Atlanta Westside Presbyterian Church
Revive Us Again - Psalm 85
The Art of Living in Community
Silencing Shame
Equipped with Everything Good
Unshaken Hope
The Weight of Love
Those Who Lead Among You
Worth It
The Greatest Love Story
di Walter Henegar
Sep 1, 2024 | Walter Henegar | Psalm 85 |
Aug 25, 2024 | Josh Kim | Psalm 1 |
Psalm 130 Jake Fulwiler
Hebrews 13:20-25 The closing verses of the book of Hebrews pray that God will "equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ" (v. 21). This sermon celebrates all the ways that God has already answered that prayer in the previous chapters.
July 21, 2024 Hebrews 12:8-29. We all want some combination of change and stability. The author of Hebrews argues that the Gospel gives us both sweeter stability and sturdier hope than living under the law. A Christian's "address" is no longer the scary, gloomy Mount Sinai where God gave Moses the Law, but the full and festive Mount Zion, the heavenly Jerusalem where angels, saints and God himself rejoice for all eternity.
July 28, 2024 Hebrews 13:1-6 commends a surprising combination of four virtues that are all forms of "brotherly love." Each of them identifies something of great weight or value—including isolation, mistreatment, sex and money—and pairs it with a corresponding aspect of the grace of God. Jesus matches the weight of isolation with the grace of providence, the weight of mistreatment with the grace of empathy, the weight of sex with the grace of judgment, and the wight of money with the grace of steadfast love. NOTE: Our denomination's prison ministry is called Metanoia. You can explore ways to get involved here.
Hebrews 13: 7-19 How do you assess whether spiritual leaders are worthy of your trust? The author of Hebrews provides at least six key criteria, which we can apply to leaders across the spectrum—from any man, woman or child who "spoke the word of God to you" (v. 7) to the official church leaders we should trust and defer to. At the center of all criteria is the person of Jesus, who "is the same yesterday, today and forever" (v. 8).
The race of faith requires discipline. Discipline includes embracing hard circumstances that God sends our way, and also hard choices that we make to fight our own sin. In both cases, we trust that we are God's beloved children, and he wants to redeem our pain to make us more like himself. Because discipline hurts, we must remember that Jesus always goes before us, trusting his Father's will to the point of shedding his blood for us. Some resources on "straightening the path": - Emotionally Healthy Spirituality, Pete Scazzero - The Common Rule, Justin Whitmel Early - Liturgy of the Ordinary, Tish Harrison Warren - You Are What You Love, James K.A. Smith - Practicing the Way, John Mark Comer