Peter says that our adversary roams around like a lion looking for someone to devour.

Judas got more than he bargained for when he conspired with evil.

But is this someone we really need to pay attention to today? What would he want to attack in our lives? And how does Jesus tell us to stop him?

Christmas tends to be a time that we’re either filled with more hope or more despair. Either way, the birth of the Savior promises a future in which all of our hopes will be fulfilled and all of our despairs will be healed. Behold, the Lamb of God who comes to take away the sins of the world.

The story of Jesus’ birth, pondered and treasured, can fill our hearts with love, joy, peace, thankfulness, and so

Unfortunately, that is not always the case. The craziness of this time of year can put us in a Christmas funk, and we can find ourselves stressed out and exhausted. Which is the opposite of what Mary and the others who were there to experience that first Christmas felt. We’ll see today that their Christmas spirit can be ours, too.

Love is harder than we think. Of course we love our kids and grandkids and close friends and those who treat us well. We love nice people. But Jesus says everybody naturally does that anyway (Matthew 5:47). That’s not hard. People love people who love them.

The real question is, will we also love those who harm us? Will we keep on loving even when it means bearing burdens we would rather not be bothered with? Will we love when the people we love do not love us in return? Will we love those who are unlovely, undeserving, or ungrateful?

Loving others is challenging. God does not make it easy, but He does make it possible. And He shows us how it’s done.

Christmas is a wonderful reminder that God came and lived among us (John 1:14). It’s a reminder of how God came: born of a virgin in Bethlehem, as prophesied hundreds of years beforehand. It’s a reminder of when God came to the earth: Jesus appeared at just the right moment in human history “in the fullness of time” (Galatians 4:4). But as important as these truths are, if we don’t also understand why God sent His Son—in other words, what Jesus’ purpose and mission was—then we risk missing the entire point of the Christmas story.

The apostle John, though, knew why Jesus came. He knew because Jesus had explained it to him when they spent three years of ministry together. And thankfully we have John’s words to help us remember why Jesus came and why it matters to us today.

We know Thanksgiving is good for the body. At least that’s what we tell ourselves when we sit down for Thanksgiving dinner. It’s a meal that we’ve looked forward to since last Thanksgiving. There’s nothing like digging into roast turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, cranberry sauce, dinner rolls, and pumpkin pie. With a menu like that, it’s not surprising that in the United States we eat more on Thanksgiving than any other day of the year! And we love it.

If Thanksgiving is good for the body, it’s even better for the soul—that part of us that needs healthy doses of gratitude for our attitude. Especially when the world around us is filled with so much negativity and complaining, and we can easily find ourselves infected with unhappiness and discontentment. Thanksgiving can make a world of difference! We’ll experience that today as we gather for worship and see why it’s good to give thanks to the Lord.

Food for the body; food for the soul. We definitely need both.

Now and Then is more than a new television show, a movie, or a media presentation at a high school reunion that compares how we look now to how we used to look way back then.

John tells us that we need to be people of now and people of then. But he’s not talking about the past and present. He’s talking about the present and the future. Now, and then. He tells us that we are at our best when we act and think in light of both the here & now and the not yet & then.

Our world is big on the hedonistic “You only live once, so get everything you can now, while you can.” Yes, one could do that, but it would be sad. There is so much more to live for when we live in light of now…and then. We’ll see how to do that in today’s message in 1 John.

Most of us have changed our beliefs about something at some point in our lives. Which economic system is best? How closely do we need to watch our diet? Should we buy a foreign or domestic car? Or no car at all? Maybe we were passionate about something in college that just doesn’t seem like that big of deal anymore.

But can that happen with our faith as well? Today we’ll examine how to understand people who were once

You have to admit, living on planet earth is pretty incredible. It sure beats life on the Moon or Mars. There is so much to love about the world, in comparison. Food, water, air, shelter. Autumn leaves, wildflowers, mountains, waterfalls. Yes, we are very thankful God created earth and made it habitable. And lovable, too. Who doesn’t love a beautiful sunset or a stroll along the beach?

That’s all well and good, until you get to a Bible passage like the one before us this Sunday. The one that says,

All living things grow. It might seem slow and incremental at times, but growth is a normal expression of life. Whether we think of people, animals, or plants, we expect them to grow until they reach maturity. So when something or someone doesn’t grow, we begin to wonder what’s wrong.

Growth should also be a normal expression of the life of a Christ-follower, but it too can seem slow and incremental. Nevertheless, the New Testament writers assumed spiritual growth and constantly urged us to pursue it. And moreover, contrary to how growth works in the physical realm, Christ-followers should never stop growing.

But what, exactly, does spiritual growth look like? And how do you know if you are actually growing spiritually?