Different Now | Love Builds Up

Different Now | Love Builds Up

This sermon explores 1 Corinthians 8, addressing how early Christians navigated living faithfully in a non-Christian culture. Using the case study of meat sacrificed to idols, Paul teaches that knowledge without love is destructive, while love builds up the community. The sermon emphasizes that Christian maturity is not measured by how much freedom we can claim, but by how willingly we lay down our rights for others. Just as Christ entered into our weakness to restore us, believers are called to restrict their freedoms in love, preferring others and meeting them at their point of need. The core theological truth is that every person is someone for whom Christ died, and this reality should shape how we use our freedom within the family of God.

Different Now | The Married Life

This sermon explores Christian marriage as a sacred covenant under Christ's lordship, contrasting cultural views of marriage with biblical teaching. The pastor addresses 1 Corinthians 7, emphasizing that Christian marriage is fundamentally different from secular marriage—it's not merely a contract for personal fulfillment but a covenant that reflects God's unconditional love for His people. The message acknowledges the pain of divorce and marital struggles while presenting marriage as a training ground for holiness and a living sermon that preaches the gospel to the watching world. The sermon also addresses spiritually mismatched marriages, encouraging believing spouses to influence through Christlike service rather than abandoning the relationship.

Different Now | The Unmarried Life

This sermon explores the biblical teaching on singleness as a positive gift from God, challenging cultural assumptions that marriage is necessary for completeness. Drawing from 1 Corinthians 7 and Matthew 19, the message emphasizes that both singleness and marriage are equal kingdom gifts that enable undivided devotion to the Lord. Jesus, through His own unmarried life, modeled a fully flourishing human existence that doesn't require marriage, sex, or children. The sermon calls the church to honor both vocations equally, recognizing that true completeness comes through relationship with God and life together in His family. The vision is for a church where no one feels more whole because they're married or less whole because they're single, and where all members—regardless of relationship status—belong to each other as the integrated family of God.

Different Now | Sacred & Given

This sermon addresses how the gospel transforms our understanding of sex and marriage within the context of 1 Corinthians 7. Pastor Josh emphasizes that following Jesus means learning to live differently in every area of life, including sexuality and relationships. The message challenges both cultural extremes—making marriage/sex everything or making them nothing—and returns to the biblical foundation of Genesis 2 where sex is presented as a covenant sign of whole-life self-giving between husband and wife. Paul's instruction to the Corinthian church navigates between sexual indulgence and body-denying asceticism, calling married couples to mutual submission and honor. The sermon stresses that we are "different now" in Christ—our bodies belong first to Jesus, and in marriage, spouses yield themselves to one another in covenant love that reflects Christ's sacrificial love for the church. Throughout, the message balances the need for God's word (providing boundaries and protection) with the need for God's grace (offering redemption and healing for all brokenness).

Be. Become. Do. | Do What Jesus Did

This sermon concludes a mini-series on spiritual formation, focusing on the third goal of discipleship: doing what Jesus did. The message emphasizes that Jesus trained his disciples through a four-stage apprenticeship model (I do/you watch, I do/you help, You do/I help, You do/I watch) to equip them to continue his kingdom work. The core teaching addresses the misconception that Jesus performed miracles solely because he was God, clarifying that Jesus operated as a fully human being empowered by the Holy Spirit—the same Spirit available to believers today. The sermon encourages Christians to embrace their calling as "fishers of men," empowered by the Holy Spirit to preach the gospel, heal, cast out demons, practice hospitality, and demonstrate kingdom living in ordinary moments. The overarching posture is to "start with yes" to God's leading in all areas of life.