Midtown Church Austin

The Sabbath is not just a day when we stop and rest. It's also a day meant to remind us why we can stop and rest.

The Bible encourages us to "Keep the Sabbath holy" yet we struggle to stop in our success-driven culture. This week we remember that keeping the Sabbath reminds us we have limits, our value is not based on what we do and God is good.

Jesus told us to expect trouble and crisis of faith while we are in the world, but he invites us to take heart and see our faith grow in such times by remembering that he has overcome the world.

When facing grief we must know that one way to joy is through grief. Jesus is the source of ultimate joy and in Jesus, joy is certain.

John 16:1-15. Jesus tells the disciples to expect opposition as they bear witness to him, but he promises to give them a Helper, the Holy Spirit, to speak to and through them and convict people of their sins and their need for a Savior.

Luke 7:36-40. How we relate to Jesus is determined by what we believe about who he is and how he relates to us.

Luke 24:13-24. Jesus's followers lost hope after his death, and we, too, suffer from a lack of hope. But Jesus reveals his resurrected self to his followers to give them hope, just as he does to us. His resurrection is our ultimate source of hope.

Mark 14:22-25. The Lord's Supper meal communicated the meaning and purpose of Jesus's death when he made the Passover meal about himself, the sacrificial lamb.

Luke 5:27-32. Jesus came to seek and save the lost, and he did so by eating and drinking with people. He was happy to share a meal with anyone, and his followers should do the same.

Psalm 103. It's too easy to remember the negatives in life and forget the benefits of God, which is why this Psalm calls us not to forget the God who has loved us without condition.

Psalm 66. God turns our troubles into testimonies. Those with troubles should cling to the promises of God and cry out to him in prayer. Those with testimonies should praise God and tell others what he has done for them.

I Thessalonians 5:16-18. Praying unceasingly with a constant awareness of God's loving presence leads to our joy, which we can learn to do by having fixed times of prayer each day.

II Corinthians 3:18. We can enjoy being with God in prayer by recognizing God's presence, reflecting on God's beauty, and resting in God's love for us. When we do, we'll want to be with God more and become more like God.

I Samuel 3:1-10. God still speaks, and we can learn to hear his voice more and more, making prayer a two-way conversation.

Luke:11:1-13. When we pray to God, we come to him as our loving Father who delights to hear our gratitude, laments, and petitions and answer our prayers.

II Chronicles 7:11-16. God accomplishes his providential purpose in prayer, changing the world, by accomplishing his secret purpose in prayer, changing us.

John 15:26-27. Jesus said we would become his witnesses, telling others what we have seen and experienced in Jesus. To become his witnesses, we need to seek him so that we will have firsthand experiences to tell.

John 15:18-25. The world tries to get us to conform to its ways of living without God and redefine good and evil. When we don't conform, the world will hate us as it hated Jesus. Even so, we can be a light to the world when we are transformed by Jesus rather than conformed to the world.

John 15:9-17. Joy is gratitude in all circumstances in response to God's love and grace. Jesus says we can experience such joy as we abide in him through obedience, love, pruning, and fruit-bearing.

John 15:1-8. Jesus is the only source of spiritual life. When we remain in him, we bear fruit and bring glory to God.

John 14:27-31. Jesus gives us his peace as a gift. We receive and access his peace through worship, prayer, thanksgiving, meditation, and obedience.

John 14:15-26. Jesus said if we love him, we will obey his commands. He knew we'd need help to obey his commands, so he promised the Holy Spirit to testify to who he is and remind us what he said.

John 14:6-22. How do we find peace in a troubled world? By trusting God, which would be easier if we could see him.What we see in Jesus is enough to cause us the trust in God.

John 14:1-6. Jesus's disciples were troubled after hearing that Jesus would be with them no longer be with them. Jesus comforts them, saying don't be troubled, I have prepared a place for you, and I am the way for you.

John 13:31-38. Peter promised to be faithful to Jesus unto death, but he broke the promise by disowning Jesus three times. Even so, Jesus was eager to restore Peter and remind him that he was not through with him yet.

John 13:34,35. How will people know that we're disciples of Jesus? When we follow Jesus's new command to love one another as he has loved us.

John 13. In a cultural moment when it's hard to follow Jesus, what can keep us following Jesus? By remembering the good news about how Jesus loved and served us.

John 13:1-5. In light of God’s unconditional acceptance and friendship toward us, how do we extend that kind of unconditional friendship to those around us? John 13:1-5 gives us keen insight into what it takes to have deep, meaningful friendships. When we know we are fully loved and accepted, we are free to extend that to those around us.

John 17:20-26. Jesus prays that we would be one so that the world may believe that the Father sent the Son. We need loving Christian communities, and the world needs to see loving Christian communities.

Ephesians 4:1-16. We practice the community of Christ by becoming a community of practice, and practice means embodied participation.

Mark 3:31-35. Jesus started a new spiritual family and said it takes priority over our biological family. As brothers and sisters, we are obligated to one another.

Genesis 1:26,27 and 2:18. We were made in the image of our triune God which means we were made for relationships.

Matthew 10:1-4. Following Jesus has from the beginning been in community (messy community) because it's only in the context of community that we learn how to love.

Matthew 14:13-33. One of the ways we change is by doing what we can to follow Jesus's missional practices while depending on Jesus to do what only he can do when we do.

I Corinthians 9:24-27. What we do spiritually forms us to Jesus or the world, so we need to ask, "What are the things we're doing, doing to us?"

Luke 6:39,40. Jesus’ goal is to make us like him. But why does it often feel like it’s not happening? In this sermon, we consider two main reasons why and what we need to overcome them.

John 15:1-8. Jesus teaches us that to become like him, we must be with him, and we can be with him today through the power of the Spirit.

Mark 1:16-20. Jesus's invitation to follow him is an invitation to become like him, restoring us to who he created us to be.

Haggai 2. In a time of great discouragement, Haggai urges the remnant to be strong, have hope, and check their hearts.

Haggai 1. After more than forty years in exile, the remnant community returned to Jerusalem to rebuild their home. When the temple reconstruction is halted, God sends Haggai to the nation's leaders to address the ambivalence which had taken root in their hearts.

Psalm 63: To keep our passion for God alive, our desire must be for God, our delight must be in God, our dependence must be on God, and our deliverance must come from God.

Psalm 51. What do you do when you feel impossibly helpless about the guilt in your life? In Psalm 51, David teaches us that when we come to God with gutsy guilt, God gives gob stopping grace.

Psalm 3. This psalm is a lament Psalm retelling the time David fled from his son Absalom. It helps us see a real-life example of what it looks like to see our faith grow as we take our fears and anxieties to God.

Psalm 8. God is magnificent because he created the entire universe, and we are significant because we're made in his image and called to represent him in the world.

Psalm 116. When we pray to God in our distress and experience his deliverance, we grow in our love for God and our faith in God. We can rest because we know he is good.

Ruth 4. Experiencing God's loyal love through others has the power to move us to witness, redeem broken lives, and make our lives significant.

Ruth 3. The story of Ruth teaches us that God's extraordinary love is expressed through the actions of ordinary (and often the most unlikely) people. This is especially in times of suffering and cultural confusion. In this teaching, we consider Ruth's conversation with Boaz on the threshing floor and reflect on how Ruth's actions teach Boaz and Naomi about the extraordinary love of God.

Ruth 2. There's a mystery about where God's sovereignty intersects humanity's free will. We can experience this mystery through "as it turned out" moments when we trust God's providence while faithfully trying to find favor.

Ruth 1. To keep our faith while facing difficult trials, we must believe in God's providence (that He is in control) and God's promises (that He can be trusted). Circumstances don't tell us what God is like, but His promises do.

Matthew 7:24-29. Jesus ends his sermon by warning his readers about what happens to people who don't put to practice his teaching. His warning should cause us to evaluate what foundation we're building our lives upon and put his teachings into practice.