Risen Life has a heart for reaching Salt Lake City and Utah for the Gospel. The mission of Risen Life Church is to see Real Life Transformation and Real Life Multiplication happening in our church and community. Listen to our sermons here.
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This week we will be in Acts 21:37-22:29 considering Paul’s defense of his life to the crowd in the temple. Paul does an interesting thing when given the opportunity to speak to the angry crowd, he defends himself with his testimony. Basically for Paul, the defense of his life–the things he does, what he stands for, and what he teaches–is wrapped up in how he met Jesus and Jesus changed his life. As we look at Paul’s defense I think there are good things for us to learn about how we can share the Gospel as God gives us opportunity. Paul gives us a simple example of how to share our testimony a
For the next several weeks we will finish out the book of Acts looking at chapters 21-28. In these chapters we will see Paul give more of himself to the Gospel ministry Jesus has called him to, and in the process, Paul will begin to look a lot more like Jesus himself. We will look at Acts 21:1-36 tomorrow and consider what it means to hear the Spirit’s voice and lose our life so that we can find it as we join Jesus in his ministry to save the lost world around us.
We have looked at Proverbs 1-9 and now will consider one more chapter, Proverbs 31. Proverbs 31 provides a fitting end to the book of Proverbs as it shows us lady wisdom in action, personified as the “excellent wife.” If you look closely the “excellent wife” does the very same things lady wisdom has talked about and done in chapters 1-9. Really, Proverbs 31 is a celebration of Godly wisdom. The chapter will encourage us to celebrate Godly wisdom, walk in the blessing of wisdom, and worship the wisdom of God that has been revealed to us in the face of Christ.
This week in our series “Walking in Wisdom” we will take a look at Proverbs 9. This is the final chapter in the introductory section of the book of Proverbs where Solomon is urging his son to find, get, and live by Godly wisdom. In chapter 9 Lady wisdom and lady folly will make one final appeal and we as the readers have a choice to make. Will we follow lady wisdom and find life, or will we be seduced by lady folly who will take us on a path towards death? The choice is ours. The Bible encourages us to take up wisdom by making Jesus, the very wisdom of God, Lord of our lives.
This is a really great chapter in Proverbs and in the whole Bible that makes Jesus shine. After three weeks of hearing warning and instruction on how to avoid lady folly, lady wisdom comes back in a very triumphant way and invites us to live in a better way in Jesus. Her invitation is to gain wisdom and find the blessing and favor of God as we place our faith in Christ. In chapter 8 wisdom lists out her virtues and then shows us why she is most qualified to teach us a better way of living in Jesus. The NT writers pick up what Solomon says in chapter 8 and then show us how Jesus is the fulfilme
In this chapter Solomon again urges us to get and hang onto wisdom. Then he gives us a big illustration of what it looks like to be foolish as he describes a young man that is ensnared by the forbidden woman. Solomon wants us to love the word of God and let it sink deep into our souls so that we can stand strong in the Lord when temptation comes our way and enjoy the blessing of walking with God.
In this chapter Solomon will continue the contrast between walking in Godly wisdom and being tempted by lady folly. Solomon will also have lots of practical advice for us before he returns to the theme of adultery–both to speak about the dangers of sexual sin and as a metaphor for any of our spiritual rebellion against God. Solomon ultimately wants us to get a hold of Godly wisdom and not let go of her so that we can live a life of blessing with the Lord.
Chapters 5-7 will introduce us to the forbidden woman, really the opposite of lady wisdom. Unlike lady wisdom, the forbidden woman will steal, kill, and destroy the life of the one who engages with her. Solomon’s push to us this week will be to choose wisdom, walk in sexual purity, and experience God’s blessing.
This week we will consider Proverbs 4 together in our series Walking in Wisdom. In this chapter Solomon will make three important appeals to us: 1) to receive wisdom, 2) to walk on the path of righteousness, and 3) to embrace wisdom with our whole being. Solomon’s word to us is that if we will take these steps and embrace Godly wisdom, our life will go really well. The path to wisdom starts by making Jesus Lord of our life. Life going well doesn’t mean that we won’t face adversity, but we will face it with God on our side and will have the tools to walk in a way that honors the Lord. For the C
Proverbs 3 reminds us to trust in the Lord with with all our hearts and lean not on our own understanding. It goes on to encourage us to acknowledge God in all our ways and he will make our paths straight. Join us as our executive minister Phil Hirz delivers our message this week.
As we continue in our sermon series in Proverbs, Walking in Wisdom, and look at Proverbs chapter 2. In this chapter we take one more step in our journey toward Godly wisdom for practical living. Last week, Solomon showed us that the starting point for Godly wisdom is the fear of the Lord. This week he will show us that all wisdom comes from God.
This week we will begin a new series for the summer in Proverbs called Walking in Wisdom! We will consider Proverbs 1-9, and 31 over the next ten weeks led by various members of our preaching team. This week I will get us started by looking at Proverbs 1. The most important verse in Proverbs is Proverbs 1:7 “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.” In Proverbs, Solomon wants to teach us wisdom for practical, Godly living as followers of Jesus. But wise living begins with one important decision. Will we be wise and acknowledge God as Lord of our
Join us as Ben Sutton, our College and Discipleship Minister, finishes our series in Delighting in the Lord as we look at His Salvation that He offers us.
This week we will look at how we delight in the Lord in his creation. We are blessed to live in UT and God’s glorious creative works are on display every day. Many of us live here because we love the outdoors. But the created world is meant to be a place that points us to God and says many things about him. Ultimately as we delight in the Lord in his creation it should lead us to praise our good creator God that has saved us in the person of Christ.
This week Pastor Jim Harding will be continuing our new sermon series entitled “Delighting in the Lord”. Pastor Jim will share with us about delighting in His character. We serve a great God who is all loving, faithful, and patient, who holds everything together, and still cares for each of us deeply and personally. Psalm 145:3 says: “Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable.” We can’t fully understand the depth of the character of God but we can know what He has revealed to us. So what is our response to God’s greatness? Check out the verse right before i
Sometimes it is easy to overlook the fact that God saved us with a great and enjoyable purpose in mind. Really the end of our salvation is that we get to know and enjoy the Lord forever. In this series we will look at how the Bible calls us to delight in the Lord in his word, in his character, in creation, and in the salvation Jesus has accomplished for us. Today we will consider how we delight in the Lord in his Word. Psalm 19:7-11 and Psalm 119 are great reflections on what it looks like to delight in God’s word. There are many ways to delight ourselves in God’s word, but as we do so we want
Today we will focus on Acts 20:7-38. In verses 17-38 we get a farewell speech by Paul to the Elders of the church of Ephesus. But more than just a speech to the Elders of Ephesus, Paul’s speech really serves as a final word to every church on how they can stay faithful and fruitful as the seek to live out the Gospel. Paul says three things in his final sermon to the churches: 1) stick to the Gospel, 2) serve Jesus like me, 3) and cling to God and his word. Paul says if you will do these things you will receive the promised inheritance kept for us in Christ. In a world full of things that distr
This week we will be nearing the end of Paul’s third missionary journey looking at Acts 19:21-20:6. This is an interesting section of scripture with lots of what we have come to see as Paul’s travel log. But, if we slow down I think this text once again shows us all the things the Spirit of God is doing to advance his church. What the Spirit is doing is meant to be an encouragement to us! In fact, I think this passage is calling us individually and as a church walk confidently in the power of the Spirit as God grows us into faithful and fruitful Christians throughout our lives. God is teaching
Join us as Jeremiah Johnston continues our series in Acts as we look at Paul's continued missionary journeys.
Join us as Ben Sutton, our college and discipleship minister, continues our series in Acts as we look at proclaiming the gospel message boldly even in the face of adversity.
We continue in our Acts series looking at Acts 17. At the center of the passage is the message of the resurrection of Jesus. The Gospel message preached by Paul is best summarized in Acts 17:2 where it says “[Paul] reasoned…from the scriptures, 3 explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead.” We will see the reasonableness of the Gospel, how we can miss the Gospel as “religious” people, and the true saving Gospel offered in Christ. Christ’s life, death, and resurrection are all essential to save us and to prove the veracity of the Gospel and G
We will continue in our study of Acts looking at Acts 16:6-40. Here Luke will teach us through the lives of Paul and Silas that we have a great God who directs believers steps, transforms hearts, and cannot be stopped. If we have this kind of God we can live without fear as we work to be bold witnesses for Jesus wherever he takes us.
This week we will consider one of the most honest passages in the Bible in Acts 15:36-16:5. The first part of our text will deal with the separation of Paul and Barnabas after a sharp disagreement. I am glad this text is in the Bible as it highlights how our sin can separate us, but also how God’s grace can redeem and bring us together. We all have broken interpersonal relationships in the church, in our families, and elsewhere. This text reminds us of that reality, but also of what God can do in the midst of his people to redeem and advance his purposes. Take a few moments to read these verse
This week we are in Acts 15:1-35. In this passage the apostles worked to strive for unity amongst the believers who were from Jewish customs and new believers who were Gentiles. We will see how they had care and understanding for one another and that we receive grace through faith. I’m grateful for this passage as it reminds us we also need to strive for unity today and that we as Christians are to look different from the world, allowing Scripture to guide us.
As we gather for worship we will continue in our Acts series To the Ends of the Earth as we look at Acts 14:1-28. We will consider Paul and Barnabas’ bold witness for the Gospel as they plant churches across the Gentile world. Their example challenges us to be a bold witness in a world that needs Jesus. If you live in Salt Lake City, God has you here to be a witness for him. They will also challenge us to consider the vain things of this world that we may worship and exchange them for a relationship or deeper relationship with the living God. We are created to worship God and our hearts will n
