed to be generous. Oftentimes, this is where teaching on what financial stewardship means for citizens of the Kingdom. But, as Benjamin Chua talks through this week, Jesus has much more in mind in Luke 16. Jesus says people of the Kingdom can't serve God and Mamon. If Jesus was simply saying we can't be lovers of both God and money, He'd have said that plainly. Instead, He intentionally used the word Mamon, because Mamon was understood by Jesus' original audience as a "power" or "force." In other words, when we serve Mamon, we participate in idolatry. And, every day we uncritically participate in the Western financial system, we participate in and prop up a structure that trusts and idol to meet our financial needs. So, what does this mean for us as people of the Kingdom? What does it mean for how we think about our financial resource or even our 401K? We cannot serve both God and Mamon.

This week, Dennis Allan continued our series by exploring what it means for followers of Jesus and the church to cultivate a prophetic voice in today's culture. In the Hebrerw Scriptures prophets functioned as God's spokespeople, speaking God's words and communicating God's will to God's people. In the Gospels we see Jesus function in a prophetic role by speaking God's words, living as God's Word, communicating God's will, and foretelling the future. And now, in our post-Pentecost world, every person is empowered by the Spirit to call God's people back to covenant faithfulness, remind God's people of their true citizenship in the Kingdom, prompt God's people to return to right relationship with their King, and to declare to God's people, the powers, and the powerful that the Kingdom is at hand. And, Jesus' invitation is to take up this task even if it means sacrificing our reputations, finances, security, safety, or even our very lives. Because our neighbors and the world are searching for Jesus, and we don't find Him inside a politcal party or by electing a particular candidate.

Today, we celebrated as one, extended family dedicated four children and seven people were baptized. Which is why this week's conversation, lead by Dennis Allan, is more a sermonette focused on baptism as the Christian's pledge of allegiance. Baptism is a choice we make where we are naturalized into a new way of living and being, and where we pledge ultimate allegiance to King Jesus. When we're baptized we join into what the apostle Paul refers to as a “new humanity.” According to Paul, in this “new humanity” there is neither Jew nor Greek, neither male nor female, neither slave nor free. These groups of people who had intentionally been separated from one another were now being joined together through Jesus. In baptism everything we are is subordinated to Jesus. Our identity. Our mission. Our way of living and being. Our financial resources. Our loves. Our affections. Our desires. Everything is now submitted to Jesus, because He is our King, and we are His Kingdom people.

We are supposed to be political, just not in the ways we think. We tend to think the primary vehicle for our political expression are political parties and elections. But, if we're citizens of the Kingdom living in America as exiles, then shouldn't the church by our primary vechicle for our political expression? The New Testament authors used the word "ekklesia" to describe the church, a word that carried clear political overtones. Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount, outlines how to live as Kingdom citizens within an empire. We don't overpower and crush our enemies, but instead love them and sacrifice for them. We don't use our money to acquire more cultural power, but to care for the under-resourced. We don't create stories to gain attention, but instead tell the truth and practice integrity. This is how the church develops and lives out an alternative political ethic that subverts the powers of the empire and proclaims the hope of Jesus to the world.

Benjamin Chua continues our series, "People of the Kingdom." If we are first and foremost citizens of the Kingdom of God, then the country we find ourselves in is not our true home. As citizens of the Kingdom we live in America as exiles, not dissimilar from the Israelites who were exiles in Babylon or how the early church identified as exiles within the Roman Empire. We are foreigners and strangers on earth. And yet, as Christians we've sought to make our home in America by adopting a Christianed version of the American Dream and claiming it as God's promise to us. So, if we're exiles, what does that mean? How are we supposed to live here and now if we're active outposts of the Kingdom? If we can live out Jesus' words as Kingdom-minded exiles distinct from American culture we'll get to watch God's rule and reign spread all across our neighborhoods, cities, and country.

This week, we start a new series titled, "People of the Kingdom." Over the next eight weeks we'll explore the idea that the church in America's first political task is to become the church Jesus intended. And that starts by recovering our true citizenship. As the people of God we are citizens of the Kingdom, first and foremost. Only secondarily are we citizens of the country we live in. Our first and primary allegiance is to Jesus and His Kingdom. Our ways of living and being are to be shaped exclusively by the Kingdom, yet many of us have been profoundly formed by the empire we live within. How do we live as citizens of the Kingdom and as an active outpost of the Kingdom in the places we find ourselves today? It all starts in Philippians when Paul reminds the women and men in Philippi that their citizenship has its roots in a heavenly commonwealth.

This week Pastor Shaq Hager introduces us to Junia, an apostle, who helped lead and build the early church. Junia's status as an apostle, however, has been questioned. From approximately the 13th centurty until about 1980 Bible translators added an "s" to Junia's name, making it Junias, which was a male name. Yet, early Christian writers like John Chrysostom make it clear Junia is a woman, and Origen even states that Junia was one of the 70 who were also called apostles. Paul describes Junia as a person who was imprisoned and "in chains" for the Gospel. In Junia, we have an example of a courageous woman who lived into her gifts as an apostle and helped advance the Gospel and build the early church.

This week, Carrie Bucker walks through Priscilla's story. Paul identifies Priscilla as a co-laborer in the ministry of proclaiming and living out the Gospel. He even identifies her and her husband, Aquila, as having protected his life and saving the early church, ensuring it was able to thrive and flourish. There's even a story about Priscilla taking aside a young, charismatic, and gifted teacher named Apollos, and identifying some of his theological weaknesses and teaching him. Priscilla being a woman was not a hindrance for Paul or God. She was living out the Kingdom of Heaven on earth in her leadership and teaching, and she was performing her role in the body of Christ for which God had equipped her.

This week we start a three week series focused on women leaders in the early church, and what their lives and ministries can teach the church today about following Jesus. Phoebe was entrusted by Paul with carrying, arguably, Paul's most theologically substantive letter. Not only was she expected to deliver Paul's letter to the Romans, but she was also expected to teach and discuss it with the church in Rome to ensure they understood it. In a sense, she was a physical representation of Paul's teaching and ministry for the Roman Christians. She was a servant-leader, a protector, and a provider who used her life and resource to advance the Gospel and build the Kingdom.

This week we take a look back across sixty-three sermons and our study of the book of Acts to identify major themes and what they mean for us today. In particular, the conversation focuses on the expansive and inclusive nature of the Gospel, the Kingdom of God breaking into and challenging the kingdom of man, the call to go to our neighbors, what it means to wait on the Spirit, and how everywhere we find ourselves is an opportunity to be a signpost to the hope and love of Jesus.Every one who taught as part of the series was included in the conversation: Reverend Eleanor Williams, Carrie Buckner, Julia Allan, Benjamin Chua, Pastor Shaq Hager, and Pastor Dennis Allan. Katie Long facilitated.

Luke ends the book of Acts with Paul in Rome, imprisoned, meeting with a group of Jewish people. He shares the Gospel with them, proclaiming the ways the Old Testament foretold Jesus as Israel's true Messiah and prophesied that, through Jesus' death and resurrection, the Kingdom of God had been inaugurated. While some chose to believe the Gospel, most did not. Even the people most committed to following God's laws are capable of missing out on what God's doing. Paul's vision of the Kingdom is a scandal to many. It's a Gospel that's radically inclusive, wildly expansive, and it lifts Jesus high. The invitation Luke extends to all of his readers is this: Jesus' ministry and Paul's ministry are now ours to continue. We are to proclaim the good news of the Kingdom to everyone, everywhere we go. Because God wants all His kids to come home.

Sometimes we're so convinced we're right about a particular belief, a specific way of seeing or understanding the world, or, even, a way of interprepting a particular portion of Scripture that we tell ourselves it's more Jesus-like to remove ourselves from relationship with people who think or believe differently than we do. In essence, we can believe purity of doctrine or adherence to biblical interpreptations is more important than extending love and relationship to those we disagree with. This week, Pastor Shaq Hager focused on Acts 28:11-22, leading to a congregational conversation focused on three questions:What beliefs do you find problematic in other Christians?Which of your own beliefs do you think other Christians might find problematic?How can we, as Jesus prays in John 17, be one as followers of Jesus while also holding space for our disagreement?*In the podcast, you'll hear Pastor Shaq set-up the discussion and then you'll hear a few seconds of quiet. Then, Pastor Shaq will lead a brief prayer. Feel free to pause the sermon after Pastor Shaq introduces the conversation questions and reflect on them on your own.

What happens when things start feeling out of control and chaotic? When it feels like the ship of your life is caught in the midst of a storm? How do you respond? How do you find and remain in Jesus throughout the storm? What happens when everything feels like it's falling apart and you just want to get off the ship? This is the story of Paul in Acts 27:33-44 (NIV). Reverend Eleanor Williams walks us through the passage and helps us understand how to anchor our lives in Jesus no matter what is happening in the world or in our lives.Reverend Eleanor is a member of Garden City Church. She was a special education teacher in Pittsburgh Public Schools for more than thirty years, earned an M.Div. from Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, and is an ordained pastor in the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Currently, she is the Executive Director of the Northside Partnership Project.

This week, Julia Allan walks through Paul's story, just before he's shipwrecked on his way to Rome in Acts 27. Paul, who first heard Jesus' voice along the Damascus Road, heard from the Lord that everyone on the ship would survive the storm. Paul said to the crew, "Last night an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I serve..." Even in the midst of an incredible storm Paul could hear and discern Jesus' voice. And that ability to know Jesus' voice is cultivated through belonging and service. Paul belonged to Jesus and served Him. Paul knew the sound of Jesus' voice, even when a literal storm enveloped him. How can we also hear and know Jesus' voice in the midst of the storms in our lives and society? And, in our own and the world's storms, what might God be saying to us?

This week, Pastor Shaq walks through Acts 25:1-12. Paul is now on trial for the third time, now before Festus. The Jewish leaders ask a "favor" of Festus - they want Paul transferred from Caesarea to Jerusalem because they've designed a plot to kill Paul. Festus, newly appointed to his role, wants to do a "favor" for the Jewish leaders. He asks Paul if he'll go to Jerusalem to stand trial. Paul refuses and, instead, demands to have his trial heard by Caesar, himself. It's yet another instance of political corruption in the book of Acts, one group seeking "favors" from a political leader, while that political leader is willing to grant the "favor" so he can extract something in the future. Through it all, Paul is caught in the middle. Yet, despite man's corrupt and evil plans, God's will never fails. It's something Paul knows and trusts, and it's something we can trust, too.

The legal system exists to maintain the status quo; it almost always has. It is often controlled by self-serving, powerful, rich individuals and corporate interests who like how things are and want to keep them that way. When prophets come who point out flaws in the system, it feels threatened, and the system seeks to stamp out critique and dissent with extreme force and a thin veneer of legality. Little did those systems know that the Jesus Revolution could not be killed: crucifixion only paves the way for resurrection, and a people willing to suffer and love against all odds, in the power and name of the Spirit, can endure and overcome injustice. Ever since Pentecost, every time those Spirit-filled people have formed non-violent, enemy-loving movements outside of the system, the world has changed, and the systems have been forced to bow in a prophetic nod to Jesus' second coming. Will you bow? Will you live in Him and for Him, and welcome His soon return? This week, Benjamin Chua walks our church through Acts 24.

This week Carrie Buckner continues our series on Acts, talking through Acts 23:12-22. It's the story of a plan concoted by a group of Jewish religious zealots (or, Jewish nationalists) that reached to the highest levels of the Jewish religious system. The people to whom God entrusted His law and now openly planning to break it. How do people, especially people who claim to love, follow, and represent God, succumb to and participate in the type of zealotry that embraces political violence, bearing false witness, and murder? How do people reach a point of subordinating their religious convictions to achieve their political desires? These are questions that faced Jewish people in and around Jerusalem in the first century, as well as Christians here in America today.

Jesus instructed His disciples to be wise as serpents and gentle as doves. In Acts 22:22-29 (NIV) the apostle Paul is living these words. He was lynched in the Temple and then arrested and at no point did he fight back or physically defend himself. He was gentle. And now, he's about to be tortured by the Roman state when he asks a soldier, "Is it legal for you to flog a Roman citizen who hasn't even been found guilty?" It's a shrewd question. Paul knows it's illegal for a Roman to be flogged when they haven't been proven guilty in a court. He's leveraging his privileged status as a citizen to advance the Kingdom. In our current cultural moment, it's a timely lesson for all of us. This week Pastor Shaq Hager walks us through what it means to be gentle and wise, willing to sacrifice our bodies, like Paul, for the sake of the Kingdom.

Paul knows the Gospel crosses every boundary and eradicates racial and ethnic hatred. He's given his life to proclaiming a Gospel that knits Jews and Gentiles into a new "family" rooted in Jesus. And yet, in Acts 21:37-22:22, when Paul tells a crowd of Jews who are zealous for the law that God sent him to proclaim the Gospel to the Gentiles they shout, "Rid the earth of him! He's not fit to live!" These Jews embraced a segregationist theology that told them who was superior and who was inferior based on ethnicity. It's a theology still at work in our country and churches today. Building a multi-ethnic church is an elusive dream. But it's always been God's vision to knit together a multi-ethnic, multi-racial people founded in Jesus. This week Pastor Dennis Allan talks through how the church is meant to be a signpost to the world that, in Jesus, unity and equality are possible.

This week, Pastor Dennis walks through Acts 21:26-36. Paul is in Jerusalem, trying to prove to the Jewish Christians who are "zealous for the law" that he isn't trying to abolish the law. In fact, while Paul is actively observing and upholding the law he's captured and beaten in the temple by a crowd of "law-observing" Jews. We see in this passage what can happen when people believe their political desires align with God's will for a nation. We can embrace the false idea that "the ends justify the means," which is not a way of living or being we ever see Jesus embrace. We are oftentimes "zealous for Jesus" until He becomes an obstacle to our worldly pursuits. So, how then are we to live and act? This story begins helping us figure out what faithfulness to Jesus might look like in this fraught political and cultural moment in America?*This sermon includes an excerpt of Rage Against the Machine's song, "Killing in the Name," which is available on Apple Music here.

This week Benjamin Chua walked through the story of Paul's return to Jerusalem in Acts 21:17-25. Almost immediately after entering Jerusalem, Paul learns the church there is fiercely enthusiastic for the law, not Jesus. For the Jewish Christians in Jerusalem their belief wasn't rooted in the foundational story of God's covenant family culminating in Jesus and looking ahead to the fullness of His kingdom on earth as it is in heaven, but in a rigid, backwards-looking interpretation of the law, in which they used Jesus to rubber-stamp their rule-following theology. The church is to be a community cradled in the love of God, with love for one another. This is what Paul fought for and it's what we should fight for, too.*The music at the end of the sermon is "3 Hours of Soaking in His Presence" by William Augusto. The full song can be found here.

In Acts 21:1-16 Paul is en route to Jerusalem. He's resolved in his heart after discerning through the Spirit this is where he's supposed to go, even though he knows suffering and imprisonment likely await him there. In these sixteen verses we see people who love Paul try to discourage him from continuing his journey. They encourage him to abandon this trip, to not go to Jerusalem, and even claim they've heard from the Spirit, too. These people, who love Paul, demonstrate a belief many of us fall prey to - that if something involves suffering it can't possibly be God's will for us. And yet, just because our journey might involve suffering, it doesn't mean it isn't God's will.

Pastor Shaq Hager continued our Acts series by discussing Acts 20:28-38, the second half of Paul's speech to the Ephesian Elders. Paul believes this is the last time he'll see these leaders he loves so much. It's heartfelt and emotional. Paul knows these leaders will need to shepherd their congregation within an empire that believed the early church to be anti-imperial and a subversive threat to Rome. It's why he wants these leaders to take their role seriously - care for people and love Jesus. It's an invitation for everyone of us. We are to love our neighbors and God with all that we are.

The apostle Paul endured great suffering. A kind of suffering that works like a crucible, forging his soul more into the shape of Jesus.* This week, Pastor Dennis walks us through the end of Acts 19 and into Acts 20 exploring the end of Paul's ministry in Ephesus and how his letter, 2 Corinthians, reveals the depths of suffering he endured there. Suffering is part of the human condition and experience. Jesus and Paul suffered, and we will, too. Our suffering doesn't disprove God's existence or His love for us. Instead, our suffering can draw us closer to Jesus' heart, shape our hearts and souls more into the image of Jesus, and help us provide comfort and hope to others.*This is language used by John Mark Comer in his book, Practicing the Way.

This week Pastor Dennis lead a conversation focused on Acts 19:23-41, a story about people in Ephesus rioting because they believed Jesus' followers were actively seeking to undermine the financial, economic, and religious systems that shaped the city. It's a story that makes clear Jesus' words in Matthew's Gospel about two roads - a narrow road and a wide road. The narrow road leads to Jesus and the wide road leads away from Him. The story serves as an invitation for us to join Jesus on the narrow road and, in so doing, to be people whose very way of living challenges the power structures and value systems of the majority culture in our neighborhoods.