Emmaus Road Church | Fort Collins, Colorado

Sermon Scripture: Matthew 6:16-18, Romans 12:1-2

When we fast, at least four things are happening in our body and soul; it’s weaning us off the pleasure principle, it’s revealing what’s in our heart, it’s re-ordering our desires, and it’s drawing on the power of God to overcome sin.

Our fight is not against the body — the body is broken, but it is a good gift. Our fight is for the body. It’s against the flesh, or sinful appetites within us all. And fasting is one of the most powerful disciplines of the Way to free our body and soul from the chains of sin and the prison of shame.

Sermon Scripture: Matthew 6:16-18, Romans 12:1-2

When we fast FROM food or activities we also fast TO something. We fast TO Jesus. After all, hunger only results when you long for something more of what you do not have, and in Jesus, there is always more for us if we seek.

The body is the sphere where our discipleship to Jesus becomes real. Where it’s not just an idea or even a feeling, but a practice. Or what Jesus called a Way of life.

Sermon Scripture: 2 Corinthians 3:17-18

In prayer, we learn with quiet confidence that God is at work building a place for himself in our hearts and mind. This is not done by painful deconstruction of our lives but is simply accomplished when we intently look at God’s glory as revealed in Jesus and are being transformed.

Sermon Scripture: John 10:2-5, Deuteronomy 6:4-5

As we mature, we begin to pray our own words, but in time, we desire not just to speak to God, but to listen to God — to hear God’s voice. The desire to hear and understand God’s voice in prayer is a Spirit-generated desire in the heart of a disciple of Jesus.

God comes to each of us inside the contours of our own life – our personality, background, stage of life. In fact, you likely already hear God way more than you realized, but like young Samuel in the Temple, you may not recognize it as God yet.

We will consider six ways we hear God’s voice.

Sermon Scripture: Luke 11:5-13

This week we will be focusing on talking WITH God, which simply means, “sharing with God what is on our mind.” In this, our prayers will include a few critical elements.

May we embrace prayer as we ask God to act and do things only he can do in the world; as we give God the space to do what only he can do in us.

Sermon Scripture: Luke 11:1-8

Jesus did all sorts of amazing things, but the disciples do not ask Jesus to teach them how to heal the sick, or to cast out demons, or perform miracles. They ask him to teach them how to pray.

The disciples were smart enough to know that Jesus was experiencing something in prayer that they were not.  Prayer wasn’t a duty, but a delight. He really enjoyed his Father’s company. In prayer Jesus was drinking from and replenishing a deep well, and they wanted a taste of the water.

Sermon Scripture: Matthew 12:1-8

The sabbath is a means by which we enter into what Jesus called “the kingdom, or the reign, of God.” It’s a day when God’s will is done on earth as it is in heaven. But sabbath is so much more than a set of do’s and don’ts that we etch into our lives. 

There is a heart orientation to sabbath life that is freedom for us and this freedom unlocks the delight and worship that is vital in keeping sabbath from becoming sabbish.

Sermon Scripture: Isaiah 58:13-14

Many of us have yet to learn how to enjoy God… believe in him, yes, learn from him, yes, obey him even, but delight in him? 

In the access we have to God, through Jesus’ death and resurrection and the coming of the Spirit, into the inner life of the Trinity, we get to participate in the flow of love and joy and peace between the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, just by setting our life before God and lifting up our heart to him in prayer.

This is true delight in the Lord.

Sermon Scripture: Deuteronomy 5:12-15

The Bible gives us 2 versions of the 1st Commandment on the Sabbath. At Sinai, Sabbath is about rhythm, In Deuteronomy, it’s about resistance.

We work more than ever before, we have more than ever before, and we’re still not happy. It’s Egypt all over again and it’s so easy to just get sucked into the culture. To feel like you just have to work those extra hours to get ahead. It’s so easy to just say, “Well, this is just how it is now.” But it doesn’t have to be this way.

Sabbath is a way to break our addiction to the twin gods of the west; accomplishment and accumulation.

Sermon Scripture: Matthew 11:28-30, Exodus 20:8-11

Flip through any popular magazine, watch any show, scroll on you phone, and you will see all sorts of advertisements; a couple drinking coffee and reading the morning newspaper in bed, a man lounging on the couch playing the guitar, a group of friends on the beach for a picnic. What exactly are they selling? They are selling sabbath.

To sabbath, you don’t need to drop $69.99 on a new terry cloth bathrobe or blow half your paycheck on a new couch, you just need to stop.