This week we resume the story of Matthew’s Gospel. Jesus has just concluded the Sermon on the Mount, leaving the crowds stunned by his claim to have authority over God’s law. And now, in a brief encounter with a Roman centurion, Jesus is going to show...

Matthew 7:1 starts off with that famous verse, “Judge not , that you be not judged.” We’re asking the question, what are humans worth? It may seem like a strange question to ask when we’re talking about judging others, but this week we’re going to...

Fast-changing values and ideas in the culture around us can be scary. Historic good convictions can become twisted and distorted. The apostle Paul is honest with his Christian friends living in Philippi when he told them they lived among a “warped...

The Sermon on the Mount has been called a manifesto of a counter culture (John Stott). Jesus’ Sermon declares the norms and values, the characteristics and conduct of the new world, the new society that Jesus calls the kingdom of heaven. This...

What makes my life worth living? When I am old, will I look back and measure the worth of my life by how much I was able to maximize my experiences? In the United States we tend to live as though we exist simply to get the most our of life, and as a...

Ethics are more in question than they have been in many years. While most people start a conversation on ethics with, “How far can a person go without trespassing a line?,” Jesus approaches things a little differently. The question for him becomes...