City Beautiful Church : Audio

7/01/25 Confession opens us up to the continual forgiveness of God so we might choose back into love.

05/25/25 The psalms are the prayers of the exiled people of God, confessing in faith that the LORD reigns in the midst of history’s afflictions.

05/18/2025 A single word uttered from an open heart can do more for us than any amount of anxious babbling.

05/11/2025 A rich prayer life connects us to God from the inside-out, and from the outside-in.

05/04/2025 Everything about our faith flows first from sharing in divine love with Jesus through prayer.

04/27/25 Jesus meets them in their fear and faithlessness and, gives them direction. He doesn’t give them the whole picture but he promises to ALWAYS be with them.

04/20/2025 The resurrection, as the central event of history, gathers all human experience into itself and sets us on a new trajectory.

4/13/25 The Salvation of the World does not parade in the front door with power and prestige, but enters in with humility and sacrificial love.

04/06/2025 Jesus is not an accessory to our modern lives, but the foundation upon which we build everything.

03/30/25 The Narrow & Wide Gates are not so much about a heaven/hell afterlife, as the way in which we embark on the journey to find God. Are we cultivating an interior posture of humility, or performing popular spirituality?

03/23/25 It is vital to become fluent in self-examination before judging others, to foster accountability and holiness with humility and grace.

03/16/25 Do we believe that God is actually good, that God will protect us and will provide what we need day by day?

03/09/25 The reward for our spiritual practices is to know and be known by God. Anything else is either secondary or a distraction.

03/02/25 We are called to be peaceable; not because it makes the world a less violent place, but because that is what God is like.

02/23/25 The syntax of the Kingdom invites us to keep our hearts tender and have a high vision of love.

02/16/25 The syntax of the kingdom invites us to shift from “how am I supposed to behave?” to “who am I becoming?" If we want to learn the language of the Kingdom, we have to stop thinking in bare-minimum obedience and turn to aspirational faithfulness.

02/09/2025 The syntax of the kingdom reveals that God’s heart is to bless all the “wrong” people in the eyes of the world.

02/02/2025 The Good News is a declaration of what God is really like, and an invitation to become truly human in God’s family.

1/20/25 We take by faith that God desires to speak to each of us, and we are capable of learning to listen.

01/12/2025 The invitation in the present moment is to repent, be refreshed, and anticipate restoration of all things.

01/05/2025 In an era of Herodian power-grabbing and religious lethargy, we have an opportunity to reclaim the joy and awe of those who move towards Jesus in humble worship.

12/29/24 Divine revelation breaks into our supposedly “normal” lives, inviting us to witness the arrival of the Messiah. What we experience is made real when we share what we have seen and glorify God.

12/22/2024 The light of Love has dawned on us in the coming of the Messiah, piercing the darkness of sin and death.

12/15/2024 Our joy increases as we travel the Highway of God, seeing God’s splendor in the Messiah, and witnessing new life spring forth in the desert of meaninglessness.

12/08/24 The peace offered in the Messiah is the antidote to a world that insists on violence, oppression, and neglect as the status quo.

12/01/24 We begin Advent by waiting in darkness, because real Hope is birthed only when we are at our wits’ end.

11/24/24 The Kingdom comes through patient endurance in the shadow of Empire, if we stay true to the Voice Who guides us.

11/17/24

11/10/24 The Spirit binds us together as the new family of God; but we cannot take advantage of this precious gift. We train our hearts and minds to move in the same direction towards King Jesus.

11/03/24 Wisdom contends with the goodness and brokenness of life, helping us discern what is ours to do and what is out of our hands.

10/27/24 Despite our trepidations, God—Trinity—tenderly breathes into us Himself, desiring always to share life with humanity.

10/20/24 As we mature in God’s sacrificial love, we cling less tightly to the wisdom of the world and find our home in the wisdom of the Spirit.

10/13/24 Being delivered from our Old Names is not a passive endeavor. We must persevere and wrestle with God until daybreak to lay claim to who God says we are.

10/06/24 When we embrace the reality that we have been adopted into Abba’s family, the Spirit can set us free from the unhealthy patterns of our earthly families.

09/29/24 Healing, like the other spiritual gifts, is a glimpse now of what is to come fully in the New Heavens and New Earth.

09/22/24 Prophecy is a gift meant to encourage the church by speaking a fresh word of God to one another that is framed in love and points to hope.

09/15/24 This garden is where God is our safe refuge. Christ inaugurated the eco-system, the Spirit helps us follow in His footsteps, by building each other up to be a foretaste of the coming Kingdom.

09/08/24 The spiritual gifts are different expressions of God’s singular love, creating a beautiful diversity-in-unity.

09/01/24 The Holy Spirit advocates and convicts; the spirit of the satan accuses and condemns.

The spirit-filled life is more wholistic and robust than many of us have grown up learning or participating in.

08/18/24 A total life of the Spirit marries the contemplative and the charismatic; the inner transformation with the outer demonstration.

08/11/24 The Christian life is one in which we follow in the tailwind of the Wild Goose, knowing he will lead us to ever greater freedom.

8/04/24 What have I learned about my attachment to Abba in this series? What is the invitation for me in the next season to grow in love and secure attachment?

07/28/24 To love God with our hearts is to leave behind the illusion of self-sufficiency and risk desire and affection for God.

7/21/24 Rather than exhausting ourselves with frenetic activity or falling prey to sloth, Jesus invites us to right action as a sign of tangible love for him.

07/14/24 Contemplative thinking enables us to to lean in and listen for the heartbeat of God.

07/07/24 We need a vision of what secure attachment to God looks and feels like in order to know where we’re headed.

06/30/24 To become like children is to return to a place where we can learn who we are in Abba’s eyes.

06/23/24 When we’re shamefully attached to God, we may accept that God loves us because God has to, but we don’t believe God like us very much.