Gulf Coast Community Church - Sunday Sermons

Speaker: Jerry Cisar

Pastors wanting to motivate their church to evangelize or go on mission often turn to the book of Jonah. This isn’t all wrong but going to any book with an agenda mutes the message of the book. According to such an approach, the evangelism message of Jonah is either that you can’t run from God so you better go ahead and tell your neighbor the gospel because you don’t want to end up in the belly of a fish. Or, Jonah was a terrible messenger who didn’t have his heart in it, and look at the revival which he experienced.

Another tact is to use Jonah to address “racism” or xenophobia. Jonah just didn’t like people who weren’t Jews (though he didn’t seem to have problems with the pagan sailors). A creative approach I saw this week suggested that Jonah is about mission: God’s mission to Jonah. If that’s the case, the book ends not telling us whether God’s mission was a success or a failure.

There’s a thread of truth in all of these, but that they obscure the message of the book itself. What is the message of Jonah? From the perspective of Jonah, the character in the story’s real time, it is about the absurdity of God’s compassion. From the Lord’s perspective, as he acts and speaks in the story’s real time, it is about His people’s preoccupation with and misconception of justice. Putting these together it highlights the strangeness of God’s way in the world.

Handout: http://media.gccc.net/2022/05/20220501.pdf

Speaker: Rob Mastry

Handout: http://media.gccc.net/2022/04/20220424.pdf

Speaker: Jerry Cisar

The Great Plains of the U.S. were struck with two great disasters in the 1930’s. The Great Depression and severe drought. Many farmers were left with nothing but dust. Not soil, just dust. They were starving; no way to make a living. To stay was utter futility. Work the ground would end with ruin. Many of them packed all their possessions onto old trucks and headed west for California, some made signs saying, “California or bust!” In other words, their life was subject to so much futility they would rather risk everything to gain a better future.

It is this same attitude that the Christian walks away from the empty tomb with: Resurrection or Bust! The tomb itself represents the futility of life as we know it because everything ends up there. Paul tells us “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is in vain. If Christ has not been raised, and therefore only in this life do we have hope in Christ, then we are of all people most to be pitied” (1 Cor. 15:17, 19). Why? Because there is a cost to following Christ in a resurrection life.

Christians are most to be pitied if Christ has not been raised because they have bet everything on it; they have set out on a journey carrying a sign that reads, “Resurrection of Bust!” Of course, everyone else is to be pitied too, but at least they had fun while the party lasted.

Handout: http://media.gccc.net/2022/04/20220417.pdf

Speaker: Jerry Cisar

The earliest known image of Jesus on the cross was graffiti etched into a wall in the form of a cartoon taunting Christians who worship the crucified God. Often referred to as “The Alexamenos Graffito,” this crude drawing of a human figure raising a hand in worship toward a crucified individual with the head of a donkey. The taunt written beneath the picture translates “Alexamenos worships his god.”

This Sunday is Palm Sunday, the day on which we remember Christ’s “triumphal entry” into Jerusalem. “It is a triumphal entry, but one that parodies the entry of kings and their armies” (Matthew, Brazos Commentary, 181). Here Jesus associates himself with donkey willingly, but not his head, his means of triumphal entry.

In this story, Jesus is not mocking himself, but He is playing the fool, so to speak. He is actually mocking the ways of the world by demonstrating the foolish ways of His kingdom. Foolish, that is, in the eyes of those who cannot see. We must remember, “the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom” (1 Cor. 1:25).

Handout: http://media.gccc.net/2022/04/20220410.pdf

Speaker: Jerry Cisar

We’ve been exploring various aspects of Christ’s kingdom since the beginning of the year under the heading: Advancing the Gospel of the Kingdom. We’ve discussed the kingdom message, kingdom prayer, kingdom culture, kingdom warfare, kingdom vision, and even the economics of the kingdom. Alas we arrive at the kingdom mission. What is the mission of Christ’s kingdom?

A lot of attention has been given to the Great Commission in the church at large, but that hasn’t necessarily resulted in more understanding. The commission is often assumed or various parts of it have become catch phrases to communicate various other missions and goals. “Go in the all the world…” is oft quoted but leaves out the instructions for what to do. “Make disciples” is great but doesn’t explain what a disciple is.

This Sunday we are going to explore the Great Commission (Matthew 28:16-20) in its context: its immediate context, its context in Matthew’s Gospel, and its context in the rest of Scripture. Each of these should inform our understanding of the mission of Christ’s kingdom.

Handout: http://media.gccc.net/2022/04/20220403.pdf

Speaker: Jerry Cisar

Jesus came proclaiming that the Kingdom of God was near, which is the gospel of the Kingdom that we also are to proclaim. If one looks at the promises in the OT you might make the same conclusions about life in the Kingdom of God which Sigurd Grindheim accurately described in his book, Living in the Kingdom of God: A Biblical Theology for the Life of the Church.

“Where God is king, there are no evil powers. I often dream of such a society, a society without evil, a society ruled by God. I imagine what the world would be like if everyone did good all the time, if every individual always did what God wants us to do, if everyone obeyed the golden rule: ‘Do to other what you would have them do to you.’ (Matt 7:12).

Don’t miss in these descriptions that the way money and possessions are viewed and used in the kingdom of Christ is radically different than how the world teaches us to view money and possessions.

Handout: http://media.gccc.net/2022/03/20220327.pdf

Speaker: Jerry Cisar

What would it mean for us to truly have the peace which passes understanding? Not some sort of personal feeling of peace or peace as a state of mind, but an experienced peace, a true peace among people that passes all human understanding. Is that possible? Some days I’d be thrilled to have peace which is well within grasp of human understanding. Is it possible to surpass that? If so, how do we get there?

Within our series, Advancing the Gospel of the Kingdom, we’ve been talking about kingdom culture. This Sunday will be the 4th time we’ve focused specifically on that. The premise is that before we can advance the Gospel, we have to live the Gospel, to be a community that models the message.

What kind of culture within a church can create peace that passes all understanding? What corporate practices can form us into a Christlikeness that will produce the peace that passes understanding? I offer that according to what Paul wrote to the Philippian believers, we must change our goal, change our story – the controlling narrative of our lives, and change our thoughts.

Handout: http://media.gccc.net/2022/03/20220313.pdf

Speaker: Jerry Cisar

Matthew 18 is the so-called chapter on “church discipline,” though that may be a bit misleading. R. T. France notes that, “Within such a community [of Jesus followers] there is opportunity both to harm and to care for others, and the health and effectiveness of the group will depend on the attitudes toward one another that are fostered.”

This chapter is less about procedure than the heart that needs to drive the process. It is less about church discipline than it is about forgiveness and relationship. Less about removing people from the church, and more about pursuing the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

If one goes to this chapter looking to deal with someone’s sin, they will not get the results Jesus intends. But if one goes to this chapter looking to reconcile with one’s brother or sister, one might well find the relationships God intends.

Handout: http://media.gccc.net/2022/03/20220306.pdf

Speaker: Jerry Cisar

Alfred Poirier, in The Peacemaking Pastor, suggests that unresolved conflicts between Christians have less to do with people lacking skills than with them being sinful. We could teach people all the processes and procedures in the world and do little to solve conflicts because the problem is in our hearts.

What is that problem in our hearts? In broadest terms, pride must be exchanged for humility. More specifically, Poirier offers that “real change comes… through a renewed vision of the gospel of Jesus Christ. The gospel is the engine that drives the train of reconciliation.”

The Gospel must be the engine powering the culture which God desires any church to have. In some respects, I am preaching the same message as last week from a different angle. Last week, in Kingdom Culture part 1, we explored gentleness or meekness as essential to Christ’s kingdom culture. This week, in Kingdom Culture part 2, we are exploring the essential starting places to begin developing such a culture.

This message carries the same awkwardness as last week’s message. I am speaking about very real problems we face as a church, all the while knowing that not only do I have to grow in these areas, I am also blind to the ways I need to grow most. So I appeal that you hear me as your brother in Christ who knows this applies to me as much as it applies to you. I can only hope that you hear it as applying to you as much as it applies to me.

Handout: http://media.gccc.net/2022/02/20220213.pdf