"As Jesus goes deeper into His message on the hillside, He begins to move His hearers beyond the popularly accepted religious teachings of their day. Opening with a shocking statement about the eternal destination of the Jewish leaders and teachers, Jesus intentionally shifts focus from our outward moral behaviors to the inward condition of our hearts. While all of those listening would agree that murder is a sin, Jesus calls them to address the deeper issue of unresolved anger in their hearts. In doing so, He begins a portion of the Sermon on the Mount that forces all of us to diagnose the status of our own hearts before His exalted Kingdom expectations for us. Actions are easier to manage than attitudes. The King wants all of His followers to know that He did not come to enforce a new moral behavioral list of regulations. He came to completely transform our hearts."
But I Say to You: ANGER
Matthew 5:20-26
June 26, 2019 • Jeff Lyle
Life From The Ground Up
September 11, 2019 • Jeff Lyle
Every preacher knows that how a sermon is concluded can have a major impact on the listeners. Many books have been written that instruct the preacher how to "draw the net" so that the listener knows what to do with what they have heard. Jesus finishes up His most famous and longest sermon with a crystal-clear illustration that enables His audience to understand just how much is riding on their response to the Sermon on the Mount. Each one of us has the call to examine our own heart and to discern how our lives are presently aligned with what Jesus has said throughout this sermon. His final words serve as both an invitation and a warning to us. It is no small matter what we decide. Jesus is telling us that how we respond is a matter of eternal life or eternal death. He brings the entire sermon to a pointed end when He calls us to examine the foundation upon which we are presently building our lives.
Upon Closer Inspection
September 4, 2019 • Jeff Lyle
Life for all of us is a summary of our choices and the results which come from those choices. We cannot control everything, but we can and must be proactively engaged in deciding what we will do without lives. The Christian life is no different in that all Jesus-followers make daily choices based on their identity in Christ and the level to which they are committed to follow Him by faith. Some would overly simplify the Christian life with clichés like, "Let go and let God!" Yet, there is a clear principle found in the bible that Christians must be prayerful, patient, discerning and wise when deciding how to live their lives. Ultimately, our lives are a reflection of what we think about Jesus, and that is not going to be revealed in excellence if we are casual. Many things in the believer's life requires closer inspection. In this message, Jesus calls for our careful consideration in four distinct areas when choosing our own paths during this life. A quick glance will not lead us down the right pathway. We need to pay close attention to who we are, what we believe, who we are following and where we are heading.
Pearls, Prayer, & People
August 28, 2019 • Jeff Lyle
Sometimes, the Son of God went rapid-fire in His teachings. Sometimes, Jesus released some seemingly random teachings on His audience. While it is challenging to connect the dots in these teachings, we find within them some valuable help for our day to day lives. In this message, Jesus goes back-to-back-to-back with three Kingdom nuggets. From these teachings we are empowered in the areas of how to invest our lives, how to persist in a lifestyle of committed prayer and how to interact with other human beings in the normal rhythms of life.