One Hope Church Sermons

We don't have to hold it all together. As Colossians says, it is Christ that holds all things together. This sermon expands upon who Jesus is and what that means for our lives by addressing three things that are true in light of this. 1. We don't need to fear. 2. God has not forsaken us. 3. God is still calling us to follow him.

Have you ever thought about what an apostle would pray for? Paul prays in Colossians 1 that God's people would personally know God and live accordingly. This sermon outlines this prayer as well as a practical example of how we can pray, through interactive gratitude, in a way that we encounter God and engage with him.

There is something in us that is prone to wander from God. Nehemiah 13 outlines a number of the sins that the people of Israel turned back to after Nehemiah went back to Babylon, but there is hope. How do we keep the fire burning in our spiritual life? This sermon outlines three different things we can prioritize to maintain our passion and relationship with God.

Nehemiah 9-11 focuses on the repentance and renewal of the Israelites. Throughout history, every revival has been accompanied by deep repentance. Repentance is based on who God is—not who we are, but who we are to Him. Repentance begins with conviction, leads to confession, and results in returning to God. We need to return to and invest in God's ways because it is God who restores and renews.

Nehemiah 9 warns the people about their tendency to fall into sin and the need for confession. Confession is the pathway to restoration. Confession affirms the goodness of God, our need, God's grace, and Christ's solution, and enables an openness to the work of the Spirit.

While the people of Israel are physically restoring the walls throughout the book of Nehemiah, God is also restoring their hearts. Part of restoring hearts involves restoring the law, the word of God, to the proper place in the hearts of the people of Israel, which is what Nehemiah 8 focuses on. God's word is essential for the restoration of his people. There is no other way to be brought back into a relationship with God unless we value, honor, meditate on, and act on his word.

As believers, we often know what the Bible says about our relationship with God, but that knowledge doesn't always impact us on an emotional level. We don't often feel it. One way we can grow in this is through fasting. This sermon dives deeper into the purposes of fasting and how we can fast to move into a deeper relationship with God.

Why isn't this easier? This is a question Nehemiah probably asked himself while rebuilding the wall and a question we often ask ourselves. If we have the expectation that God will make it easy for us when we're trying to do something good, we will end up frustrated, disappointed, and discouraged. However, Nehemiah responded to difficulty with a prayer for strength, not the absence of difficulty. Similarly, we can view difficulty as a context for faith, wisdom, courage, and perseverance.

Nehemiah 5 focuses on how God uses the leadership of Nehemiah to both restore the walls of Jerusalem and the hearts of the people. Their hearts were in disrepair, and God used Nehemiah's courageous and servant-hearted leadership to build his people. By knowing that God is the real reward, we are able to lead like Nehemiah did, as a protector of people, not an exploiter.

Innovation was part of the plan that God used to restore the people of Israel through the work that Nehemiah was doing. God used a culture of innovation in the restoration of the wall in Jerusalem, and he continues to use our innovation and creativity in all aspects of life.

What part does man play in God's plan for restoration? What part does God play? Agency means effort, work, and action. This sermon explores how God uses Nehemiah, and in general, human agency, to accomplish his plans. He uses all aspects of humanity, our heads, our hearts, and our hands to creatively and meaningfully take part in the restoration He has in store. These intentional actions demonstrate our faith in a fallen world.

Paul finishes his letter to Timothy talking about wealth and riches. Paul does not criticize the wealthy but lays out how to fulfill the role correctly. Ultimately, it is trusting God by pursuing godliness, not wealth, that brings contentment, joy, and generosity. This is a truly rich life.

Healthy elders lead to a healthy church. In 1 Timothy 5, Paul writes to Timothy about how to bring order and health to the church and to ensure that the church is functioning in a way that will help it to endure long-term. This sermon focuses on how to honor and hold elders accountable in a biblical way that leads to a healthy, enduring church.

Propriety simply means what is proper. This sermon explains Paul's instructions to Timothy in 1 Timothy 5 about how we ought to conduct ourselves and proper relationships within the church. These proper relationships are mapped onto the God-given, structured patterns of human creation and create a context for faith.

There is something that we are all hungering for. We often confuse our hunger for something from God with a hunger for God himself. God is looking for people who burn for him, but there are obstacles to spiritual hunger. How do we hunger for God himself? This sermon focuses on three enemies of spiritual hunger, apathy, the orphan spirit, and prayerlessness, and how to overcome them.

How do you know if you are in the presence of godly leadership in the church? Good leaders create leadership for everyone. This sermon explores further what Paul says to Timothy in 1 Timothy 3, about finding and raising up godly leaders.

This sermon continues to explore what God's design for his people is as we live together as the body of Christ. Paul encourages Timothy and all believers to place a priority on praying for all people, people they know and people they don't. We are also reminded that prayer might not change our circumstances, but prayer always changes us.

We further examine Paul's letter to Timothy talking about how to lead the church well. Paul shares it is gratitude to God that fuels him to give his life in service. When we are filled with gratitude like Paul for what Jesus has done for us, we serve Christ out of delight. The Coopers also share about their ministry and how God is using them overseas.

This sermon introduces the theme of 1 Timothy and how we live together in the household of faith. The foundation of our life together is the Gospel. We have a responsibility to defend and preserve the Gospel which is revealed to us in the Bible. Together, we preserve the truth of the Gospel through word and deed, in doctrine, and in life.

Jesus says in Matthew 22 that loving God and others is what is most important to God. But, how do we actually grow in our love for God? In this sermon, we look at five movements of love in order to grow in our love for God that overflows into our love for others.

Paul writes to the Corinthians not as a teacher, leader, or business manager, but as a father. One of the greatest needs for the church today is for spiritual fathers and mothers. The church is a spiritual family and the call is to raise up spiritual generations of disciples through the love of Christ. In this sermon, we discuss how to become spiritual fathers and mothers.

Fear and anxiety are at all-time highs in our culture. Fear can keep us from responding to God's call on our lives and from experiencing the fullness of God. How can we overcome our fears? Joshua 1:9 gives us four keys to overcoming our fear and following God to the fullest.

On Easter, we celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus. But why did Jesus have to die and rise? God's love for us is the most powerful, life-changing reality in all creation. It is the why behind the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

Joshua faced difficult circumstances as he was leading the people of Israel into the Promised Land. He was able to face difficulty without fear because of his confidence in the presence of God. As individuals and as a church, we can do the same, since we know God will never leave or forsake us.

Acts 6 tells us the story of a growing church that inevitably encounters struggles and difficulty. The early church shows us the path to keep prayer and the preaching of the word as primary while empowering other spirit-filled leaders to help accomplish the day-to-day ministry. This leads to greater unity in the church and provides principles for the church in every age to live by.

The Church is God's plan A to reach the world with the Gospel. The local church does this by facilitating essential and committed relationships that create the environment for transformation. These diverse relationships allow the Holy Spirit to have the environment to remake people in Christ's image. Our task is to develop these life-giving communities, utilizing the gifts of the Spirit to further expand our reach and raise up new leaders.

Peter preaches the first Spirit-empowered Gospel message after Pentecost, and 3000 people come to faith. It is the first revival followed by the first global missionary movement as many are sent back to their home with the very gospel that saved them. Peter's gospel was all about Jesus. Do we preach the same gospel with our words and our lives?

The promised Holy Spirit comes at Pentecost, and the church is born. The people of God are now filled with the Spirit of God and are empowered to witness for Jesus through words, wonders, and good works. The Holy Spirit moves today in the same way that he moved in the book of Acts. We should seek to be filled by the Spirit, walk by the Spirit, and live by the Spirit so that our lives will be a witness to Jesus Christ.

We have been caught up into the grandest story of all time, the story of the Church. What Jesus began in His life, death and resurrection, we are called to finish. The Church is the body of Christ on earth today and has been filled by His spirit to finish the story that God is writing. When we catch a vision of His story  in our everyday life it restores our purpose, motivation and passion to live for Jesus.

Jesus prayed, so we need to pray. In John 17, Jesus prays for his disciples and for all who would believe in Him over the ages. As we listen to Jesus pray we can receive his prayers for us, and we can also learn how to pray like Jesus.

Jesus teaches his disciples that there will be a cost to following Him. He says the world will hate you, persecute you and even kill you because it first hated me. This is a sobering reality for many in the world today. What does it mean for us to be ready for persecution and the hatred of the world here in the west? Whatever may come, Jesus teaches that the Holy Spirit is the power to endure and testify in the midst of hardship and persecution. 

In John 15, Jesus begins to unpack what it means to live out of our union with Him by giving us the rich metaphor of a vineyard. In this, we see that God's purposes for us are to produce God's fruit by God's power. The key to our walk with Christ and bearing fruit for Him is to abide in Him. In this sermon, we look at what it means to abide in Jesus and to bear fruit for Him.

Jesus concludes John 14 by teaching about the peace that He gives us. The peace of Jesus is not the absence of conflict, but rather a deep sense of wholeness, harmony, welfare, and well-being. We have peace with God through the atoning work of Jesus and we have ongoing peace with God through our reconciled relationship with Him. When we live out of this peace we can follow Jesus' call to “not let our hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid” (John 14:27).

Jesus teaches the disciples in John 14:18-26 that if they believe in Him then God Himself will live inside of them. It is one of the most profound and life changing truths in the Bible. How can we experience this union with Christ in a greater degree? Jesus's answer to this is to simply love Him and follow Him. In this teaching we look at what that means.

Learn how to read your Bible in a consistent way that also grows your relationship with God.

What does it mean to pray in the name of Jesus?

What does it mean for us to do the works of Jesus and grow in the power of the Spirit as the church?

Pastor Justin shares church updates and teaching from Mark 4:35-41.

Jesus claimed to be God because He is God. He calls us to believe His words and His works. If Jesus is God, then we can give and receive forgiveness. We can have real hope for redemption, restoration, and reconciliation in our lives. We can be a part of God's mighty work in the world today.