Can Jesus change your life? Acts 16 shares several compelling case studies in gospel transformation: the influence of a mother and grandmother, the conversion of a successful and entrepreneurial woman, a young slave girl oppressed both spiritually and financially, and a jailer in the immediate aftermath of his failure. Join us as we learn from these stories of life-change.

Disagreements happen to the best of us. Whether you are talking about friendships, teammates, co-workers, or families, we all experience conflict in one way or another. In Acts 15, we see a sorrowful parting of two great leaders. Paul and Barnabas served together, bled together, and walked together as friends for years, then a disagreement drove a wedge between them. Join us as we explore how God works in the messiness.

As we progress through Acts, the Church is exploding among Gentiles but tensions between Jews and Gentiles are rising to the surface. Contrary to the teaching Paul and Barnabas, some Jews are telling Gentiles that they must be circumcised and keep the Old Testament law in order to be saved. These tensions lead to the first historic Church council where nothing less than the core message of Christianity is on the line as the Church debates the question, How is someone saved?

Whenever the grace and truth of Christ enters new places to engage new people, we see a variety of responses. Some receive this message with joy. Others reject it with animosity. Opinions in our world can flip-flop from curiosity to animosity moment-by-moment. In the midst of fickle crowds, the church is called to grow faithful disciples who live under the good care of the living God.

When asked if he had any word of encouragement for people, Paul immediately talked about the resurrection of Jesus. He knew that understanding the importance of this single event to your own life is the only way to comprehend Christian faith. It has been said, “If the resurrection is real, nothing else matters. And if the resurrection is not real, then nothing else matters.” Everything hinges on this.

Do you ever wonder if God is sovereign why do we need to pray? Or whether or not your prayers make any difference in the world? Prayer is a mystery that we'll never fully wrap our minds around but the Bible teaches that our prayers do matter and that our prayers are one of the means God uses to bring about his purposes in the world.

When the Church is at its best, we see the grace of God visibly at work in changing people. At its best, church is people whose lives are marked by courage, joy, intentionality, purpose, encouragement, teamwork, generosity. When we are at our best, we experience the hand of God upon our lives.

Our time is filled with spiritual confusion caused by the enmeshment of Christian faith wrapped in cultural trappings. While this is certainly heightened in our day, this issue is not new. In fact, the early church wrestled with many of the same questions: how does my faith intersect with my politics, my ethnicity, my cultural preferences? This week, we continue to explore these tensions in one of the most important sections in the book of Acts.

Our time is filled with spiritual confusion caused by the enmeshment of Christian faith wrapped in cultural trappings. While this is certainly heightened in our day, this issue is not new. In fact, the early church wrestled with many of the same questions: how does my faith intersect with my politics, my ethnicity, my cultural preferences? This week, we explore these tensions in one of the most important sections in the book of Acts.

After his powerful conversion on the road to Damascus, Saul immediately turns from arresting Christians to inviting all of Damascus to become Christians, and the Church continues to spread and strengthen. As we pick up the story in Acts, we see that though not everyone has the same remarkable conversion story as Saul, God is inviting us all on the path from personal salvation to powerful participation with God in bringing the kingdom of heaven to our broken world.