Matt Crummy reflects on joy through the story of the Magi in Matthew 2:1-12. Beginning with Edward Hopper’s painting Nighthawks and the idea of liminal, in-between spaces, he explores how Advent situates us between Christ’s first coming and his promised return. The Magi become a picture of people who reorient their lives around what they love most, traveling far to seek the long-promised King. Drawing on Daniel’s role as chief of the wise men, Thomas Aquinas’s definition of joy as “caused by love,” and Augustine’s line that “our hearts are restless until they rest in you,” Matt invites us to pursue our highest loves, encourage these loves to bloom into joy, and let joy move us into worship and a renewed imagination for who Jesus really is.

Dominic Jackson reflects on what it means to let “the peace of Christ rule in your hearts” (Colossians 3:15) in a world that feels anything but peaceful. He begins by examining anxiety and invites us to see that peace is not simply calmness or the absence of conflict, but shalom—wholeness, restoration, and reconciliation in the midst of the mess. Christ’s peace comes as a gift we receive rather than an achievement we earn. We are invited to look forward to the healing of all things, look back to Christ’s first coming, look around at our present worries with honest prayer, and then pass peace on as peacemakers in our homes, workplaces, and world.

Dominic Jackson explores Advent as a season of hope in the waiting—rooted in God’s promises, centered on the coming King, and forming us into a redeemed people. He reflects on the tension we all feel between fear and expectation and invites us to distinguish between hope and optimism: hope is not dictated by circumstances but sustained by God’s faithfulness. With Jeremiah 33 as a guiding text, this message draws on the experience of waiting for life-changing news and the Bible’s language of expectant, stretched waiting, calling us to look back on God’s past faithfulness so we can live forward in trust as we await Christ’s promised arrival—past, present, and future.

Dominic Jackson wraps up our series on beauty by inviting us to rediscover mystery as a way God draws us into wonder, trust, and a deeper relationship. Through Elijah’s encounter with God in 1 Kings 19—where God is not in the wind, earthquake, or fire, but in a gentle whisper—we learn that God often meets us in ways we wouldn’t expect, yet exactly as we need. The New Testament deepens this invitation by naming Christ himself as the mystery of God (Colossians 4:3; 1 Timothy 3:16; Colossians 2:1–3), calling us to seek not just answers about God, but to truly know him.

Dominic Jackson explores the hard, honest question of suffering through John 16 and Romans 8. Jesus does not hide the reality of trouble, but he does promise his presence and his victory. This sermon invites us to name pain without minimizing it, to rediscover lament as a faithful practice, and to trust that God is at work even when healing or resolution feels far away. We are reminded that creation groans, we groan, and the Spirit even groans with us—and that the cross reveals God’s pattern of turning what is darkest into redemption and hope.

In week 3 of Beauty: See Again What God Calls Good, Matt Crummy turns to the created world as a living witness to God’s presence and love. Drawing especially from Psalm 104, this sermon reminds us that responding to creation with praise is not extra or peripheral, but a sign that we’re seeing a fuller picture of what’s real. We’re invited into a simple, transformative rhythm: direct our attention to the world already declaring God, learn to read what creation’s “speech” is revealing, and be reformed as this goodness reshapes our desires, pace, and way of life. The sermon closes with Augustine’s stirring invitation to “question” the beauty of earth, sea, sky, and stars—until creation’s confession leads us to the One who is beautiful and unchangeable.

In week 2 of Beauty: See Again What God Calls Good, Dominic Jackson explores how our identity is formed and healed in Christ. Starting with Jesus’ command to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Mark 12:30–31), this sermon reframes self-love as learning to see ourselves as God sees us—so we can love others more truly. Drawing on Paul’s repeated language of being “in Christ” (Ephesians 1:3–14), Dominic invites us to resist the pull of competing voices that name us and, instead, to receive our truest identity as chosen, adopted, forgiven, and sealed by the Spirit. Along the way, he contrasts WWJD with the deeper question of what Jesus has already done for us, and what it looks like to live from that reality today.

Dominic Jackson opens our series by asking a foundational question: What does God think is beautiful? Centered on Matthew 26 (with parallels in Mark 14), this sermon reflects on the woman who anoints Jesus with costly perfume and how her devotion looks like waste to some but is called beautiful by Jesus himself. The message invites us to examine how perspective shapes our worship, how easily we judge others' faith, and how Jesus helps us recognize beauty in people we might overlook or dismiss.

Dominic Jackson closes 1 John by arguing that Scripture frames the true opposite of love not as hate but fear—“perfect love casts out fear” (1 John 4). He traces how fear is instilled in us through advertising, news, and social media, then shows how our anger and hatred often mask deeper fears—of loss, insignificance, or lack of control. Drawing on voices like Nouwen, Thurman, and Baldwin, he shows how beneath each sin lies a temporary identity crisis. In Christ, however, Paul’s “to live is Christ, to die is gain” becomes a settled posture that defangs fear.

Practically, the path isn’t sin-management but turning toward God in the moment of fear—through prayer, community, and “seeking first the kingdom” (Matthew 6). The closing “homework” from 1 Corinthians 13 (replace “love” with your own name) exposes our limits and points to Jesus as the only one who truly fits that definition. His perfect love—not our performance—drives out fear.

John warns his churches, “Don’t believe every spirit—test the spirits” (1 John 2:26–27; 4:1). In this sermon, Dominic Jackson names how half-true “American gospels” can sound biblical yet quietly edit the good news. This week he focuses on two influential versions—Christian nationalism and the liberation/social gospel—asking one simple question of each: Is this the gospel?

Anchoring in 1 Corinthians 15, he re-centers us on the crucified and risen Jesus as the only gospel, inviting self-examination: Where have we added qualifiers, swapped persuasion for power, or confused social outcomes with heart transformation? The call is to remain in Christ, let the gospel stay the gospel, and let everything else be a response to it.