Today as we enter the Advent season we’re going to talk about Hope. Right now, you may feel there is no hope, that walls are closing in around you. But today, you can know there is hope for one reason above all else. No matter what season of life you’re in, today, hope can find you if you let it. Hope is calling to you, if you listen.

Thanksgiving is a posture to be taken all of our lives. Being grateful is an action; when we choose not to express gratitude, we convey an attitude of ingratitude.

This week provides us a story of a godly man who lost his way through sin that he worked to keep secret, altering his values and behavior. Find out about how God knows our sins and is the only one we know can save us and still love us.

God wants contentment for us because it is the soil in which joy grows. Out of that growth comes meaning, significance and peace maintained by our nearness to God. Then we can be free from a passion to possess what we don't have.

Speaking truth in love is how we grow to maturity in the likeness of Christ. God calls us to lighten the load by speaking truthfully to others. Don't weigh anyone down with the burden of telling them untruths.

Today we come to the commandment that’s most easily understood and most commonly broken. The eighth commandment gets broken so often that our lives are filled with things designed to make it harder to break the eighth commandment. We work hard to keep other people from taking our stuff - but what might the eighth commandment be trying to tell us about what kind of people to be?

Your marriage matters to God because you matter. You get married to reach the finish line of loving and being with our spouse for the rest of your life. Not committing adultery is not a high standard, but it is a beginning step in lots of sequential steps that can take you exactly where you do not want to end up; or you can shun adultery and take alternative steps to get you right where God wants you and your marriage.

We see God's motives for commandments through Jesus' teachings. When it comes to the sixth commandment, it moves deeper than a prevention of physical murder to capping emotional harm. Earthly judges view your actions, but God judges your heart.

Continuing in the series on God's commandments, we now look at the fifth commandment; this is probably a familiar directive and it instructs us to honor our parents (and other authorities). Unfortunately, as we grow up it is easier to default to our own selfish nature, rather than honoring our God by following this instruction. However, when we learn to submit, we are freed from selfishness.

Sabbath is a gift from God encouraging us to rest and recharge. God doesn't need our worship and instead provides worship as a way to remember who and whose we are. We should lean into the rhythm of remembering our God and restoring our strength through praise of Him.