When Weeping Gives Way to Witness

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Speaker: Dave Royes
Scripture: John 20:1-18
April 20, 2025

Sermon Outline

1. Main Idea

2. Wondering about truth

• The tomb provokes questions

• The Scripture speaks

3. Weeping that turns

• Jesus is The Resurrection

• Jesus is The Good Shepherd

• Jesus is The Way to The Father

4. Witnessing to Triumph

Eye-Opening Light: Seeing at Night

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Speaker: Dave Royes
Scripture: John 3:1-21
April 13, 2025

Sermon Outline

1. Main point

2. A religious man (with a hidden problem)

• A man with wealth and influence

• A man with spiritual curiosity, but cultural hindrance

3. The Triune God (with an unbelievable plan)

• The Spirit gives life

• The Son is lifted

• The Father loved

4. All people (with ultimate beliefs)

• Whoever

• Response to the Light

• Empty living vs. eternal living

The Test of Prosperity

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Speaker: Dave Royes
Scripture: Luke 12:13-21
April 4, 2025

Luke 12:13-21: Someone in the crowd said to [Jesus], “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.” But he said to him, “Man, who made me a judge or arbiter over you?” And he said to them, “Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” And he told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man produced plentifully, and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?’ And he said, ‘I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat drink, and be merry.”’ But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”

Sermon Outline

1. The main point

2. The shocking exhortation

• A particularly blinding sin

• A particularly captivating sin

3. The exposing parable

• Our delight is in God

• Our security comes from God

• Our eternity is with God

4. The truth about treasure

Job’s Lament

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Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: Job 2:11-13, 3:1-26
March 30, 2025

Job 2:11-13: When Job’s three friends, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite, heard about all the troubles that had come upon him, they set out from their homes and met together by agreement to go and sympathize with him and comfort him. When they saw him from a distance, they could hardly recognize him; they began to weep aloud, and they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads. Then they sat on the ground with him for seven days and seven nights. No one said a word to him, because they saw how great his suffering was.

Sermon Outline

1. Introduction

• Review

• Job’s friends arrive

2. Job begins his lament

3. Job utters a series of curses

• A curse

• “May God not care about that day”

• “May that day be shrouded in darkness”

4. “Why?”

• The universally spoken three-letter word

• How Job imagines the grave

• The final “why”

• Summary

5. Applications

• God sometimes lets the righteous suffer terribly

• It is important for believers to acknowledge another’s suffering before explaining it

• It is appropriate for a Christian to groan, sometimes long and loudly

Job 3:1-26: After this, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth. He said: “May the day of my birth perish, and the night that said, ‘A boy is conceived!’ That day — may it turn to darkness; may God above not care about it; may no light shine on it. May gloom and utter darkness claim it once more; may a cloud settle over it; may blackness overwhelm it. That night — may thick darkness seize it; may it not be included among the days of the year nor be entered in any of the months. May that night be barren; may no shout of joy be heard in it. May those who curse days curse that day, those who are ready to rouse Leviathan. May its morning stars become dark; may it wait for daylight in vain and not see the first rays of dawn, for it did not shut the doors of the womb on me to hide trouble from my eyes.

“Why did I not perish at birth, and die as I came from the womb? Why were there knees to receive me and breasts that I might be nursed? For now I would be lying down in peace; I would be asleep and at rest with kings and rulers of the earth, who built for themselves places now lying in ruins, with princes who had gold, who filled their houses with silver. Or why was I not hidden away in the ground like a stillborn child, like an infant who never saw the light of day? There the wicked cease from turmoil, and there the weary are at rest. Captives also enjoy their ease; they no longer hear the slave driver’s shout. The small and the great are there, and the slaves are freed from their owners.

“Why is light given to those in misery, and life to the bitter of soul, to those who long for death that does not come, who search for it more than for hidden treasure, who are filled with gladness and rejoice when they reach the grave? Why is life given to a man whose way is hidden, whom God has hedged in? For sighing has become my daily food; my groans pour out like water. What I feared has come upon me; what I dreaded has happened to me. I have no peace, no quietness; I have no rest, but only turmoil.”

Sermon Outline

1. Job utters a series of curses

• A curse

• “God may not care about the day of his birth”

• “May that day be shrouded in darkness”

2. “Why” questions

• The universally spoken 3-letter word

• How He imagines the grave

• Final “Why”

• summary

3. Principle: God sometimes lets the righteous suffer terribly

• Yet God himself affirmed Job as righteous

4. Principle: It is important for believers to acknowledge another’s suffering before explaining it. It is appropriate for a Christian to groan, sometimes long and loudly

5. Conclusion

A Blameless Man Devastated

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Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: Job 1:1-2:10
March 23, 2025

Sermon Outline

1. A well-run world on earth

• Where Job lived

• When Job lived

• What sort of man was Job religiously?

• Job’s greatness

• Job’s anxiety

2. Transition from earth to heaven

3. First scene in heaven

• The gathering of angels

• The dialogue between the adversary and the King

4. First scene on earth

• Sabeans

• Act of nature

• Chaldeans

• The real horror

5. Second scene in heaven

• “Skin for skin”

• Is God an egomaniac for agreeing to this?

• Job’s agonizing illness

6. Applications

Eye-Opening Light: Seeing His Signs

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Speaker: Dave Royes
Scripture: John 2:1-11
March 16, 2025

Sermon Outline

1. Introduction

• A crisis at a wedding

• Why did John include this in his gospel?

• The main point

2. The revealing crisis

• Why a wedding?

• What the crisis mirrors

3. The foretaste sign

• Why Jesus said what He said

• Jesus brings purification to its pinnacle

• Jesus shields us from our shame

• Jesus sets enjoyment in eternity

4. The hour approaching

• The shadow cast over the gospel of John

5. The response of faith

• The response to the miracle

• Do you perceive Jesus for who he is?

• Train yourself, Christian, to let go of lesser joys

“How soon do earthly lovers come to an end of their discoveries of each other’s beauty; how soon do they see all that is to be seen?... [But] how happy is that love, in which there is an eternal progress in all these things; wherein new beauties are continually discovered, and more and more loveliness, and in which we shall forever increase in beauty ourselves; where we shall be made capable of finding out and giving, and shall receive, more and more endearing expressions of love forever: our union will become more close, and communication more intimate.” — Jonathan Edwards, Heaven, a World of Love (2020)

Eye-Opening Light: Seeing His Glory

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Speaker: Dave Royes
Scripture: John 1:1-18
March 9, 2025

2 Chronicles 26: 15-16: The Lord, the God of their ancestors, sent word to them through his messengers again and again, because he had pity on his people and on his dwelling place. But they mocked God’s messengers, despised his words and scoffed at his prophets until the wrath of the Lord was aroused against his people and there was no remedy.

Sermon Outline

1. His climatic coming

• God called out to his own

2. His sober diagnosis

• We naturally hide

• We easily misunderstand

• We quickly reject

3. His unbelievable message

• God adopts all who receive him

4. Applications

”When we approach Him in the intensity of worship, we gather up all the sweetness involved in Fatherhood and all the tenderness wrapped up in sonship; when calamities overcome us and troubles come in like a flood, we lift up our cry and stretch out our arms to God as a compassionate Father; when the angel of death climbs in at the window of our homes and bears away the object of our love, we find our dearest solace in reflecting upon the fatherly heart of God; when we look across the swelling flood, it is our Father’s House on the light-covered hills beyond the stars which cheers us amid the crumbling of the earthly tabernacle.” — Robert Webb, Adoption: The Sweetest Doctrine, TableTalk (2024)

“How Did We Get Here?”

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Speaker: Dave Royes
Scripture: Exodus 13:17-22
March 2, 2025

Exodus 13:17-22: When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them by way of the land of the Philistines, although that was near. For God said, “Lest the people change their minds when they see war and return to Egypt.” But God led the people around by the way of the wilderness toward the Red Sea. And the people of Israel went up out of the land of Egypt equipped for battle. Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for Joseph had made the sons of Israel solemnly swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones with you from here.” And they moved on from Succoth and encamped at Etham, on the edge of the wilderness. And the LORD went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead them along the way, and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, that they might travel by day and by night. The pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night did not depart from before the people.

Sermon Outline

1. A winding road

• The path is not humanly efficient

• Why God leads them on this winding path

2. A Word remembered

• God’s plan is unfolding

• God’s promise is prevailing

• God’s people need reminding

3. A wonderful revelation

• In Exodus, God came down in pillars of cloud and fire

• In the Gospels, God came down as a human

4. Applications

Love in Heaven

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Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: 1 Corinthians 13:8-13
February 23, 2025

1 Corinthians 13:8-13: Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. When I was a child, I reasoned like a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child. When I became a man, I put childish things behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Sermon Outline

1. Wrong idea of spirituality

• Tongues

• Same wrong idea with prophesy

• What the chapter has said

2. Summary of this passage

3. Three temporary gifts of ministry

• Prophecy

• Tongues

• Knowledge

4. Two figures of speech and a clear statement

• Contrast between childhood and adulthood

• Contrast between reflection and face-to-face

• The clear statement

5. On verse 13

• “These three remain”

• “But the greatest of these is love”

6. Jonathan Edwards on love

• The cause and fountain of love

• The objects of love

• The beings who will love

• Some aspects of love

Growth in God’s Kingdom

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Speaker: Mark Estes
Scripture: Mark 4:26-29
February 16, 2025

Mark 4:26-29, NIV: He also said, “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. All by itself the soil produces grain — first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.”

Mark 4:26-29, NLT: Jesus also said, “The Kingdom of God is like a farmer who scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, while he’s asleep or awake, the seed sprouts and grows, but he does not understand how it happens. The earth produces the crops on its own. First a leaf blade pushes through, then the heads of wheat are formed, and finally the grain ripens. And as soon as the grain is ready, the former comes and harvests it with a sickle, for the harvest has come.”

Sermon Outline

1. Introduction: Parables as allegory

• E.g. Pilgrim’s Progress

• Prodigal son

1. Some church fathers took it too far

2. Hyper-allegorical

• Avoid over-allegorizing and de-allegorizing

• E.g. wicked tenants

1. Pharisees knew Jesus was talking about them

2. Why are parables hard to understand?

• Key: Mark 4:10-12

• Jesus’ two-fold purpose in telling parables

1. Reveal the truth to his disciples

2. Conceal the truth from the Pharisees

• Why do this?

• Parables were a form of judgment on Israel

3. The parable of the growing seed

• Symbolism

• Four principles

1. In both the growth of corn and the work of grace, there must be a sower

2. In both the growth of grain and grace, much is outside our understanding or control

3. True life shows itself gradually

4. Grain isn’t harvested until it is ripe

4. Applications

What Love Looks Like

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Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: 1 Corinthians 13:4-7
February 9, 2025

1 Corinthians 13:4-7, NIV: Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7, ESV: Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Sermon Outline

1. Fifteen verbs

2. First: Two positives about love

• “Love is patient”

• “Love is kind”

• Combination reflects God

3. Seven negatives about love

• “Does not envy”

• “Does not boast”

• “Is not proud”

• “Is not rude”

• ”Is not self-seeking”

• “Is not easily angered”

• “Keeps no record of wrongs”

• “Does not delight in evil”

4. Four zippy little phrases about love

• NIV translation

• ESV translation

• Answering objections

• Steve’s Uncle Tom

Love: Graces Better Than Gifts

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Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: 1 Corinthians 13:1-3
February 2, 2025

1 Corinthians 13:1-3: If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Sermon Outline

1. Introduction

• Challenges facing the earliest Christians

• How God equipped them

2. Love is more important than gifted speaking and teaching

• The gift of tongues

• The problem

• The application

3. Love is much more important than mere religious activity

• “If I have the gift of prophecy...”

• “If I can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge...”

• “If I have a faith that can move mountains...”

4. Love is more important than even acts of personal sacrifice

• “If I give all I possess to the poor...”

• “...and surrender my body to the flames...”

5. The result of no love

• “I gain nothing”

• “I am nothing”

6. Three closing thoughts

Benediction

Praise be to the Lord, for he has heard our cry for mercy. Our hearts trust in him, and we are helped. Save your people and bless your inheritance, be our shepherd and carry us forever. Amen — paraphrased from Psalm 28: 6-9

A Fine Wife

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Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: Proverbs 31:10-31
January 26, 2025

Sermon Outline

1. A wife of noble character

• Who is the passage speaking of?

• What if I’m not a wife or a mother?

• A woman of noble character

2. First area of her attention: her husband

• A helper suitable for him

• “clothed in fine linen and purple”

3. Second area of her attention: her children

• Basic needs

• Involved in their lives

• All this takes energy!

4. Third area of her attention: outside her home

• Finances (for her home)

• The needy

5. Near the end: “Who can find?”

6. Applications

The Danger of Spiritual Declension

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Speaker: Rich Goswiller
Scripture: Jeremiah 2:9-13
January 19, 2025

Jeremiah 2:9-13: “Therefore I still contend with you, declares the LORD, and with your children’s children I will contend. For cross to the coasts of Cyprus and see, or sent to Kedar and examine with care, see if there has been such a thing. Has a nation changed its gods, even though they are no gods? But my people have changed their glory for that which does not profit. Be appalled, O heavens, at this; be shocked, be utterly desolate, declares the LORD, for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water.”

Sermon Outline

1. Introduction

2. God’s declaration

• “Therefore...”

• Some measure of judgment

3. God’s indictment

• They exchanged the better for the worse

• Idol factories

4. The two evils committed by Judah

• Evil #1

• Evil #2

5. God’s word for us today

• Why do the faithful turn away from the truth?

• Keep yourself in the love of the God who loves you

Human Suffering and the Sovereignty of God

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Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: Various passages
January 12, 2025

Sermon Outline

1. Introduction

• Where is God when we suffer?

• The story of Rabbi Harold Kushner

• Many evangelicals are like Rabbi Kushner

• Some people take the opposite view

2. The causes behind suffering in the Book of Job

• What caused Job’s troubles?

• God governs nature and its laws

• God governs both intentional and unintentional actions of people

• God governs Satan and demons

3. An objection... and two answers

• The objection

• God is drawn to suffering people

• God’s motives for decreeing evil are good

4. Summary

• What about suffering is God sovereign over?

• For what purpose?

“The Christian’s Eternal Rest” — Adapted from Richard Baxter (1640)

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Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: Hebrews 4:9
January 5, 2025

Hebrews 4:9: There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works, just as God did from his.

Sermon Outline

1. Introduction

• Baxter’s life/illnesses

• Old Testament saints in the desert were promised rest

• Christians have hard lives, but God has promised eternal rest

2. Our eternal rest

• Our eternal rest means the end of tiring effort

• Our eternal rest means we will experience perfect love

• Our eternal rest means we’ll have the capacity for all heaven’s delights

3. How our souls will respond to all this in heaven

Suffering and Glory

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Speaker: Dr. Iain Duguid
Scripture: Acts 17:1-15
December 29, 2024

An Angel, a Virgin

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Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: Luke 1:26-38
December 22, 2024

Luke 1:26-38: In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”

Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”

“How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?” The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called[a] the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. For no word from God will ever fail.”

“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” Then the angel left her.

Sermon Outline

1. The angel

2. The place

• Far from Jerusalem

• Of “inferior Jewishness”

• The town of Nazareth

3. The time

4. The virgin

• Her need for a Savior

• Her modest role

• Her godliness

5. The conversation

• Gabriel’s graciousness and Mary’s fear

• Gabriel’s reassuring message

• Mary requests an explanation

• Gabriel’s astounding, mysterious answer

• Gabriel’s help to Mary’s faith

• Mary’s courageous, submissive reply

6. The applications

When the Time had Fully Come (the Birth of Jesus Christ)

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Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: Galatians 4:1-5
December 15, 2024

Galatians 4:1-5, NIV: But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, to redeem those under law, that we might receive the full rights of sons.

Galatians 4:1-5, ESV: But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.

Sermon Outline

1. “When the time had fully come, God sent his Son”

• The Father behind the Christmas story

• God moved toward us

2. “When the time had fully come, God sent his Son”

• Doctrine of the Holy Trinity

• Relationship of love

• Relationship of likeness

• The self-existent Son

3. “When the time had fully come, God sent his Son”

4. “When the time had fully come, God sent his Son”

• God sent his Son when he alone knew the time was perfect

• God sent his Son when the means were in place to spread the good news

• God sent his Son when the felt need for him had ripened

• God sent his Son when the time had fully come

Weary of Waiting for Messiah

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Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: Malachi 3:12-4:6
December 8, 2024

Malachi 3:12-4:6: “You have said harsh things against me,” says the LORD. “Yet you ask, ‘What have we said against you?’ You have said, ‘It is futile to serve God. What did we gain by carrying out his requirements and going about like mourners before the LORD Almighty? But now we call the arrogant blessed. Certainly the evildoers prosper, and even those who challenge God escape.’”

Then those who feared the LORD talked with each other, and the LORD listened and heard. A scroll of remembrance was written in his presence concerning those who feared the LORD and honored his name. “They will be mine,” says the LORD Almighty, “in the day when I make up my treasured possession. I will spare them, just as in compassion a man spares his son who serves him. And you will again see the distinction between the righteous and the wicked, between those who serve God and those who do not.”

“Surely the day is coming; it will burn like a furnace. All the arrogant and every evildoer will be stubble, and that day that is coming will set them on fire,” says the LORD Almighty. “Not a root or a branch will be left to them. But for you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings. And you will go out and leap like calves released from the stall. Then you will trample down the wicked; they will be ashes under the soles of your feet on the day when I do these things,” says the LORD Almighty. “Remember the law of my servant Moses, the decrees and laws I gave him at Horeb for all Israel. See, I will send you the prophet Elijah before that great and dreadful day of the LORD comes. He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers; or else I will come and strike the land with a curse.”

Sermon Outline

1. Background

• Return from exile

• Weary of waiting

• God’s list of grievances

2. The general problem: religion wasn’t paying off

• They had religion

• But their hearts weren’t in it

• From a resentful heart come resentful words

3. How true believers responded to Malachi’s preaching

4. God’s reaction to the conversations of believers

• God paid attention

• What God did for these believers

5. The future Day of the Lord

• What unbelievers experience

• What believers experience

6. God’s closing words

• “Remember the law of my servant Moses”

• “I will send Elijah”