eternal life on Disciple Making

Jesus didn’t tell his friends, “Go into all the world and make Christians.” But he did tell them to go into the world and make disciples. In fact, the Bible uses the word disciple 269 times. As Dallas...

What you do in the present by painting, preaching, singing, sewing, praying, teaching, building hospitals, digging wells, campaigning for justice, writing poems, caring for the needy, loving your neig...

[Eternal life] it’s not something we simply receive through a transaction that arranges for our future destination. It’s something we experience now through becoming Jesus’ disciples, which death is t...

(Scripture quotations below are from ESV unless noted otherwise.) Liturgical Context On this Third Sunday of Easter, the Revised Common Lectionary texts harmonize with the epistle’s praise of Jesus...

Leader: How good and pleasant it is when we live together in unity! People: It is like precious oil on the head, running down on the beard, Leader: Running down on Aaron’s beard, down on the colla...

In the New Testament, the terms salvation and eternal life and Kingdom of God all speak to this same life-altering reality that we grasp by becoming disciples of Jesus. Salvation isn’t about getting y...

As I repeat these words of your disciple Peter, let us believe them in our hearts: Lord, to whom can we go? You alone have the words of eternal life. Help us to hear your word and put them into prac...

O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that...

Be kind to Your little children, Lord; that is what we ask of You as their Tutor, You the Father, Israel’s guide; Son, yes, but Father as well. Grant that by doing what You told us to do, we may achie...

Believing the right things about Jesus isn't enough. You're not adopted as God's child until you confess and turn away from your wrongdoing and receive the freely offered gift of forgivene...

When we enter into the “in Christ” existence we become one with those who are in Christ. Eternal life is received individually, but it is lived out in community. And the community battles sin in the b...

O Lord, Show us your ways, Lord, Teach us your paths. Guide us in your truth and teach us, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long. Blessed Lord, who caused all holy Scrip...

It ought to be placed in the forefront of all Christian teaching that Christ's mission on earth was to give men Life. "I am come," He said, "that ye might have Life, and that ye mig...

Jesus is the holy one of God who forgives our sins and pardons our iniquities. He pursues us with words of eternal life and in him we are forgiven, fed, and freed to live again. Amen.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” We believe and although we fall short, we must persevere to the end. Hold...

We all live between two worlds. We are planted here on earth while our hope is in heaven. We are given work to do in temporary soil that, we’re told, has the potential to spring up into unending fruit...

Jesus didn’t die on the cross to change God’s mind about us; Jesus died on the cross to change our minds about God!”

Still our minds, God, and calm our hearts, so that we may hear the Word that comes from you that leads us in life, that protects us in struggle, that guides us in doing your will, that strengthens us ...

I preached my first sermon at National Community Church on January 14, 1996. The only thing I remember about that message is my opening illustration. I can’t remember the original source, but I think ...

I love golf. If only it loved me in return. Alas, it is a one-sided romance. My golf swing is the stuff that keeps an instructor awake at night. One kindly compared it to an octopus falling from a tre...

Jesus: You gave us Your love at a high price – Your own death on the cross in our place! By Your grace you give us eternal life and entrust to us Your creation. Thank You, Lord! We come today as Y...

Hear the good news: You are God’s holy, precious, and beloved children. Your sins are forgiven. But more than that: through his life, death, and resurrection, Jesus has opened the way for us to dwell ...

Leader: O righteous Father, Your Son obeyed Your holy will for the sake of our salvation. Through Your Spirit, give Your Church on earth unity of faith, that the world may know that You sent Your So...

Whether playing baseball or basketball, one of the first sports lessons kids are taught is the counterintuitive truth that focusing too much on aiming where you want for the ball to go is likely to ba...

B lessed Lord, who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning: Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed ...

What were we made for? To know God. What aim should we have in life? To know God. What is the eternal life that Jesus gives? To know God. What is the best thing in life? To know God. What in humans gi...

Pious souls can derive great confidence and delight from this sacrament, as being a testimony that they form one body with Christ, so that everything which is his they may call their own. Hence it fol...

Bless Christ through whom all things are made. Join seen and unseen in their praise of One who both creates, sustains who goes before, in justice reigns. Who makes the lion and the lamb, the farthest...

Friends, we have sinned. We have followed in the ways of Adam, with lives of disobedience and rejection. Yet as Adam’s sin brought death into this world, Christ has brought life. In Adam we were all d...

Pastor: Let us confess our sin in the presence of God and of one another. People: Gracious God, have mercy on us. In Your compassion forgive us our sins, known and unknown, things done and...