matthew on Believing in Jesus

Any manifestation that reveals Jesus’ true identity occurs because the power of God is at work upon the eyes, ears, and hearts of the recipients

Jesus is not one of many ways to approach God, nor is He the best of several ways; He is the only way.

O Lord our God, we ask that you help us to stay watchful and alert as we await the coming of your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, so that when he arrives and knocks, he will not find us asleep in sin, but...

Jesus never asks us to do something he wouldn’t do himself. He calls us to a life of faith, not a life of comfort.

Sometimes to follow in the footsteps of Jesus is to walk away from others or to let them walk away from us.

if Jesus had never lived, we would not have been able to invent him.

Justin Martyr (ca. 100–165), the most renowned apologist of the second century, dedicated his life to defending Christianity as the one true philosophy. Engaging the Greek philosophers and intellectua...

Understanding Jesus’ economic interest and competency should not be surprising when we remember that Jesus spent the majority of his life on earth learning carpentry and running a small business. In J...

Leader: Through the grace of Christ Jesus who gave His body and shed His blood for our forgiveness, hear and believe that “he delivers the needy when he calls, the poor and him who has no helper. He h...

Pastor: Let us pray. Most merciful God, as the people of Jerusalem, with palms in their hands, gathered to greet Your dearly beloved Son when He came into His Holy City, grant that we may ever hail ...

Leader: O come, let us fix our eyes on Jesus,  People: the founder and perfecter of our faith, Leader: who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, ...

Gracious God, our decisions are often rooted in keeping comfortable. We keep quiet in order to protect ourselves. We give just enough to look good in front of others. We hold back to avoid pain. Yet y...

At the Turning Point Following Simon Peter’s climatic height of his faith, his confession that Jesus was the “Messiah, the Son of the living God,” Peter now exemplifies our humbling, human tendency t...

Almighty God, whose blessed Son our Savior Jesus Christ ascended far above all heavens that he might fill all things:Mercifully give us faith to perceive that, according to hispromise, he abides with...

O God, who looked on fallen humanity and planned to redeem us by the coming of your only-begotten Son, we ask that you ensure that all who confess his glorious incarnation will have fellowship with hi...

There’s a quote by H. Richard Niebuhr that I believe is absolutely true.  “The great Christian revolutions,” he argued, “come not by the discovery of something that was not known before. They happen w...

We ask that you stir up our hearts, O Lord, to prepare the ways of your only-begotten Son, that by his Advent we may serve you with purified minds, through the same Jesus Christ our Lord.

Hear the words of comfort of our savior Christ says to all who truly turn to him: Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. (Matt. 11:28) For God so loved the world...

This story is probably apocryphal, but conveys a truth nonetheless. During the early 19th century, following the Napoleonic Wars, a French soldier was captured and imprisoned. He was thrown into a...

Jesus’ parable [of the banquet in Luke 14:16-23] makes it clear that there are business and career invitations . Some people had real estate that demanded attention, and others had invested in ox...

When Albert Berte Thorwaldsen, the renowned Dutch sculptor, finished the clay model of his statue of Christ with arms raised in blessing, he left it to harden overnight in his studio. The next morni...

And they watched Him now, And they wondered. What could Jesus mean? This bread was His body? This wine was His blood? And they didn’t yet know, But one day they would. That before He...

Almighty God, harsh words and personal attacks can bring out the worst in us. We find ourselves spending energy on thoughts of retaliation and plans to protect ourselves. Father forgive us. We long to...

Almighty God, give us grace to cast away the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light, now in the time of this mortal life in which your Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility; th...

O God, who through your Son has taught us that a house divided against itself must fall: Save us, we beg you, from the danger of a divided allegiance; unite our hearts to fear your name; and grant tha...

Pastor: Heavenly Father, as Your Son humbled Himself for our salvation, give to each of us and to every member of Your Church a confident faith in Christ’s Passion for us, so that during this Holy W...

PRAYER OF CONFESSION Pastor: O Lord, with the Palm Sunday crowd, we cry to You this day:  “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!” People: “Hosanna!  Save us, we pray, O Lord!” Pastor...

The call to 'believe in the gospel', or to 'believe in me', does not suggest that Jesus was inviting Galilean villagers to embrace a body of doctrine – not even a basic 'theory'...

What shall I say of the Romans themselves, who fortify their own empire with garrisons of their own legions, nor can extend the might of their kingdom beyond these nations? But Christ’s name is extend...

Our God, as we stand before the empty tomb, like Mary and the disciples we find it hard to believe that Christ rose from the dead. Forgive our unbelief. Take from our minds the shadows of doubt and he...