Abundant Life Sermons

Pastor Bruce Frank from Biltmore Church joins us on Live Sent Sunday to answer the question, “What does the Bible say about boldness?” He challenges us to share the gospel with boldness following the example of the early church. We usually think of the church as a place, but the Book of Acts shows that the church is a movement designed for a mission. The early church was built on a conviction that Jesus died and rose again for our sins and had sent His followers to proclaim the good news of the gospel. The danger of the church at any time is to go from a missional movement into maintenance mode. If you’re part of a movement, you’re moving, not standing still! The message of the gospel has not changed in the over 2,000 years since Jesus died and rose again, and neither has the manner in which we communicate the gospel. The single term that best describes the manner in which God wants His gospel given is boldness, which is defined as “clear communication in the face of potential opposition. Acts 4:

Men and women are equal, but we are not the same. In marriage, she needs to learn his needs, and he needs to learn her needs. Meeting each other’s needs emotionally is essential to marital intimacy. Failing to recognize your spouse’s emotional needs is often the source of marital pain. Solomon recognized the Shulamite’s beauty and told her that she was the most special woman to him. Every woman longs to feel beautiful and special. It’s the most important emotional need that she looks to her husband to fulfill. A woman will fall in love and stay in love with a man who makes her feel beautiful. She longs to feel beautiful, special, cherished, and treasured. The Shulamite told Solomon he was strong and powerful. Every man longs to feel significant and receive their wife’s admiration. God created men with strength and for strength. A man will fall in love and stay in love with a woman who makes him feel strong. The way to keep love alive in a marriage is to make emotional deposits in each other’s lives. How a

In Song of Solomon chapter 2, Solomon and the Shulamite are moving past the fleeting feelings of infatuation and fall in love. Their story teaches us what biblical dating looks like. The Bible doesn’t say much about dating, but it says a lot about people and wisdom. Who you marry is the greatest decision outside of your relationship with Christ. Your spouse will make you or break you. Song of Solomon gives us principles for biblical dating so that you can have a love story that honors God. Three questions to ask yourself to date in a way that honors God: 1.) Am I ready to marry? This is a really important question. If you want to have a love story for God’s glory, you have to make sure you are prepared for marriage before you ever start. 2.) What’s my plan? Dating is for observation and edification. Are you headed in the same direction socially, vocationally, and theologically? Compatibility has much more to do with whether you like spending time with that person than if you’re sexually compatib

Everything about marriage, including the sexual relationship, pictures some aspects of our relationship with Christ. The Bible describes Christ as the Bridegroom, and we, the Church, are the bride of Christ. Song of Solomon shows us how to be patient in a relationship to receive God’s best and not awaken love before it’s time. Song of Solomon 2 shows how Solomon and the Shulamite chose patience over passion in their dating relationship. They decided it was better to be patient in a relationship and reaped the benefits of this God-honoring decision. Any sexual activity outside of a marriage between a man and a woman is a sin. God commands sex only within marriage because it goes much deeper than merely the physical—it touches the soul of the individual. Dysfunction in marriage is often related to disobedience while dating. God created sex as a way of finding intimacy on the soul level with another human being. Sexual intercourse is more than the joining together of two bodies—it’s the joining togethe

The phrase “gift of singleness” is heard commonly throughout churches. But is singleness really a gift? What should Christian singles do while waiting and wanting to get married? Five things Christian singles should do with the gift of singleness: 1.) Grow in character qualities that are godly. Real beauty is in character qualities like integrity, fidelity, purity, and serving others selflessly. Godly character is forged from our contentment in Christ! Contentment is Christ is the building block of any successful relationship, and the gift of singleness allows people to pursue and practice it. 2.) Take care of your appearance outwardly. It’s true that God looks on the heart, but man looks on the outer appearance. You have a responsibility to take care of both! 3.) Prepare for your future financially. If you want to get married, you need to plan how you’ll provide materially for your family. 4.) Pursue marriage with integrity. While dating, you establish patterns that will either lead to dy

Historically, the Song of Solomon is a love song composed by Solomon to tell the story of the love between him and his gentile bride. Theologically, the book is a picture of the love relationship between Christ and his gentile bride, the Church. The first chapter is an example of how Solomon defines the relationship between him and his bride. The book is known as the “song of songs” because Solomon believes it’s the greatest love song ever written. The song tells the story of this couple’s love and how it developed step by step from the moment they met. Within the song, we find the story of Christ’s love for His bride and how He defines the relationship with us. Solomon represents Jesus. Both Solomon and Jesus are said to be “Shepherd Kings.” Solomon’s Shulamite bride represents us. The Church is the bride of Christ! Solomon is a picture of our Jewish bridegroom, while the Shulamite represents the Church—the gentile bride of Christ. The book uses several word pictures to illustrate

God has a plan for your life, and Satan does too! Satan wants to give you death and destruction. Jesus wants to give you life and salvation. The word “abundantly” comes from the Greek “permission,” which means “exceedingly, very highly, beyond measure, more, superfluous, a quantity so great as to be considerably more than what one would expect or anticipate.” What the abundant life is NOT: It’s not the prosperity theology. It’s not easy. What the abundant life IS: A life of eternal value. A life lived with supernatural power, purpose, meaning, and mission. Through Jesus, you can have more than an average life. You can have an abundant life! He is the doorway to eternal and abundant life. Your life will be the summation of your decisions and the doors you decide to walk through. The Jesus way is the only way to an abundant life. He is the only gate and the only way because He alone died for our sins and rose again. Jesus is worth following because He gave His life so we could

Hope in Jesus Beyond Bethlehem Description Hope is a confident expectation of what God has promised in the future. Three things to do to carry hope beyond Bethlehem: 1.) We need to trust God. You will often lose hope when you place your trust in what you see rather than what God has said. 2.) We need to obey. Just as Israel was delivered from slavery in Egypt, Jesus’ mission was to redeem humanity from sin. 3.) We need to be faithful and patient. We must be faithful to what God has called us to do and patient to wait for Him to fulfill His promises. As we look to a new year, we can confidently expect God to fulfill His promises to us. Our hope is found in Him! Don’t forget to click the “bell” to SUBSCRIBE to get more videos like this to grow your faith! ● Connect with us on Social Media ↴ Facebook: / abundantlifels Instagram: / abundantlifels ● Be a part of the Great Commission: https://livingproof.co/irresistible/ More information on our sermons: https://livingpr

God gave the gift of eternal life through His Son, Jesus Christ. We celebrate receiving that gift at Christmas! Our world is cursed by sin and full of sadness and suffering. But Jesus came to bring hope, comfort, and peace. Jesus was God with us who came to save us! Mary is remembered for the virgin birth. She teaches us that no matter how religious or righteous we might be, EVERYONE needs a Savior! The Bible never tells us that Mary was sinless. She was still a sinner in need of a Savior, even though she was the mother of the sinless Son of God. Lessons we can learn from Mary: • Mary confessed she needed a Savior. • Mary confessed she was a sinner. Why must God’s promised Savior be born of a virgin? By bypassing man’s seed, God was bypassing man’s sin so that Jesus was born sinless. Jesus was fully human, so He could bleed and die for our sins, but He was also fully God, so His sacrifice completely atoned for all our sins. The gift of Christmas is really more about the cross than it is abo

The women in Jesus’ genealogy represent specific stories. Matthew’s account of this genealogy is like a family history for the Hebrews. The story of David and Bathsheba is one of the darkest and saddest stories in the Bible. King David committed adultery with Bathsheba, she conceived, and David murdered her husband Uriah to cover up his sin. Satan was at work before Bethlehem to stop the promised Seed of Genesis 3:15! From the moment God promised the “seed of the woman” would one day bruise the head of the serpent, Satan had been trying to stop the “Seed” before He could even be born. In the Davidic Covenant, God had promised King David that one day, one of his “seed” would establish his kingdom and his throne forever. Twelve generations after King David, King Jeconiah was so wicked that God cursed him, promising none of his sons would ever sit on David’s throne. Because God cursed Jeconiah’s line, (Jesus’ legal lineage) David and Bathsheba were both direct ancestors of both Mary and Joseph! Joseph throu

The story of Christmas is found in the stories of five women in the genealogy of Jesus. The story of Ruth is the story of God’s redemptive love. Ruth was a Moabite, a people born out of incest. The Moabites hated God, and their sin was so great that God forbade any Moabite to ever enter the assembly of Israel for ten generations. Ruth, who is a picture of us, would be redeemed by Boaz—a picture of Jesus! To be legally married, Ruth would have to be married to a “kinsman redeemer”—a close relative of her deceased husband. The law of the “kinsman redeemer” is found in Leviticus 25. It was a provision to redeem family land and a deceased man’s wife. There was a closer kinsman than Boaz who was legally first in line to redeem Ruth. He could not redeem Ruth because he is a picture of the Law. The Law can only reveal our sin. It cannot redeem us from our sin. The Law was not given to redeem us, but rather to teach us of our need to be redeemed! Boaz became Ruth’s “kinsman redeemer,” like Jesus is to

The story of Christmas is found in five women in Jesus' genealogy. Their stories are the stories of us all. The second woman mentioned in Jesus’ genealogy is Rahab. She was a pagan Canaanite prostitute living in Jericho. When the Israelite spies came to spy out the land, she risked her life by hiding them in her house. Because of her faith in God, she was saved when the Israelites conquered Jericho. Rahab put her faith in the true and living God and received life and salvation instead of death and destruction! She was saved by the grace of God through her faith in God, symbolized by the scarlet cord. Regardless of what time you live, God always brings salvation in the same way: by grace alone through faith alone. God reached down from heaven and saved us with a “scarlet thread”—the blood of Jesus. In Christ, God threw us a scarlet-colored “rope” to pull us to safety and redeem us from sin’s penalty! Our purpose now is to carry that “scarlet cord” of victory to those who are perishing! As those wh

How do you discern the call of God on your life? The story of Jonah teaches us a lot about God’s call on our lives. Jonah was called by God to be a messenger of the truth and a messenger of peace! That is what missionaries are called to do—to carry God’s truth as messengers of peace. God’s call on our lives is twofold—it’s the call to “come” and the call to “go.” 1.) God calls you to come. God calls you to come to Christ through salvation. He offers you a personal invitation to join His family. But once you come God calls you to go! 2.) God calls you to go. The call to go is seen throughout Scripture and is given to all of God’s people! Our churches are full of people who have answered the call to come but will not answer the call to go. When you run from the call of God, you remove yourself from the presence of God. How do you know where God wants you to go and what He wants you to do? Say yes to God’s direction. Surrender yourself, and you won’t be controlled by fear. Join Pastor

In the Bible, the disciple Thomas earned the title “Doubting Thomas” because he doubted that Jesus appeared to the disciples. But after he saw Jesus, Doubting Thomas went from skeptical to fully surrendered. Are you living like Thomas? 1.) Thomas lived skeptical. What questions have you brought in regard to your relationship with God? Jesus invited Doubting Thomas to examine His wounds and confirm that it was really Jesus in the room. 2.) Thomas lived surrendered. Doubting Thomas surrendered his questions and chose to place His faith in Jesus. Have you surrendered your life to Jesus? 3.) Thomas lived sent. Thomas knew that Jesus is the only way of salvation. He decided to take the gospel to the furthest point of the known earth at his time. Will you live sent and take the gospel to the nations? Thomas had a deep sense of commitment to Christ. He determined to follow Him whatever the cost and he had a heart burden for unbelievers. He went from doubting to giving his life for the gospel.

Pastor J. Mark Johns from Canvas Church joins us to talk about living sent both locally and globally. One way we can do this is by sponsoring children to release them from poverty in Jesus’ name. We have no idea the ripple effect our obedience and faith can have. Pastor Mark reminds us that everything in this world has some sort of ripple effect. This means that what we do matters, and our choices today can impact the future for us and others. Join us for Live Sent weekend as we talk about the ripple effect that is set in motion by our actions! Through our partnership with Compassion International, we’re setting an ambitious goal: to sponsor 1,200 children in Tanzania and build a church plant and community resource center to serve families in the area. With your support, we can be living proof of a loving God to this part of the world by providing practical help where it’s needed most. • Join our mission by sponsoring a child in Tanzania today through Compassion International! https://livingproof.co/ge

Pastor Phil closes out the Hope for Us series by pointing out that our liberties and rights as Christians ultimately don’t come from the government. They come from God.   What is the role of government in society? How one views the role of government in society is a biblical issue. The biblical worldview of America’s Founding Fathers was that God, not government, is the giver of our fundamental rights.  Our Founding Fathers' biblical understanding caused them to set up a system limiting government authority that would maximize personal liberty. The role of government is maximized in a society where the role of God is minimized.   3 things to remember as we anticipate the upcoming election:   Remember, voting is a Kingdom issue, not a political issue.  Pray for our nation and elected leaders.   Remember, HOPE FOR US is in Jesus.  Why should Christians be involved in the institutions that shape American civilization? Because godly people have the power to bring godly outcomes.  Join Pastor Phil Hopper as

God has charged every generation with the responsibility of passing on the faith to the next generation. We are where we are as a nation because the last four generations have failed to do so. God has given parents the primary responsibility for the practical education and spiritual preparation of their children. The heart is the most important part of the human being, and God knows a child’s heart is developed in the home. What do we need to teach our children as a part of their spiritual preparation? You can teach what you know but you reproduce who you are. Teach your children who they are by teaching them whose they are. Those who know who they are can’t be easily manipulated, intimidated, confused, or controlled. We have forgotten who we are because we have forgotten who God is. You can’t know who you are if you don’t know who God is. If we don’t educate our children, the world will indoctrinate our children! Regardless of whether you choose to homeschool, you must home-educate, be

What is the purpose of law in human society? God instituted civil authority for the peace and prosperity of society, apart from which there would be anarchy. God’s primary purpose for human government is to protect its citizens from violent offenders. The purpose of law is to maintain order and peace in society. Religion shapes culture, and culture shapes laws. A nation’s legislation always reflects its civilization’s worldview and religion. Three things to remember during this election season: 1). Pray for our nation and elected leaders. 2). Voting is a Kingdom issue, not a political issue. 3). Hope for us is in Jesus. God alone has the power to save our nation. Join Pastor Phil Hopper as he answers the question, “What is the purpose of the law?” Don’t forget to click the “bell” to SUBSCRIBE to get more videos like this to grow your faith! Connect with us on Social Media ↴ Facebook:  / abundantlifels Instagram:  / abundantlifels Connect with Pastor Phil ↴ Fa

Every society needs a higher moral authority, or it falls into moral anarchy. Moral destruction leads to the collapse of civilization. Apart from internal morality that comes from a higher authority, humans abuse their personal liberty, turning it into self-idolatry leading to the collapse of society (Romans 1:21-28). When a society embraces moral anarchy, God judges that culture by allowing collapse from within or calamity from without. As Christians, our posture must be both conviction and compassion. Abraham stood in the gap, petitioning God to save Sodom. Abraham never cheered for the destruction of Sodom. He prayed for the salvation of Sodom. (See Genesis 18:22-33) God extends His hand of grace instead of judgment when His redeemed people stand in prayer on behalf of their nation. Let’s pray for God’s grace even though our nation’s sins are worthy of God’s judgment. Join Pastor Phil as he shares biblical principles of morality and how they impact our society today.