When we find ourselves trying to live up to our own self-defined expectations, there will always be a gap. And self-defined expectation gaps are the worst of all the comparison traps because we will never measure up to our own expectations. But there is hope; you can escape the comparison trap by listening to Jesus and what he says about you, who he says you are and where he sees your life going.
Comparison is something we do every single day and most don't even realize it. But there is danger to comparing, it is a danger of the heart; in facts it’s trap. And the highlight reels we see of other people are the bait that comparison uses to trap me. In this message, we begin to see the way out and we learn a better way to look at life.
Jesus was the most spiritually formed, spiritually deep person who ever lived. He was righteousness itself. And at the same time, Jesus was a magnet for people far away from God. In fact, he loved those people. And he didn’t just love them because it was his job to love them; he liked them. He liked being with them. He sought them out, and they sought him out.
It should be no surprise then, that God’s plan for His church is that it be people who have the character of Jesus and, therefore, love the people that Jesus died for. So, how can we do that? In this message, Pastor Clay explores how influence works and how God uses it to transform lives.
Ecclesiastes 4:12 says, “A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken.” So, the question is do you have people in your life who live here, locally, who've got your back, who will stand with you back to back to help you fight through those biggest troubles in life?
Today's message looks at that's how you're better when you're connected with others and how your church family can be your family, a family that makes you better, a family that's here for you when you're down and can even celebrate with you when things are great.
Who are you? Are you the sum of your success - Job, Career, Size of bank account? Are you the sum of your failures - failed relationships, additions, bad decisions? Or are you something bigger, more grand than all of that. Are you someone valued more than all the wealth on earth?
If you believe that you are unique, valued, and owned by God, are you living like it? Do you wake up each day excited to live out your purpose in God’s grand story?
If someone were to ask you what your purpose in life was, could you answer that? You may be successful in your career or trying to finish out those last few credits to complete another degree but what are you really living for. . .what’s your purpose? God wants you to know what His design is for you and for you to stop living by default. Listen as we discover the things we all need to find so that we can truly know our God-given purpose.
Whether you’re a man or a woman we all have the desire inside of us to leave our world better than the way we found it. . .to spend our lives working for something that will outlive us. In this message we discover how to begin working on that eternal legacy and how to make a real difference in your world.
How can I know God's will? Why do bad things happen, even when I am doing good? We all have questions, but what if, rather than answer our specific questions, God wants to use them to grow closer to Him. Kevin Kennedy shares with us three of the things that God uses to grow our faith.
If we could see as God sees, we would be more inclined to do as God says. When we use Gods word to listen, we gain wisdom, insight and understanding. This is the basis for good decision making. Our greatest regrets could have been avoided if we had this wisdom, insight and understanding.
When we pray, we usually want God to fix something immediately. What if God just needs to say something or explain something to us? We must learn to open His word and listen. Spending time alone communicating with God will make it easier to communicate with us.
God moves in churches that join the Jesus mission. So what is it like to be on that mission? Next Level’s founding pastor, Dan Southerland, joins us to share exactly what it looks like. And when the individuals in a church catch this vision, it moves them from being a Great Church to being a God Church; a church where there is no other explanation for all that is happening except it must be a God thing.
God desires to have an intimate relationship with us—a relationship in which we can be fully known with no fear of rejection. That intimacy was destroyed when sin, sorrow, and death entered the world and God has been striving to reconcile the relationship ever since. In this message, Clay explores the three main ingredients to a more intimate relationship with your creator.
Matt Hastings continues his exploration of a rebellion against sin and the offer of true Life that Jesus has to offer us.
Matt Hastings explores the idea that sometimes, in order to move forward, we need a rebellion. But maybe not the rebellion you think, it is a push against the thing that seems to be holding you back to most. What would life be like if that thing was no longer a problem for you. That is the offer that Jesus has for you.
What if, like what if God used Next Level Church in the way that he used the early Acts church. It can happen. It happened 2000 years ago, and it can happen today. All that has to happen is we have to realize, just like they did, that it isn't really ours, it is His. If we'll learn to share often, and give regularly, God will use us in powerful ways.
Today we explore what might be the single most dangerous word in the English language. Tomorrow. If you've bought into the lie of later - I'll do that later, I'll get serious about that later - you're fooling yourself. The Bible says, you got to number your days because every day is a gift. It's a gift and you're not guaranteed tomorrow. So, today should be the day to give up your excuses, say enough is enough and, through the power of Jesus, do something about it.
There is a desire in most of us to want to make a difference. But the problem is that somewhere along the way, through the busyness of everyday life, the routine that you got stuck in, or maybe something someone said to you, but at some point what happened for a lot of us, we began to believe I will never make a difference. The problem with that lie is that Jesus says something very different. In fact, not only did Jesus think that you could change culture with your life, for him, it was a fundamental expectation.
Although most reports of near death experiences are overwhelmingly positive, there are some who describe what appears to be a hellish afterlife. God, however, doesn’t want us to fear death or condemnation. Maybe pain and suffering are simply a warning and a chance to choose him! But even in the presence of God, would everyone choose him?
Perhaps the most common theme from NDEs is experiencing a beauty that fills the soul and is hard to put into words. People who get a glimpse of the world to come, encounter a majesty that is beyond their ability to fully comprehend, but that draws them in to desire more. It turns out that this heavenly world is the one that the Bible has been pointing to all along.
