Kaleo Church Podcast

2 Timothy is the last letter we have from the Apostle Paul. He wrote it from an underground dungeon with chains around his wrists as he waited to be executed. The letter contains his last words to a man he often referred to as his beloved son. In this introduction, we will see how it is that someone stuck in a dungeon can be filled with gratitude and how someone who saw themselves as the worst of sinners could face death with a clean conscience. We will also see the vital role that God has called each of us to play in passing our faith down to others.

The Psalms were written for a year like 2020 because they give expression to our many different emotions – our highs and our lows – our confusion and our confidence – our anger and our love – our deepest sadness and highest joys. The Psalms legitimize our emotions. The Psalms remind us that our emotions are a gift from God and rightly understood they lead us to the Creator and Redeemer of our emotions so that they can then be used to glorify Him in all of their great variety. Listen to hear how Jesus gives us hope even when we are feeling overwhelmed.

I know the topic of white privilege isn’t something you would expect to hear about in a sermon but over the past week, I have found that God has used this precise topic to give me a better understanding of the Gospel. In this sermon, I hope that you will come along on that journey with me. In the end, we will consider different ways that we might lay down privilege in solidarity with those who are suffering as well as ways that we might take up privilege in order to leverage it for the sake of others.

Is it right to confess the sins of our fathers? We see Nehemiah and Ezra and Daniel and the Psalmist doing it, but still, the practice seems strange. I mean do we really need to be forgiven for things we have never personally done? In this sermon, we will look at what the Bible teaches about the corporate confession of sins both past and present. We will also seek to apply that teaching to the long history of racial injustice that has plagued the church in America.

As we consider the tragic murder of George Floyd and the massive impact it has had on our black brothers and sisters will we listen and lament the racial divide in our country and all of the pain and suffering it has caused? Psalm 22:24 reminds us that our God does not despise or abhor the affliction of the afflicted. The question we will address today is will we join Him in sitting in solidarity with the suffering. One day our God is going to come and wipe every tear away which means that if we are ever going to weep with those who weep, now is the time.

Our world is in the midst of civil unrest, racism, and injustice. What is our role as followers of Jesus and how do we figure out what to do? It may sound odd but we need to learn from the trees. Listen and hear how the Gospel and trees creates a people whose allegiance causes them to bear fruit for the King.

No matter how happily settled you and I maybe each of us knows that deep down inside something tells us there has to be more. C.S. Lewis called this longing our inconsolable secret. In this sermon, we will consider what it is that we are ultimately longing for and how it is that we might one day experience the satisfaction we are seeking.

All of us have a deep longing not only to be loved but to be enjoyed and appreciated by the people we esteem the most. Growing up we quickly learn that if we want to get the love we seek we need to be good. But what happens when we realize that we are not good enough to get the amount of love we need to be happy? In Psalm 32 David answers this important question for us.

Most of us find ourselves fluctuating between feeling like things are under control and being happy and being overwhelmed because we realize how little control we actually have. Back and forth we go between feeling confident in our plans and feeling anxious about things we can’t control. But In Psalm 28 David comes to show us a 3rd way. He begins by reminding us all how little we really do control but instead of being overwhelmed with anxiety David says, “My heart trusts in God and I am helped.” In this message, we will consider what it would look like for us to relinquish control into the hands of our God and rest in his ability to care for us.

What is Jesus doing right now? We talk often about how Jesus died on the cross and rose again from the grave, but what is he doing right now? In Psalm 20 we will take a closer look at what Jesus is doing up in heaven today and the impact that ought to have on our own lives.

Many of us have trusted God to protect the things in life that we loved the most only to realize that he doesn’t always do it. Why? Why doesn’t God always protect the things we love the most? And what are we supposed to do with all the insecurities that come from realizing that God doesn't always protect the things we care about? This message comes to help us understand how we can still trust God and live securely even when he doesn’t always protect the things we really love.

At this point most of us probably find ourselves longing for things to go back to normal. We feel like strangers in our own world and we miss the way things used to be. Abraham and Sarah were very familiar with these feelings. For over 60 years they wandered together as strangers and foreigners waiting for God to give them the land he had promised. Today we are going to talk about the temptations they faced as they waited and see what it was that enabled them to trust God while feeling like a stranger in the world. I believe that the things we can learn in this passage could be really helpful for all of us as we learn how to navigate these strange times.

Living without answers to our most agonizing questions is hard; obeying God in the midst of these questions is even harder, but that is precisely what Abraham does in Genesis 22. In this passage, we will see what it is that we need to know in order to be able to obey God even when we don’t understand what he is doing or why he is doing it. For those of you who feel paralyzed by the unanswered “Why’s” in your life this message is meant to redirect your heart from the answers you long for to the person who holds them all in his hands. It is my prayer that we would all see that knowing the one who has the answers is far better than knowing the answers themselves.

Easter just doesn’t feel like Easter this year, does it? But today, despite all of the fear and uncertainty in the air, Easter has come and that is a reason for celebration. You see the reason we celebrate Easter has never had anything to do with our present circumstances; the reason we celebrate Easter has everything to do with something that happened 2000 years ago. In this sermon, we will see how Jesus' death and resurrection from the grave ought to impact the way that we approach these uncertain times that we find ourselves living in.

This current season with COVID-19 has stripped away a lot of things we depend on. Will we respond in clinging to new ways to try to earn God's approval or will we learn to receive His promises by faith in Jesus. Listen and hear how the Gospel from Genesis 21 can teach us to receive his promises with joy.

During this time of uncertainty as fears and anxieties creep up on all of us, one of the questions we find ourselves facing is “Can God be trusted?” Satan wants to do everything he can to use the negative circumstances in our lives to chip away at our faith in God. In Genesis 20 we find that Satan successfully uses this strategy on Abraham in order to get him to doubt the promises of God. As we look at this story of Abraham’s failure we will find that we are not alone in our fear and anxiety, however, as we look at God’s response to Abraham’s failure we will also find the answer to the all important question “Can God be trusted?”

We are living in a crazy season right now. Over the last week, it seems like everyday something significant in our lives has changed. Things that we have always taken for granted have been stripped away in an instant and as our losses begin to stack up we find ourselves wondering how we are supposed to respond. In this message, we will look at how two different men responded to the catastrophic losses they experienced. In the end, what we will find is that how we respond to our losses can make all of the difference in the world.

We are living in a unique season. There is an eeriness in the air and uncertainty abounds. Things that we have taken for granted like sports and concerts and schools are now being canceled. In this message, we are going to look at Genesis 18:16-33 and consider what it would look like to apply the truths in this text to the way we respond to the Coronavirus. Ultimately my prayer is that each of us would respond to this virus by drawing near to God through Jesus Christ knowing that he and he alone is able to save us to the uttermost.

How do the promises made to Abraham relate to the New Covenant promises made to Christ's church? In Jesus all of the promises of God are fulfilled making the New Covenant unbreakable! Received by faith these promises produce a newness of life.