Sermons from Christ Presbyterian Church in Burke, VA

Following God (When Life Takes an Unexpected Turn)

This past Lord’s Day, Pastor Harlow opened Acts 8:26-40, the account of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch, to show how God directs His servants down unlikely roads to reach unlikely people. Philip’s obedience took him to a desert highway, where he found a court official puzzling over Isaiah 53 with no one to explain it to him. Pastor Harlow traced how the suffering servant of Isaiah pointed forward to Christ, and how the gospel Philip preached reached across every barrier of nation and status to bring a foreigner and outcast into the family of God. The sermon closed with the eunuch’s baptism as a picture of the good news still going out today, to outsiders near and far.

Unlikely Converts

This past Lord’s Day, Pastor Harlow preached on the strange conversion of Simon the magician in Acts 8:9-25. Revival breaks out in Samaria, a place no one expected, among people no one expected, as Philip preaches Christ and the Spirit confirms the work through the apostles. Yet Simon’s story is a sobering warning: he believed and was baptized, but his heart remained fixed on power rather than on the Lord who gives it. Peter’s rebuke calls Simon, and us, to repent of loving God’s gifts more than God himself.

Lament & Joy: The Christian Life

This past Lord’s Day, Pastor Harlow preached from Acts 8:1-8 on the inseparable tension of lament and joy that marks the Christian life. The passage opens in grief: Stephen is dead, Saul is ravaging the church, and believers are scattered across Judea and Samaria under fierce persecution. Yet what looks like catastrophe becomes the very means by which the gospel advances, as those scattered go out preaching the Word and Philip proclaims Christ in Samaria to great effect. The sermon called the congregation to hold both realities together honestly — that genuine sorrow over suffering and genuine joy in Christ are not opposites, but twin marks of life in the Spirit.

Pursuit of Peace

This past Lord’s Day, Rev. Charles Garriott, Founder and Executive Director of the PCA’s Mission to North America’s Ministry to State, preached from Psalm 69:1–3 on the theme of pursuing peace in the midst of overwhelming distress. The psalmist’s cry from the deep waters is the cry of every believer who has known the weight of suffering and the silence that can accompany waiting on God. Yet the very act of crying out is itself an act of faith, a pursuit of peace that refuses to let go of the One who hears. The text reminds us that God is not absent in the flood, but present and worthy of our desperate, persistent trust.

Looking upon the Face of Jesus (Part II)

On Ascension Sunday, Pastor Harlow preached through Acts 7:54–8:1, tracing three reactions to Stephen’s testimony and death: the fury of the crowd, the faith of Stephen, and the response of Jesus from heaven. As the stones fell, Stephen looked up and saw what his killers could not — the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God, the ascended and reigning Lord. Stephen’s final words echo his Savior’s, as he commended his spirit to Christ and prayed forgiveness over those killing him. The passage invites us to consider where our own eyes are fixed, and to find our confidence in a Christ who receives His people and intercedes for them even now.