Revelation opens our eyes to see the empty promises of empires and systems that proclaim eternality and permanence. However, the reality is that they all fade and fall. In this sermon, Greg Boyd challenges us to set aside our hopes in these empires, and place our hope on the only kingdom that will last, the kingdom that is found in the cruciform king. 

This sermon by Dan Kent names what it means to be trapped by the culture of Babylon and the path to escape it. The Babylonian way compels us to pursue more while never having enough, while the cruciform way of Jesus offers us a gift that we cannot work to attain.

God’s judgment is a common topic throughout the Bible and even in popular culture. But what does the Bible mean by divine judgment? Does it mean God smites us when we go too far? In this sermon Greg Boyd invites us to see the divine judgment or the wrath of God in a different light. God’s judgment actually means that sin possesses its own repercussions—you might say that the wrongdoing ricochets. This is how divine wrath works because this is how God designed creation. 

Greg concludes the Love Does series with a look at Paul’s statement that love rejoices in the truth in contrast with not delighting in wrongdoing. He then connects the contrast between truth and wrongdoing to demonstrate how right relatedness is truthful and how this is the way we live in love. 

This sermon by Greg Boyd shows us that love is more than simply not wronging others. The love of God actually means that we are not delighting or celebrating the wrongdoing. The motivations of our heart are shaped by love and therefore produce the fruit of loving action. 

Love does not keep a record of things done wrong and love believes the best of others. Sandra Unger names how difficult it is to walk in these two aspects of agape love. She names how keeping a record of wrongs undermines love and provides insights into how we can move away from this all-too-common practice.

Cedrick Baker invites us to look at love in action as extreme measures for the welfare of the other. Reflecting on the extreme measures of the Incarnation and the Cross, we are called to bless the other at cost to ourselves. 

Paul wrote that love does not envy or boast. Yet these two practices are woven into modern life to such a degree that many cannot see any other option. Shawna Boren unpacks how envy and boasting undermine the practice of love and then shows us a better way, a way out and into agape love.

Greg Boyd teaches us that to dishonor others is to play the “king of the hill” game where everyone is trying to climb the social ladder at the expense of others. Love refuses to play the game of shaming another to benefit self. Instead, love honors others just as God honors us.

This first sermon in the “Love Does” series highlights the action of trust. Dan Kent explores the way that God trusts, the call to be trustworthy in our relationship with God and how to grow in our trust of one another. This challenge to the worldly pattern of distrust invites us to manifest love in concrete and practical ways.