David sings to the Lord for His deliverance. In 2 Samuel 22, Pastor Lloyd emphasizes the song of David and shows how David recognized his own weakness and understood that the enemy was too strong for him to face alone. Yet the Lord is both just and merciful. He sustains us through hardships. Like David, we must trust in His goodness and righteousness.

Jesus has already shown us that righteousness goes deeper than outward behavior. Now, in one of the most personal sections of the Sermon on the Mount, He addresses the desires of the heart, adultery, marriage, and divorce. What does Jesus mean when He says that looking with lust is adultery in the heart? Why does He use such strong language about dealing with sin? And what was happening in the culture of Jesus’ day that led Him to address divorce so directly?

These are difficult subjects, but they touch real lives, real struggles, and real relationships. Jesus isn’t interested just in what others can see. He cares about what is happening in our hearts.

In 2 Samuel 21, David seeks the Lord concerning a famine in Israel and discovers that unresolved sin from Saul’s reign must be dealt with. Through this difficult passage, Pastor Lloyd points us to the seriousness of sin and the necessity of atonement. Ultimately, God’s covenant with David points forward to its fulfillment in Jesus Christ.

Most of us can easily say, “I’ve never murdered anyone.” But Jesus asks us to look much deeper: What is happening in our hearts toward other people? Last time in The Upside-Down Kingdom series, we saw Jesus declare that the righteousness of His kingdom must go deeper than the outward religion of the scribes and Pharisees.

But what does that kind of righteousness actually look like?

This Wednesday, Pastor Robert continues through the Sermon on the Mount as Jesus begins to show us. Throughout the rest of Matthew 5, Jesus takes familiar commands and brings them directly to the heart addressing anger, lust, marriage, integrity, retaliation, and even how we treat our enemies.

Jesus takes us beyond the act of murder and confronts the anger and attitudes of the heart. Come ready to open God’s Word and allow Jesus to challenge not only what we do, but who we are becoming on the inside.

Have you ever wondered what Jesus meant when He said, “I did not come to destroy the Law or the Prophets…but to fulfill”? What does that mean for us today? And what did Jesus mean when He said our righteousness must go beyond that of the scribes and Pharisees?

This Wednesday night, Pastor Robert Baltodano continues through the Sermon on the Mount in our series, The Upside-Down Kingdom. We’re coming to an important turning point in Jesus’ message. He is going to show us that following Him is about so much more than outwardly keeping a set of rules. Jesus takes us deeper, to a righteousness that reaches the heart and transforms the way we live.

Pastor Lloyd shows us the danger and destruction that come from rebellion against God and His Word. As Sheba leads a rebellion against David, God’s anointed king, Joab is prepared to destroy a city filled with innocent people in his pursuit of him. However, one wise woman, who knew God’s Word and understood the situation, reasons with Joab, and the city is spared. This message reminds us of the importance of learning, knowing, and applying God’s Word as we seek wisdom in the midst of a rebellious world.

Salt and light are both easy to overlook, until they're missing. Jesus chose these two ordinary, everyday illustrations to describe the extraordinary influence His followers are to have in the world. But what did He mean, and why did He choose them?

Over the past two weeks, we've been studying the Beatitudes in Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. We discovered that Jesus isn't simply giving us a list of moral virtues to imitate. He's describing the character of those who belong to His Kingdom. True Kingdom citizens are transformed from the inside out. The Christian life is not about trying harder to be a better person; it is about becoming more like our Savior as He transforms our hearts.

This Wednesday, we'll continue our series, The Upside Down Kingdom, with a new message entitled: The Heart That Influences the World (Matthew 5:13-14). Jesus now turns from describing the character of His disciples to explaining their influence in the world. What did Jesus mean when He called His followers "the salt of the earth" and "the light of the world"?  

In this message, David is heartbroken by a victory that came at the cost of his son Absalom’s life. Pastor Lloyd emphasizes David’s grief as he wishes he could have died in the place of his rebellious son. Yet David could not save Absalom. His sorrow points us to another Son of David—Jesus Christ—who willingly died in the place of rebels so that they might be forgiven, redeemed, and saved.

Last week, we continued our journey through the Sermon on the Mount by studying the first four Beatitudes. We discovered that Jesus begins His greatest sermon by addressing the heart. True citizens of God's Kingdom recognize their spiritual poverty, grieve over sin, walk in humility, and hunger and thirst for righteousness. These qualities stand in stark contrast to the values of our world, reminding us that God's Kingdom is truly an upside-down Kingdom.

The Beatitudes don't simply describe how Christians should act, they describe who Christians are becoming through the transforming work of Christ. As we conclude this section of Jesus' sermon, we'll see that the character of God's people shines brightest in a world that often values the exact opposite.

This Wednesday, pastor Robert Baltodano will expound on the final four Beatitudes (Matthew 5:7–10), where Jesus reveals how a transformed heart begins to impact our relationships with others and our witness to the world.