Southland Weekend Message Series (Video)

Mike wraps up 2011 by "going under the hood" and reviewing what we learned this past year.

Three One Six: 316

God’s “present under the tree” tops any gift the world has ever given or received! Jesus came to us in our spiritual poverty and made us spiritually rich…that is what we want to do for others. We want to give our best to those who are Jesus impoverished.

We typically celebrate our own generosity at Christmas time, but we need to celebrate the generosity of God and understand the giving nature of His heart. So how do we avoid the consumerism and the materialism normally associated with Christmas? How do we set kids up for spiritual success? Do we continue to perpetuate a model of Christmas that is all about receiving or can we model for them that it really is better to give?

We will celebrate the million meal pack because God so loved the world. He didn’t just love the world…He so loved the world! How do we do the same? How do we express the intense nature of God’s love for the world we live in? This Christmas we need to see the world the way God sees the world.

Materialism and greed are rooted in a lack of contentment, as are most addictions. People pursue pleasure at all costs because they are not content. Couples cheat on one another because they are not content. Jesus is offering us a settled peace that “transcends all understanding” and when you experience it, there is an indescribable joy that flows from it.

Knowing Christ should have the same all-consuming aspects of preparation for a race; it should affect everything about us and everything we do.

So many Christians put confidence in the wrong areas of life. Specifically, in our country, we celebrate achievement. It is a privilege to be a child of God and we’ve done nothing to earn it or deserve it. We'll see what it means to “gain Christ” and to “know Christ” and the privileges we receive as a result of walking away from what the world is offering us.

Chapter 2 is one of the most power-packed Christological passages we have in the Bible and it highlights the humility of Jesus. When we die to self, others live. Lack of humility and the abundance of selfishness is the reason so many relationships are broken today. What would happen in our homes, in our city, in this country and around the world if Christians would live as if they really believed “others were better than themselves”?

Christians are always supposed to be happy and have a smile plastered on their faces, right? Paul and Silas' imprisonment shuns this vapid outlook and shows us the deeper side of following Christ — that no matter what we face, no matter what is handed us or thrown at us, we are called to be “defiantly” joyful.

We need to trust that God can not only create life, but he has the capacity and capability to re-create a new life for us and in us. This message focuses on the hope we have when we surrender our lives to the loving care of God. He is available and He is able to fight our battles for us.

Whether it is a bottle of pills or a bottle of whiskey; whether it is a mirror or scale, a computer screen or a shopping bag, a poker chip or a buffet, we need to let go of any lie that says, “Oh, I got it under control” and we need to throw the addiction down and give control of it to God.

All of us are addicted to something or someone and all of us are experts when it comes to making excuses about the idolatry in our lives. In the first week we will explore our addiction to excuses and why laziness is our worst enemy. The goal of this weekend is to identify that which keeps us from being full alive in Christ. We need to admit our weakness and own the fact that we can’t go through another day making excuses for our behavior.

Jon takes a look at pre-marriage relationships and sizes them up against marriage relationships in Scripture.

The Bible describes sex as a beautiful and powerful thing. But just like a prescription drug, there are many dangerous side effects when we don't use it the way in which it was prescribed.