The Lake Forest Sermoncast

Faces of Our Faith: Adam & Eve | Genesis 2:4-7, 15-23 | 6.7.26

We think we know this story. But do we? Before there was Adam and Eve, there was ha-adam and ha-adamah — the human and the humus, the groundling and the ground. In this opening sermon of our summer series Faces of Our Faith, Pastor Chad revisits one of Scripture’s most familiar stories and finds it stranger, richer, and more surprising than our childhood impressions let on. What does it mean that God got on both knees in the dirt to make us? Why did God bring the animals first — and what does that strange, almost comic parade tell us about what God was actually looking for? And what is tsela — really — and why does it matter that the human wasn’t split into a copy, but into a counterpart? This isn’t a story about romance or moral failure. It’s a story about what humanity actually is: a community of difference, animated by the same breath, made from the same dirt, and wonderfully — necessarily — not the same. Because the cure for loneliness was never sameness. It was each other. *Faces of Our Faith is a 16-week summer worship series from A Sanctified Art exploring misunderstood and lesser known characters from scripture.

Relationship, Discipleship, & Trinity | Matthew 28:16-20 | 5.31.26

What if the Trinity isn't the spare tire of Christian faith — tucked in the trunk, mostly forgotten — but the very chassis that holds everything together? On Trinity Sunday, Pastor Chad reflects on the ancient doctrine of perichoresis — the divine dance in which Father, Son, and Spirit make room for one another in mutual, self-giving love — and asks what it would look like for that same love to spill out of our sanctuaries and into our neighborhoods. Along the way, he revisits the Great Commission with fresh eyes: the center of gravity in Matthew 28 isn't "go" or "baptize" or even "teach" — it's a single Greek verb, mathēteusate. To disciple. Not to convert or conquer, but to walk with. To share the dust. To enter relationships the way Jesus entered ours. And for anyone carrying doubts? You're in good company. The very first disciples were standing on that mountain worshipping and doubting — and Jesus met them there anyway, saying: "I myself will be with you every day, until the end of the present age."

Fire, Water, Wind, Heart | Acts 2:1-21 | 5.24.26

What does it mean to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit?  On this Pentecost Sunday, Pastor Chad explores the chaos and wonder of Acts 2 - wind, fire, a hundred and twenty voices, and a crowd of strangers hearing God's love called out in their own language. The Spirit's first act wasn't to create uniformity. It was to create comprehension. Drawing on the image of a truly great gift-giver, this sermon invites us to consider where we are being called to translate — to do the slow, costly, unglamorous work of moving toward people we don't yet understand. Because the same Spirit who met each of us in our own tongue, in our own particularity, is the Spirit who sends us out toward the crowd - toward confusion, difference, and the neighbor we haven't bothered to know yet. The Church was born in the chaos of comprehension. We’re still being born that way today.

God is Smarter Than I Am! | Luke 22:39-42 | 5.17.26

What does it mean to trust that God's ways really our higher than our ways?  This week, Pastor Rick McIntee invites us to acknowledge that there are many different ways to be smart, and many different things we can believe. But knowledge doesn't become trust until we put it to work in the world.  Inspired by Christ's prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane, let's remember that even when things look like they're at their worst, we serve a God who refuses to give up on us, and who can turn our worst days into our most beautiful.

Ancient Linguistics & the God Who Transcends | Acts 17:22-31| 5.10.26

What happens when the gospel walks into a room full of people who already have their own answers? In this Mother’s Day sermon from Acts 17, we explore Paul’s famous speech on Mars Hill — not primarily as a model for debate or apologetics, but as a masterclass in listening. Before Paul ever said a word to Athens, he wandered its streets, read its altars, and sat with its poets long enough to find the place where their longing and his gospel were reaching toward each other. Along the way, we meet the ancient Epicureans and Stoics — and discover that their questions feel surprisingly modern. We’re also invited to ask ourselves: when is the last time we read someone else’s poets? Not to dismantle what they believe, but to understand what longing it was trying to answer? In a divided, chronically-online world, Paul’s curious, generous engagement with Athens offers us more than a communication strategy — it offers us something closer to love.