Do you have confidence that God hears your prayers?  Justin Henderson continues our God Is Love series with 1 John 5:14.  He gives us seven reasons that we lose confidence that God hears our prayers and shows us how we are told to pray.  Then he explains how having confidence that God hears our prayers changes our lives.  How confident are you that God hears you in your prayer life?  What can you do to make changes to boost that confidence and know that God hears your prayers?  Join us Sundays at 10am.

Throughout 1 John, the apostle has been addressing the matter of authentic Christianity.  John repeatedly shows that authentic Christians believe the truth about Jesus Christ, obey God’s commandments and love one another.  Chris Brannon continues our God Is Love preaching series by focusing on 1 John 5:6-12.  He will explain to us the three divine witnesses that testify to the truth: The Water, The Blood and The Spirit.  He also tells us four results that we know for sure from the truth of this testimony.  As you listen to Chris, ask yourself: “How is my intimate fellowship with the Father? Which of these results do I claim to reassure my faith and fellowship with Him?”

How seriously do we desire to follow after God?  Our love for Him is directly correlated to our level of obedience to Him and the principles and commands He has established.  We are constantly inundated by the standards and practices of this world and they seem normal to us.  We need to evaluate our life against God’s perfect Word honestly to see if we are in obedience to Him.  We have been empowered to overcome the world through faith.  Listen as Chris Brannon gives us less-than-perfect motives for obedience to God.  Then he gives us five motivations to conform to biblical standards.  As you listen, think about what area of obedience you struggle with and what you can do to change that.

Chris Brannon speaks from 1 John 4:16-21 on having confidence in the day of judgement.  Judgement is coming for unbelievers and believers alike.  For unbelievers, it will be a woeful day.  The judgement of believers will be to evaluate and give various degrees of reward. It should never cause the believers to fear that they will be eternally condemned.  Salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone!  Regardless of the reward, each person’s joy will be full and complete.  Biblical love drives out fear of the judgement.  Listen as Chris tells us what love is truly all about and reasons we resist it.  Join us Sundays at 10am as we continue in our God Is Love series.

If you don’t know God’s love, then you don’t know God!  Justin Henderson continues in our God Is Love series with 1 John 4:10.  He shows us seven different examples of God’s love.  God has actively chosen to love us, even though we don’t deserve it.  His love is sacrificial, forgiving, generous, life-giving, committed and it sees beyond all barriers.  Join us Sundays at 10am as we continue to look into the Epistles of John in our God Is Love Series.

People talk about being spiritual, but what spirit are they following?  Chris Brannon speaks on the need for spiritual discernment and how to know what’s truth.  Lies can take many forms: obviously false, mostly true, conforming to cultural norms, true but emphasizing the wrong thing and right words, wrong meaning.  Listen as Chris describes what these lies are how we need to learn to use discernment.  He also gives us A.W. Tozer’s 7 tests of how to test the spirits:

1. How does the teaching affect my relationship with God? Is He magnified and glorified, or diminished?
2. How does the teaching affect my attitude toward the Lord Jesus Chris? Does it magnify Him and give Him first place? Or, does it subtly shift my focus onto myself or some experience?
3. How does the teaching affect my attitude toward Scripture? Did the teaching come from and agree with the Word? Does it increase my love for the Word?
4. How does the teaching affect my self-life? Does it feed self or crucify it? Does it feed pride or humility?
5. How does the teaching affect my relationships to other Christians? Does it cause me to withdraw, find fault and exalt myself in superiority? Or, does it lead me to genuine love for all that truly know Christ?
6. How does the teaching affect my relationship to the world system? Does it lead me to pursue the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life? Does it lead me to pursue worldly riches, reputation, and pleasures? Or, does it crucify the world to me?
7. How does the teaching affect my attitude toward sin? Does it cause me to tolerate sin in my life or to turn from it and grow in holiness? Any teaching that makes holiness more acceptable and sin more intolerable is genuine.

Chris Brannon continues our God Is Love series with 1 John 3:11-18.  He shows us the difference between human love and Godly love.  Human love is self-centered and does what pleases us. Where Godly love does what pleases God and others and makes others feel good. We should be showing Godly love to one another.  God’s kind of love is unconditional and does not depend on it being reciprocated.  Chris also shows us what the evidences of true love are and what actions it prompts. Are you loving with Godly love or human love?

As we continue our God Is Love series, Justin Henderson speaks on the love of the Father in 1 John 3:1-10.  It’s through God’s love that we have become His children.  The fact that we are children of God, comes with responsibility.  1 John 3:6-10 shows us what those responsibilities are.  Justin also shows us how God’s love is constant and sacrificial.  You have to truly see God for yourself to see His love for you, so what would it take for you to enhance your relationship with Jesus Christ?

Chris Brannon continues our God Is Love series, looking deeper into 1 John 2:18-27.  In this passage, John is not talking about the antichrist as an individual person, but as anyone who is “against the gospel of Christ”.  There are many religions out there that attack Christ and diminish Him and His work.  Chris explains six great lies that are in the church today:  overemphasis of prosperity, antinomianism, egocentric gospel, challenging the authority of the Word, rejecting Hell, and universal reconciliation.  When trying to stay in the truth, there are five questions to ask:

1.  Is it absolutely scriptural?

2. Does it point to Christ alone?

3. Is it anchored in grace apart from works?

4. Does it depend on faith rather than human effort?

5. Does it honor God?

Chris Brannon continues through 1 John as he speaks on disconnecting ourselves from dying things.  We, as Christians, need to be in the world, but not of it!  The essence of worldliness is the craving of sinful man, the lust of the eyes and the boasting of what he has and does.  We must learn to discern the internal before we can clearly understand the pull of the environment.  John specified three well-known phrases that highlights the world’s false outlook:  desires of the flesh, desires of the eyes and pride of life.  How do you define yourself?  We should identify with Christ and His definition of greatness: the humble, the servant.  Chris asks us two questions to think about:

1. Which of these three areas of worldliness affect you the most?  How?

2. What do you plan to do about it?