Building on the theological foundation that secures the reality that we know that God is working all things for our good, this passage goes on to raise the questions that plague every one of us. What about opposition we face? What about our unmet needs? What about accusations? What about condemnation? What about the dangers and suffering all around us that threaten us? Can any of this threaten to separate us from God’s love? Can anything take His love away from us?
All Things For Our Good
June 21, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
This Sunday we continue our series with Romans 8:28-30. In the context of suffering, Paul makes the strong statement that God works all things for our good. How can that be? And what does that mean? This is an often quoted and misapplied verse. The context is key for us to understand it. The assurance we have that it can be true that all things work together for our good lies in what many have called the golden chain of our salvation. This passage is timely and hope-filled.
Suffering and Glory
June 14, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
Suffering is one of the only universal human experiences, and it messes us up. Even more than suffering personally, it's hard to know how to make sense of the world around us. God's Word doesn't ignore the reality of suffering. It makes sense of the world and helps us to see that all of creation is groaning, but redemption is coming.
Children and Heirs
June 7, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
This week we continue through Romans 8 with verses 12-17. In this timely passage, we see the highest privilege of the gospel – that in Christ we are adopted through the Spirit to be children of God, all calling out to one Father together. We will spend time working out how this powerful theological foundation impacts our lives practically as we approach others as brothers and sisters in Christ.
Indwelt by the Spirit
May 31, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
This week we continue through Romans 8 with verses 9-11. This is a deeply comforting passage at a time that we all need great comfort. For all who are in Christ, we are promised that the Spirit of God dwells within us. This Sunday we will look at who the Holy Spirit is, and what it means for us to be indwelt by God’s Spirit.
The Mindset of the Spirit
May 24, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
This week we continue through Romans 8 with verses 5-8. A major characteristic for all who are in Jesus Christ, having now no condemnation, who are walking in the Spirit, is that we will experience transformation to a spiritual mindset. We need to be careful not to get this backward, as we so often do, thinking that it is our minds and right thinking that will lead to transformation in our hearts. Rather, it is God’s work by His Spirit to transform our hearts that will show up in a changed mindset in our lives.
Righteousness Fulfilled in Us
May 17, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
This week we continue through Romans 8 with verses 3-4. If you missed last week, it would be worth going back to listen and get caught up in this powerful chapter. Last week we saw that there is no condemnation for anyone who is in Christ. This week gives an explanation for that, showing us what God has done to set us free, by Jesus’ work accomplished for us, and to walk in the Spirit.
No Condemnation
May 10, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
This Sunday we continue our series with Romans 8:1-2. That’s right, one week after covering a whole chapter, we are slowing things down to two verses. Lord willing, we will take about eight weeks to walk through Romans 8 together. God’s Word powerfully meets us where we are, and brings rays of light to the darkest of times and places.
The Battle Within
May 3, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
This incredible passage shows the struggle within us between our desires, and the good and right things we want in life, and the sin that still lurks within us. It is a powerful look at the battle within and shows how victory is won.
Emancipation
April 19, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
As we gather from scattered places this Sunday, we will continue in our series with Romans 6:12-23. This passage is focused on our emancipation from slavery to sin. It’s a timely theme for us, having celebrated Emancipation Day in DC just Thursday. We will look together at what it means to be freed from sin and bound to Christ.
The Death of Sin
April 12, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
As we gather from scattered places this Easter Sunday, we will continue in our series with Romans 6:1-11. This passage gives us a clear calling with its foundations in the death and resurrection of Jesus. If we have come to God by grace through faith in Jesus, we are united with Jesus in His death, burial, and resurrection. Our baptism joins us to Him in unity. Then we are called and freed to live in the newness of life, free from the dominion of sin. This is the beauty of what we celebrate on Easter. Not just that these are true historical events, and they are, but that we enter into the story by the work of God’s Spirit in our redemption.
The First and Second Adam
April 5, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
In this section, Paul answers the question, “How can one person’s actions save us?” In doing so, he pulls way up to a view of all of human history, and with it redemptive history. For all of the ways we divide, and all the categories we create for others, the biblical perspective is that there is one human race. We are all in Adam or in Christ. This passage is timely as we look at the results of sin and the one place we can find hope as we are faced with death itself.
God's Love is Sure
March 29, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
As we gather from scattered places, we will continue in our series with Romans 5:6-11. Last week we saw the timely call to rejoice, even in times of suffering, knowing that God loves us. This week continues the same themes but is helpful at a more concrete level. When we don’t feel God’s love for us, how can we still know in our hearts that it is true and sure? Rest assured that our hope is not merely fanciful but is rock solid and historically rooted. This paragraph is densely packed with gospel beauty and God’s love, at full cask strength with no dilution.
Hope in Suffering
March 22, 2020 • Pastor Bill Riedel
This chapter starts a whole new section of the book. As I prepared to preach, I was struck again at God’s timing for us in a series that was planned out long ago. This text addresses suffering head on and calls us to rejoice even in the midst of suffering. That runs contrary to everything that we naturally turn to when things aren’t going our way. In the face of uncertainty and anxiety about living in the middle of a global pandemic, this passage will help us all recenter ourselves and remind us of the greatest source of hope we could ever have.
