The Apostle Peter reminds us that believers are aliens in this world, that ultimately the earth is not our home. And as such, we will be subject to trials, challenges and suffering. But scripture calls us to be "joyful aliens" and brings to mind 4 truths about our trials: they are varied, they are transitory, they can be painful but ultimately they serve a purpose.

What enabled the Apostle Paul to forsake a life of pleasing others or self and instead seek to please God? Paul possessed an eternal mindset. As a result, he lived his life in a way that pointed to God, glorified God and directed other believers to God. In fact, we are still feeling his impact today, nearly 2,000 years later.

One of the challenges that believers face in this life is that we live in the "already" but also in the "not yet". We have been saved by Christ yet we still live in this world with its challenges, temptations and pressures. But even if our afflictions here last a lifetime, they are light and momentary when compared to the glory that awaits us in eternity.

For message 16 of our "Our Story" sermon series, our Children and Family Pastor Steve Alde steps in for Dr. Kinlaw to continue our discussion on our Vision point #5~ Living Truth and Love. He reminds us that we are in a fight not against flesh and blood but against the spiritual forces of evil. Steve goes on to discuss what is the truth and God's purpose and wraps things up with examples of the truth that brings joy to all believers. A fantastic message you don't want to miss.

In a time of gross moral and spiritual relativism, guest speaker Kris Calhoun delivers a timely message on the importance of knowing the Truth. He looks at scripture and covers three critical points: (1) What is truth, (2) Why is truth important and (3) Discovering truth.

For while we were still helpless, at the appointed moment, Christ died for the ungodly. For rarely will someone die for a just person—though for a good person perhaps someone might even dare to die. But God proves His own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us! Much more then, since we have now been declared righteous by His blood, we will be saved through Him from wrath. (Romans 5:6-9)

In part 15 of the "Our Story" series, we begin to review another characteristic of people being conformed to the image of Christ: Living truth and love. Dr. Brian Kinlaw looks at 1 John 4:7-12 and discusses the idea that God is love…though perhaps not as how the world defines love. God is the origin of love, the manifestation of God's love is seen in his Son's sacrifice on the cross and God's love is perfection.

In part 14 of the "Our Story" sermon series, Dr. Brian Kinlaw reviews Romans 6:15-23 and pulls 4 key thoughts from scripture: the truth of our enslavement, the practice of our enslavement, the past tragedy of our enslavement to sin and the present victory of our enslavement to Christ. Praise God that if we are saved, we can say we serve a new and better Master!

In order to live a victorious Christian life, we must KNOW the truth, we must reckon to ourselves this truth and begin to apply it to our lives and we must yield to this truth in order that we may be transformed into the image of Christ and He be glorified in and through our lives.

On our journey to reflecting Godly character more and more through our lives, there are three truths we need to know: The believer has been immersed into Christ- His death and His resurrection; the old man has been crucified with Christ; the believer shall live with Christ both now and forever.