A sermon based on Romans 7:18 by Shane Preached, preached on June 21st, 2015 at Veritas West as part of the “Practical Theology” series.

A sermon based on Acts 8:4-25 by Shane Huey, preached on April 26th, 2015 at Veritas Short North as part of “The Book of Acts” series.

A sermon by Shane Huey, preached on February 15th, 2015 as part of “The Book of Acts” series.

Freedom begins when we see Jesus’ surpassing worth exalted over and above all over things.

In this text, we see Sarah laugh at God in unbelief when he promises her a child. We often are called to wait upon God to fulfill his promises to us, but tend to fall into unbelief. In the end, God gave Sarah great joy when he fulfilled his promise and proved himself faithful.

In our text, we see God call and bless Abram, and Abram respond to God in worship. God calls Abram to leave his home and move to a place unbeknownst to him, but not without the promise of blessing him and blessing all the families of the earth through him. In faith, Abram responds to God in obedience and worships him.

In Ezekiel 37, we see God promise to demonstrate his reconciling power by reuniting Israel and Judah as one nation. This is significant because of the insurmountable hatred that they had for one another. But God shows himself as graciously doing the impossible by reconciling Israel and Judah, and later, by breaking down the division between Jew and Gentile. Today, we have the gift and opportunity to demonstrate God’s Gospel by being united—black and white, asian and hispanic—as one in Christ Jesus.

This is the beginning of the Apostle Paul’s conclusion to the book of Romans. Paul gets very personal and pastoral as He calls us to live on mission to the glory of God.

What then shall we say to these things? What do we say to our undeserved justification, our unearned sanctification, and our yet incomplete glorification? God loves us. How do we know? Christ died and rose again. God provides for us. God withheld no suffering from Christ on the cross, how will withhold any of His love from those Christ has saved? God protects us. Christ intercedes on our behalf; there is no condemnation. God is passionate for us. Literally nothing can separate us from the love that God has for us. Nothing.

Peter’s letter is written to a church in the midst of sufferings, trials, and persecutions. So what does he tell them? Jesus Christ died and rose again, breathing into us the new life of rebirth. Why say that? The basics sound so trite and even cliché. But the Gospel doesn’t disappoint. Peter encouraged the church then—just as we are encouraged now—to have joy and hope in our trials because we have a better inheritance. Our prize is Christ, both in our present here and in our eternity in heaven. Our pursuit of any other source of joy or our best life now is doomed to fail because only Jesus took the sin and death that mars our world to the grave and then rose back from death. Only Jesus delivers like that. No other job, relationship, car, house, or prestige can lay a finger on that standard.