City Church Garland

In this sermon Dr. Adrian Smith does an excellent job of telling the story revealing the big picture of the message in the book of Ecclesiastes. He articulately expounds on the reality that we all live under in post the Fall of humanity, yet Dr. Smith doesn't leave us in this message without the hope of the resurrection which "solves the riddle of death" that the Preacher in Ecclesiastes wrestled with. He said "Without resurrection there really is no answer to the pessimistic sermon of Ecclesiastes, a sermon squarely and solidly based on the undeniable reality of death. What Ecclesiastes observed hasn't gone away; fate, accidents, tragedies, injustice, death. But knowing the resurrection of Jesus enables us to face all of those things with hope".

Wisdom teaches us to live well in this life. To stay on the path of wisdom one must keep their eyes and ears attentive to wisdom and guard their hearts and mouths.

The book of Proverbs teaches us that there are two main paths in life that people follow and pleasant benefits accompany those on the way of wisdom, while painful consequences accompany those who are on the wrong path. In Proverbs we learn how to live well in this world according to our Creator's design and in it we learn why one should seek to live well. In this sermon Pastor Keith explains how; wisdom is to be priority for the person who desires to live well, wisdom is to be parentally transferred to the next generation and, wisdom teaches us to ponder which path each of us are on, along with it's outcome.

The workers of Christ, especially devoted to reach the lost of our world with the Gospel, are "few" indeed (and have always been). Yet it has always been through the "few" that Christ has expanded His Kingdom. Christ has invested in these "few" with His authority and as a result they are proven again and again to be more than conquerors. In Luke 10 Jesus taught His followers to pray to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into the harvest and He sent out His followers to be among those "few" laborers. Will you take action on His instructions to pray that laborers be sent out and will you be one of the "few" workers of Christ?

The book of Jonah is a comical story of a reluctant prophet who tried to avoid God and His missional assignment. In God's mercy He overcame the resistance of the prophet Jonah, in order to display His mercy not only to Nineveh but also to Jonah. God is a missional God who calls His people to join Him in accomplishing His global mission. God's mission overflows from His character, namely that he is gracious, compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. When one fails to align with mission of God it reveals a disconnect with the heart and character of God. That's was the case with Jonah. The thing that should have fueled Jonah mission, the mercy of God for sinners, was the reason He avoided the mission. Jonah knew that God would grant mercy to anybody who turns to Him in repentance. God worked with the brokenness and failures of this reluctant prophet. So we can be encouraged that God too will work through us and regardless of our weakness and failures when we surrender to Him. God used a sinfu

The cross of Christ is central to the Christian faith and one way that Christians can center themselves upon the gospel message is through act of partaking in the Lord's Supper. Christ has called His followers to remember Him and His sacrifice for us, examine our lives in view of that sacrifice and align our lives with His sacrificial love. In this sermon Pastor Keith explains what the Lord's Supper is and means, why Christians should partake regularly of it, who should partake of the elements and how the ordinance is to be practiced.

Those who trust in the Lord will be sustained through dark times by the supernatural power that God supplies. In this sermon Pastor Mike ward explains the hope that we can have in God to strengthen us as we wait on Him. He also explains what it looks like to wait on God. He says that waiting on God is not a passive thing but an active thing that we do not only by trusting God but by being faithful to do what God has us doing.

In 1 Corinthians 15:58 we see that God calls His people to faithfully and increasingly partner with Him in His meaningful work in the world. From 1 Corinthians chapter 15 Pastor Keith explains that the gospel is the foundation for doing the work of the Lord. God's love is the motivator and His grace is the energizer for doing the work of the Lord. Whatever labor that is not done in love, energized by grace and built upon the foundation of the gospel will prove to be vain. But that labor which is done in the Lord will not be in vain because there truly is a resurrection and eternal rewards that will be given at the resurrection. The "work of the Lord" is doing God's will which is revealed in Scripture, following His way with the guidance of the Spirit, all for God' glory and for the good of others.

God loves us more than we realize and He waits for us to return to Him when we stray. He then celebrates when we return to Him. In Luke 15 Jesus told a story about a compassionate father that loved his sons greatly, even though they strayed from him. One son requested his inheritance early before his father passed away and he went and squandered that wealth. When he fell upon hard times he realized that life would be much better back at home with his father. So he returned hoping to just be an employee for his father but his father rejoiced and threw a party upon his return. This son was reconciled and restored to his place in his family upon his return. Though there was a great party over the return of the younger son, the elder brother was angry about the his younger brother being accepted back into the family and getting a celebration. The older brother's response revealed a disconnect with his father who he had served diligently and faithfully for many years. The older son proved to be just as wayward in

God has called, commissioned and empowered His church to continue His Mission. Being a disciple of Jesus and making disciples who follow Jesus is the core of that mission.

God extends His invitations to His Kingdom through His people and those invitations must go out to everyone with a sense of urgency and be received by the recipients.

Jesus calls His followers to obedience, abandon and mission. The results of heeding that call are amazing. In Luke chapter 5 we get a glimpse of the 1st disciples of Christ being called by Christ and their response. From the very beginning Jesus let the know that following Him would mean that they would be on mission with Him. Make no mistake you can't follow Christ and not join in on His mission to reach the lost.

In the book of Ruth we see a beautiful love story that begins with difficult and bitter circumstances then turns into a sweet redemptive narrative. Ruth displayed faithfulness to her mother-in-law & her God during the most difficult time of her life and God took notice of that and rewarded her for it. The faithful tend to find themselves in the right place at the right time and that was the case with Ruth. Ruth “happened to come to the part of the field belonging to Boaz” (Ruth 2:3). And that is where things started turing around for Ruth & her mother-in-law Naomi. They found a “redeemer” who was willing and able to do something about their circumstances and he did what a godly Israelite was supposed to do in that time. Boaz provided & protected Ruth while she gleaned food from his field and eventually he married Ruth. Ruth got the great honor of being included in the lineage of King David, one of the most important figures in the old testament, and in the lineage of the Jesus the

God faithfully cares for His people and He sovereignly works out His good plans in their lives. This is a truth that you can see displayed in Ruth's story. May you experience this reality your own life story.

Lessons for Life & Leadership in the book of 1st Samuel Character is foundational for leadership. Challenges are necessary in preparation for leadership because they can build character. You can flourish into who God had called you to be even under poor leadership. Trust God to bring to pass His plans for your life. Be faithful where God has you & don't give up. Obey God’s voice and wait for Him. Don’t get ahead of God.

God generously cares for the poor and He expects His people to do the same, so we must keep our hearts compassionate towards them and our hands open to them. In this sermon you will hear some of the ways God displays His care for the poor and ways that He communicates that His people should do the same.

God tests His people to develop them, teach them and do them good. In Deuteronomy 8 we see that God led His people Israel into the wilderness to humble them, test them, to expose their hearts and do them good in the end. Remember that God is at work in your difficult times of testing, He is the source of life, He provides, He disciplines His children and He will punish those who forget and forsake Him. These are some of the lessons to be learned in the wilderness.

Our God demands that we love Him with all of our being and that we diligently lead our family in loving Him. In message Pastor Keith aims to describe what it looks like to love God with our whole being and lead our family in doing so.

God is 100% for His people, He is faithful to His people and He fights for His people. We must trust and obey Him and get to know His heart for us if we are to experience all that He has for us.

God's Graciousness nature is one aspect of His goodness that we must become acquantied with if we are to truly know Him.