GARDEN CHURCH Podcast

We as humans are constantly being formed by the world around us. If we are not careful, we will be shaped to look more like the culture of the world, while thinking we are moving more towards Christ-likeness. Listen as Pastor Darren helps us set up a paradigm that will help us live lives of intentional spiritual formation. This will be our foundation to practice the way of Jesus, by being with Jesus, becoming like Jesus, and doing what Jesus did.

With the start of each new year, there comes an overarching sense of reflection of the past year, and the hopeful planning of the year to come. Pastor Bill walks us through his reflection of becoming more like Jesus, and why because God is always there in the midst of victories and failures we are called to tune our hearts to him and his voice. Listen as we start this new year off with a new sense of our place in the relationship between Creator and creation.

Christmas has become so familiar to us. However, when we take a closer look at the Christmas story, we realize that Jesus' birth is anything but familiar. Join us as Pastor Darren helps reintroduce us to the Christmas story, as the radical arrival of the Messiah, Jesus.

"I have to get to this meeting. I have to make sure I can post this. I have to make sure I have time for my family, friends, and myself." Our culture is constantly moving us into a space that is marked by hurry, and it is stretching us thin and wearing us out. In order to thrive in the midst of the 21st century, we need to adopt the lifestyle and pace of our God and Rabbi, Jesus. Listen as Pastor Darren walks us through practical steps in living an unhurried life.

John Rinehart joins us in his second message at Garden Church on the practicals of generosity. In order to live a life that is rooted in the generous God of the Bible, we need to make drastic shifts in our day to day. We do not want to be people marked by how much we earn, but by how much we give. Join us in learning practical ways to implement a generous lifestyle.

Because YAHWEH is so generous and loving, his people should be just as generous and loving. God has been so good since the beginning of creation, the redemption of His people, and the continual outpouring of His Spirit. Once we truly understand this about God, we can then live out a radically different life marked by generosity. Listen as our guest speaker, John Rinehart, walks us through the 'Theology of Generosity'.

In order to be a redemptive presence in today's world, followers of Jesus have to go deeper. It takes more than just being with Jesus and becoming like him, we are also called to do the things that Jesus did. We are a living and breathing representation of Jesus' ministry in the 21st century America, meaning we are to be continuing his ministry here and now. Join us as Pastor Darren lays out this final overview of our Practicing the Way of Jesus series.

A product of being with Jesus, is becoming like Jesus. Pastor Darren describes how we need to reshape the environments that we are in to make sure the product is Christ-likeness. Listen with us as we continue to radically reshape our lives in order to take part in Jesus' upside-down kingdom.

During a power outage Pastor Darren did an impromptu sermon all around the Hebrew word Selah. We constantly need holy pauses to reflect and contemplate how God is working in us, where is God taking us, and who is God forming us to be? Listen as we refocus Garden Church through this Selah.

During a power outage Pastor Darren did an impromptu sermon all around the Hebrew word Selah. We constantly need holy pauses to reflect and contemplate how God is working in us, where is God taking us, and who is God forming us to be? Listen as we refocus Garden Church through this Selah.

Pastor Darren begins our series Practicing the Way of Jesus as we look to the first principle of discipleship, to be with Jesus. Currently, we are constantly pulled in multiple directions every day, work, family, friends, the gym, and Netflix. When can we have time to be with Jesus? In order to live the life that Jesus calls us into, we also need to adopt the lifestyle of Jesus. This means a radical reshaping of how we spend our time, primarily how we spend time with God.

Discipleship to Jesus is more than just attending a Sunday service. True Discipleship is marked by accepting the call to be with Jesus, to be like Jesus, and to do what Jesus did. Pastor John Mark Comer of Bridgetown Church in Portland, Oregon helps us end our "Garden Church" series as we transition into a year-long series entitled "Practicing the Way of Jesus."

Our current age is plagued by the lie that "material things will make you happy, and the more you have will only make you even happier." This idea is completely foreign to Jesus and should be alien to his followers. Pastor Darren walks us through the value of Simplicity as a way of life that should be prevailing in our church, a life marked my simple living so that we may live abundantly generous lives that reign in Heaven on Earth.

What is God's primary way of moving forward the Kingdom? Generosity. God is a generous God that models giving wholeheartedly. Pastor Darren continues our value series, Garden Church, with the introduction of our fifth value - A life committed to extravagant generosity. Join us as we walk through this value together in order to bring God's generous love in our every day lives.

We as Garden Church want to live a life moved by compassion. Pastor Bill helps us wrestle with the difficulty of living a compassionate lifestyle in our modern age. Where the world, culture, friends, and even family are so inward focused, how can we possibly begin to take a step for those who are "others" to us? Listen and learn how we can invite those who are "other" to us, into the present Trinitarian reality that we are all invited into.

In Romans 12:1-2, Paul urges the church to offer their lives as living sacrifices to God, which is pleasing to God. However, in order to live a life pleasing to God, it needs to be filled with God and dedicated to God. This can only happen when the Holy Spirit invades our lives, our everyday and normal lives. Our guest, Alan Scott, guides us in our third value "being empowered by the Holy Spirit," and shows us how God can break out of the holy and extraordinary and break into the plain and mundane.

In Romans 12:1-2, Paul urges the church to offer their lives as living sacrifices to God, which is pleasing to God. However, in order to live a life pleasing to God, it needs to be filled with God and dedicated to God. This can only happen when the Holy Spirit invades our lives, our everyday and normal lives. Our guest, Alan Scott, guides us in our third value "being empowered by the Holy Spirit," and shows us how God can break out of the holy and extraordinary and break into the plain and mundane.

As we continue in our Value Series, Garden Church, Pastor Darren walks us through our second value - A Life Rooted in the Scriptures. The Bible has been ignored, abused, misread, and misused by people outside and within the Church. We want to create a culture that values the Scriptures and properly handles them, while also having our lives firmly rooted in its teachings.

With the launch of house churches, Pastor Darren led us into the start of a new sermon series, Garden Church: Essentials for Kingdom Life. This series' intention is to go over our values as a church, and how these values are what we believe every Christian should embody at Garden Church. The first value is, a life shared with loving family. The church is a family founded on the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus that thrives together. Followers of Jesus are not meant to live in isolation, for life, reprove, and growth cannot happen in solidarity.

As Pastor Darren closes our vision series, Bring Life. He discusses what he wants Garden Church to be known for, Power + Love. We believe that in order to be a church who makes a lasting impact on the city, that church needs to be marked by unconditional love, and God's unmistakable power. This is the way that the early church operated, and this is the way that we want to bring life into Long Beach.

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

We experience warfare on two fronts. The first comes from the flesh, or our sinful nature. The second comes from legalism and making our faith influenced by culture. Pastor Darren helps us discern these two realities that oppose our Discipleship to Jesus, and helps us navigate past these two strongholds. Join us as we finish our Battle Ready series in the book of Galatians.

God has authority over everything, everywhere, and everyone. This includes that which we call, the demonic. However, we as followers of Jesus have also been given authority from God, thus giving us the power against the demonic. Pastor Darren walks us through the story of the man possessed by 'Legion', and then teaches us how we can learn to live lives worthy of opposition.

The ministry of Jesus can be summarized to the forgiveness of sins, the healing of the sick, and the deliverance of evil spirits. While for most followers of Jesus focus on the precious two aspects of Jesus' ministry, Pastor Darren helped us see how important it is to develop a Spiritual Warfare Worldview. Listen and learn how wherever we go, we are to continue Jesus' ministry today.

The Renaissance, Reformation, and Enlightenment have all been necessary periods for our culture to transform, mature, and adapt; but is it the same for our faith? During the most recent centuries our culture, within the church and outside of the church, seem to be more focused on the physically tangible and have forgotten about the spiritual world that we cannot see. Pastor Darren helped us kick off our new four week series, Battle Ready: preparing for spiritual warfare, in order to help reshape and reform our worldview of the universe around us.

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

The American dream may define most of our every day lives. However, our guest Bonnie Lewis was able to prophetically attack the American dream and reveal to us, that it is not a big enough dream for God. Our God gives us a new identity and a new purpose every day. As we live in God's reality, we are able to truly understand that our work is for his glory, and not for our titles. We will truly find purpose when our work doesn't define us, but our place in God's kingdom.

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

The Church is called to live as a redemptive presence in the world; partnering with God in the reconciliation and renewal of all things. But how does this actually happen? The Apostle Paul insists it's through the power of the Holy Spirit filling individual followers of Jesus and empowering local communities of faith. He insists we as followers are to "be continually filled" with the presence of God in our everyday ordinary life. Pastor Darren continues our series through Ephesians showing how the connection between being Spirit-Filled and the renewal of all things.

In a world marked by the oppression of others, within the God design structure of marriage we find the Gospel. Pastor Bill helps walk us through the dynamic of marriage and how followers of Jesus can fully glorify God, empower each other, and witness to the world.

As a triune God, Yahweh reveals himself as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He yearns for us to have a deep and true relationship with him, but a crucial part of any relationship is truly knowing one another. John Peters helped us truly know and begin to understand God as 'Father'. In order to do that, we have to be willing to let go of lies about God and accept the truths about him. This is how we are able to have a loving and lasting with God as our 'Father'.

Our Pastor and Friend, John Peters, continued with us in our series through Ephesians - Artisan Faith. The truest, most authentic, rawest form of church is 'supernatural'. Each local church is filled with humans from all sorts of ethnic, financial, and even educational background. With all of these opposing opinions and life experiences, only God can get them to be on the same page. This is why Paul calls the church to "be filled with the Holy Spirit." It is only though God's Spirit that we may unite and reflect the church as it was intended.

Followers of Jesus often fall into common traps that have plagued the church from its foundation. These include the traps of complacency to the traps of legalism, but where are we called to live? Paul writes to the letter of the Ephesians about living lives defined by wisdom. Pastor Jon helps us navigate what a life marked by wisdom looks like and how that impacts every aspect of our lives.

How do we remain faithful followers of Jesus in the midst of a culture that has blinded us? Guest speaker, Chris Weinand, took us through Ephesians 4:1-16 to answer that questions. We can go against the culture around us and into the culture that Jesus lays out by Celebrating our Captivity and Embracing our Togetherness. First, we are captive to God and his will for the church. Second, we are to be fully immersed in the community known as the body of Christ.

Paul had his finger on the pulse of his culture, and he knew how drastically different the lives of Christ's followers were to be compared to culture. Three issues that Paul addresses specifically in the letter to the Ephesians are sex, greed, and idolatry. As we continue our study through Ephesians, we take a step back and try to find the pulse of our current culture, so that we can choose to go against it in order to pursue a more vibrant relationship with Jesus.

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

The Apostle Paul reveals that the church is the primary vehicle by which God’s master plan of the reconciliation is fulfilled. As God works in this world to redeem and unite all things back to himself, Jesus gives gifts to his followers to equip and empower the church to fulfill it’s mission in the world. Jesus gives us gifts, he gives gifts to be given away and calls all of his followers into full time ministry.

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

Dallas Willard said, “The greatest issue facing the world today, with all its heartbreaking needs, is whether those who… are identified as “Christians” will become disciples - students, apprentices, practitioners - of Jesus Christ, steadily learning from him how to live the life of the Kingdom of the Heavens into every corner of human existence." Practicing the way of Jesus is an invitation to be an apprentice of Jesus, to learn to be with him, become like him and do what he did. This is the call for the church; this is the call for all who come to follow Jesus today.

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

Of all the prayers the Apostle Paul could have prayed for the church in Ephesians, he prays for the church to experience the love of Christ in greater ways through the power of the Holy Spirit. For Paul, living from the experience of God’s love is fundamental to life change and transformation. What we learn from Paul is not only how to pray from a place of intimacy and abundance but also how to live out our Christian faith from the source of God’s love.

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church

"Here as in Heaven." For more information visit : garden.church