Brooklyn Tabernacle - Audio Sermons Feed

Have you ever been wrongly accused of something? There are few things more frustrating than injustice. Jesus was falsely convicted. He lived such a pure and sinless life that the Pharisees had to hire people to make up accusations against Him! As Christians, our lives should have no room for hatred or bias. Let’s pray to have good testimonies like Jesus.

To follow Jesus at a distance is to be a lukewarm Christian. God said He would rather we be hot or cold—never lukewarm. If we “tone down” our beliefs to appease others, we add distance to our relationship with Jesus. We must draw closer to Him every day!

Politics are filled with hatred and anger. This is nothing new. Jesus was taken by an organized group of men who hated Him. Though it seems hard to consider, we could be like those men! Are we so caught up in our political devotion that we are against the things of God? We must choose the love of God every single day. By God’s grace, we can display that to an angry world.

Again and again in the Bible and in our own lives, we see God pick up broken pieces and make something amazing. He uses our failures to humble us so that we can showcase His strength and not our own. The moment we realize we fail is when we are most usable to Him. If we've messed up, we haven’t gone too far. God uses failures in beautiful, healing ways if we let Him.

Imagine being asleep when the Son of God wants help! Just like the disciples were physically sleeping when Jesus prayed before His crucifixion, we too can be spiritually asleep when Jesus wants us alert. There are people who need to hear about Him! Let’s be alert, because it’s harvest time!

We are in spiritual warfare every single day. What is our greatest defense? Prayer! Jesus told His disciples to watch and pray so that they wouldn’t fall into temptation. That command applies to us today. The best way to stay strong against attacks from Satan is to get alone with God and pray. Let’s ask God for a spirit of prayer!

Life feels hopeless sometimes. But Jesus made us such a precious promise! We can know immediately that we’ll be with God infinitely. All we have to do is acknowledge Jesus. Recognize that you are a sinner in need of saving, and the only One who can save you is the Lamb of God. Once we accept that gift, we need to tell others about God’s promise! Let’s live in the love of our Holy Father.

Jesus, the Son of God, faced more stress than we could ever comprehend. As the cross loomed before Him, He was “overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.” What would have happened if Jesus had avoided the cross? May we never take for granted the amazing sacrifice made on our behalf. What great love He showed!

We don’t know ourselves that well. We sure think we do—we can think highly of ourselves and judgmentally of others. But when we see how strong and holy God is, we realize how weak and woeful we are. Take a step back today and ask God to reveal Himself—it’s humbling!

We can easily get so caught up in our views of pastors and leaders that we lose sight of Jesus. People will fail us and hurt us. But God never will. Even when we fail or get hurt by people in church, Jesus never changes. Today can be the day we start over in our relationships with Him and restore our faith!

We all have times when we don’t quite feel right spiritually. Even pastors get discouraged and need prayer. What we need is something from heaven. Only those things from God above will fulfill us. Let's pray for a fresh fire in our spirits and trust that the Lord will comfort and anoint us.

If it wasn't for Jesus going to the cross, where would we be? When we think of that, it gives our hearts a song! God gave us the gift of music so our souls could express our praise in a fitting way. Even if we don’t have fantastic voices, let’s sing and worship the Lord today.

During the sacred act of communion, we do not literally partake in the flesh and blood of Jesus. Communion is symbolic. It's important, though, because it reminds us of Jesus’ sacrifice. Because of what He gave, we are free and forgiven! God does not remember our sins!

Drifting away from God is so easy yet so dangerous. How do we know when we’re drifting? When we neglect the Word of God, lose our dependance on the Lord, and cease communion, we drift! If we’re too busy for God, then we are too busy. He should always be our first priority. By the grace of God, let’s be intentional about not drifting spiritually.

Why was Jesus betrayed by someone close to Him? Jesus knew that Judas would be the one to betray Him. Yet He chose Judas anyway. This exchange reveals to us how each of us is totally responsible for our own actions. God knows everything and set everything in motion—but He gave us free will. Let’s use that to serve and follow Him today rather than go our own way.

In one biblical account, Jesus told His disciples the where, when, and who of what was about to happen. How could He have known all that beforehand? Because He was God in the flesh. God knows every detail of our lives. When we keep this in mind, it becomes easier to rest in His knowledge and be led by the Spirit, wherever that may take us.

Swimmers at the beach must always be wary of the undertow. If they don’t stay close to the shore and pay attention to where they are, they can get swept away! The same is true for our daily spiritual lives. If we don’t stay close to Jesus, we can be pulled away into the world. As long as we draw near to God, nothing can snatch us from Him. Let’s stay close to Jesus every day.

How often do we hear that “everything happens for a reason”? Well, according to Scripture, that’s true! God has this wonderful way of taking things that are negative in our lives and working them out. No matter how much we think we’ve missed the mark or failed God, His grace is more. The love of God is unchanging. May we never forget that He works all things for good.

The Bible doesn't tell us to be busybodies. Unless someone is asking for guidance, we should mind our own business and do what we can for the Lord. God isn’t calling us to climb the Andes Mountains or monitor the actions of everyone in the church. All He's asking us to do is what we can.

To really serve the Lord the right way, we have to not care about ourselves. We must be totally taken up with Jesus. We can certainly learn a lot from those believers who were willing to die for their faith. May we be like them and like Paul and say, “If I live, I live to the Lord. If I die, I die for the Lord. Either way, it's Jesus all the way.”

God will guide us to the very end, just as He led the people of Israel with the cloud and the pillar of fire in the wilderness. All we have to do is look up and then have the faith to follow where He leads. Let's not follow the influences around us but instead be led by Jesus every day.

Jesus is not a subject to be studied; He is a person to be experienced. He came to earth like an undercover boss, fully God yet fully man, so that we could draw near to Him. He spent thirty years preparing for ministry, modeling for us how God wants to grow us for service. The more we know Jesus, the better we can articulate Him to a badly broken world.

As Paul wrote his last words to Timothy, he warned against “godless chatter”—arguing over words, peripheral issues, doctrinal views. Instead, Paul wrote, “Rightly divide the Word of God.” Many today are leaving the faith, ignoring this warning. Paul closed, “Come before winter”—before it would be too late to see him again. Let’s be rooted in God’s Word “before winter,” while we have the chance

Many today are leaving the faith. So-called exvangelicals are deconstructing, pulling out of the race. But Paul, knowing he was soon to die, wrote to Timothy, “I remember your faith—it was the real deal. Fan into flame the gift of God.” In this letter Paul, writing his own epitaph, encouraged Timothy, and us, not just to start the race but to finish it, and to finish it well.

We can’t worship Jesus and be conscious about the opinions of others. We will always be criticized by carnal people. All that matters is what Jesus thinks. He wants us to draw near to Him with our hearts and worship Him with everything we have. Let’s go all in to worship God today!

Many Christians talk Jesus but live by old covenant law. That’s why it’s vital to understand the Old Testament. Rightly handling the Bible is mostly about knowing the difference between the old and new covenants. God’s plan to redeem mankind was not by law but by faith, as we see with Abraham and shining throughout Old Testament history. This is Christianity 101.

The Old Testament can be difficult to understand. But when we learn how to read it and how not to read it, it comes alive. The Old Testament is mostly a narrative of God’s story—how He created people in His name, how Satan came in to destroy His work, and how God set in motion His plan to redeem and restore us through “Christ in us, the hope of glory.”

Jesus wasn’t too high and mighty for anyone. He warned wealthy and well-known people that earthly goods will be worth nothing when we get to heaven. Only the true riches of knowing God can never be taken. When we live close to the Lord, we’re rich. Life becomes much more enjoyable when we live with eternity in view.

There are no secrets with God. The Bible tells us people do things in the dark and want to have secrets because they don't want anyone to know what they're doing. But everything will be brought to light when Christ returns. It's a good habit for us not to have secrets!

In a world full of anxiety and anger, many of us find ourselves bracing for impact—waiting for the next blow of bad news or frustration. A wonderful thing about being a child of God is that we do not have to live this way! We don’t have to hold on to fear and defensiveness, we can simply rest at Jesus’ feet. God is moving even in our times of uncertainty. It’s so sweet to trust in Jesus!

Order matters. In Jewish history, Passover came before the feast of unleavened bread. For us today, this represents salvation first, since Jesus our Passover lamb saved us, and then dealing with the leaven—sin—in our lives. We don’t deal with sin to get saved, we do it because we’re saved. Praise God, we don’t have to earn salvation.

People throughout the years have tried to predict when Jesus will return, but the Bible plainly tells us that no one knows. And if no one knows the day or hour that it will happen, that means no one knows when it won’t happen—so we’d better stay alert! May the Lord help us to keep an attitude of watching for Him every day.

"Born again." The term is hard to understand—unless we realize that Jesus was talking about spiritual rebirth. The only way we can be saved and spend eternity with God is to be born again. That means having a new spiritual life, with the Holy Spirit coming to live inside us. This incredible new birth gives us a living hope. Let’s be alive in Christ today, knowing that we have a heavenly inheritance in Him that can never be shaken!

We don’t need to have prophetic calendars or understand all the verses on the end times. We actually should have a little latitude on secondary matters. There has never been total agreement on every portion of Scripture. But there is one thing we can unite around: Jesus is the Savior of the world.

Almost everyone has an opinion how to interpret verses about the end times. Some people hold strongly to their personal beliefs about when Jesus will return and what the apocalypse will look like. But why do we have to argue over nuances that we’re not sure of? Let’s focus on what matters: Jesus is coming again!

Jesus warned us, in the midst of our evangelizing, fellowshipping, praying, and worshiping, “Be on your guard.” The enemy can take on the form of an angel of light to deceive people who are used to light. Praise God, the Holy Spirit will warn us about that false presence! Let’s stay in the Word so we can sort out heresy and false teaching.

The difficulty you’re facing right now is an opportunity to draw near to God. He said His power is perfected in our weaknesses. We fail when we try to get strength on our own—like Uzziah, the Old Testament king, who saw firsthand the destruction of not drawing on God’s strength. Instead, let’s be like Paul, who prayed to God and fully depended on His power.

As Christians, we can easily get caught up in the interpretations of Bible prophecy. But we have to remember that the prophecies are there to remind us of God’s faithfulness—that His Word is sure. If God says something is going to happen, we can rest assured that it will!

The age of social media sometimes feels like a hostile environment. When we stand up for our faith, we can be labeled as haters and radicals. Though that's nothing compared to what Jesus faced, it is the form of persecution many of us identify with. We have to be encouraged by Jesus’s words, “The one who endures to the end will be saved.”

The most beautiful moments in life tend to be when we are worshiping Jesus. Worship is pouring out what is inside of our hearts, not repeating words we’ve heard. There’s no casual worship in the Bible. It should be a sweet and powerful time with Jesus. We were created to worship God. Let’s tell Him how much we love Him today!

Some teachers claim that we don’t have fancy blessings because we lack faith. What does that mean for the suffering Christians in third-world countries? Jesus disproved this message in the Gospel of Mark when He said that some believers will experience great trials. Difficulties don’t show a lack of faith—mature Christians see that they create opportunities to witness for the Lord!

Many of us have heard a lot about the end times—the end is near, prophecies are being fulfilled, this next war is “it.” Yet here we are, and the world still hasn’t ended! Jesus made it very clear that there will be wars and rumors of wars. But we don’t need to worry about that. God has the whole world in His hands! Shake off the anxiety, and trust Him today!

Diligently search the Scriptures and compare everything you hear to the Word of God. Why? We need to watch out for false teachers! Everywhere, every day, there are people who claim to have a word from above, and we must stay clear of any false teachings. When we draw close to God daily, the Spirit will show us the truth. Let’s stay on guard!

How often do we realize that God doesn’t care about the beauty of buildings? Even stunning cathedrals and magnificent churches aren’t His focus. He said heaven and earth will pass away before He replaces them with perfection. We must shift our focus from the earthly things the world is impressed by to what actually pleases God.

As Christians, we often try to be Christlike through our own effort. But no matter how hard we try, we can't defeat our sinful tendencies on our own. When we walk in the Spirit, though, the grace of God teaches us to say no to our sinful human natures so we can live in victory. Let’s say no to sin today and yes to Jesus and His grace!

Nobody thinks that five cents is greater than five hundred dollars—except God! To Him, what matters most is the sacrifice and honor. Anything we do for the Lord that costs us something is honorable and pleasing to Him. Jesus sacrificed His life for us—surely we can give to Him our tithes and offerings, knowing all the while that He blesses those who trust in Him.

The Lord loves a cheerful giver. But fewer than 5 percent of Christians tithe! The love of money is the root of all kinds of problems. We can’t take money with us to heaven. We should give with joyful hearts, letting others see our love for and trust in God.

One look on social media shows us the lives of millionaires, the latest trends—even the next big evangelical product. The problem is, it’s all fake! Jesus tells us to watch out for hypocrites and legalists. If we claim to be believers, then we must be sincere and keep our eyes on Jesus alone. Let’s block out worldly distractions and just be real.

As Christians, we are called to love everyone. But that's not always so easy! We can put on appearances at church, but when we pray in secret to God, sometimes we tell Him how people rub us the wrong way instead of praying with gratefulness for them. Even in our private prayers, we are to love others—especially our church family.

Whether it’s for a new job, a good diagnosis, or a wayward family member to turn to God, we are all waiting for something. But Jesus Himself is waiting for God to right all the wickedness in the world! And God's going to be right on time. Periods of waiting can be so discouraging, but we can rest in our Father’s goodness while we wait.