Come Sojourn with Us
This is where you will find sermons and updates for our church. Our mission is to preach expository sermons focusing on the gospel of Christ. We are a church that is tied to the reformed tradition and seeks to submit to the scriptures so we walk in the Lord’s wisdom rather than our own.
We would love to have you join us on our Christian sojourn if you are in the Belgrade, MT area. If you are not in area then join us by listening to our bi weekly free sermon podcast.
Stay informed by following us on Facebook, YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or through our RSS feed. We would love for you to join us for worship every Sunday at 10 am and 6 pm. If you cannot join us in person then tune into our YouTube livestream.
We are a sinful people confirmed in sin and have no hope apart from the Grace of God. It is a blessing that the Lord shows his grace to us, but how do we know that his grace in enough? How do we know that the promises of the Gospel are enough to save? How do we know that having Christ as our priest is enough for our entrance into heaven?
God is a just God, and God cannot overlook an offense. This is pretty serious considering we have heard that we naturally hate God and our neighbor. So, how did we get in this position? Is there a way to escape this place where we find ourselves?
If we were left with the news that we are a people who naturally hate God and our neighbor then there is no reason to continue to move forward in life. In fact, our lives would be meaningless without any purpose at all. However, the message of the gospel is not something where we just hope we will arrive. If we are sinful, if we naturally hate God and our neighbor, then how do we really turn to the Lord?
Our catechism uses strong language that we naturally hate God and our neighbor. Do we really want to say that we naturally hate God? Do we really want to say that we naturally hate all people? Are we really that sinful? How can we find any way out of this sinful way of life?
The catechism makes a strong statement that we have only one comfort in life and in death. How can there be only one comfort rather than the top five or top ten comforts? Is it really possible to have only one comfort?
Moses lays out the expectations for the sacrificial system with Israel. Moses communicates essential points of this sacrificial system from Leviticus 7. This chapter teaches us that there are feasts anyone can eat, other feasts only the priests, and then there are offerings that are not eaten at all by the priests. Why does the Lord have some meals with his people? Why does the Lord have some meals with the priests? What does any of this have to do with the Lord’s Supper?
The Lord enters his rest at the end of the creation. The Lord has finished his work and is now in the rest where man is to join the Lord enjoying the eternal bliss of heaven. However, man has fallen, martyrdom has already happened, and the Lord has dealt with the offender. Now what is going to happen? How is this creation going to respond to Lord warning Cain? Will the Lord have to intervene once again?
The Lord’s prayer has a strange request that we ask the Lord not to lead us into temptation. If the Lord desires us to dwell with Him forever in heaven, then why would the Lord tempt us? What does this request mean for our Christian life? Can we trust our Lord if He is tempting us? So, what does this request mean?
It is easy to judge the younger brother and to let him live with the consequences of his actions. It might be touching to think that the father still hosts the banquet for the younger brother. You can almost have a sentimental feeling that the father is a really good father. The parable hits home when the father explains to the older brother why this banquet is so significant. It also hits home when the father has to pursue the lost son. Which son is really the lost son in this parable? What is the significance of the father going out to meet with each of the sons?
When we ask our heavenly father to forgive us our debts we are also asking that we forgive our debtors meaning those who sin against us. The reality is that there is a cost involved with forgiveness and we might not always be willing to bear the cost of it. What is more, the bigger problem is that we might not think that we ourselves need that much forgiveness. So, what does the older brother or the older son tell us about forgiveness in the kingdom? Why does Christ tell us that this man had two sons?
When Christ walked this earth there were two kinds of people with whom he interacted. There were the sinners who knew that they were sinners. These are the people who liked Christ’s message because it was clear their sins would be taken away in Him. Christ also dealt with the pharisees. These were the people who were righteous and in a position to judge Christ’s work. When Christ speaks of the prodigal son who recklessly spent his father’s inheritance, how does this son show the folly of sin and the folly of righteousness?
Asking the Lord to give us our daily bread could be another way of asking the Lord to make me more successful. In other words it is the desire that we want to be successful. The problem that we have as humans is looking beyond this world and believing that our Heavenly Father is more than looking down upon us, but is actually caring for us. So, when we ask the Lord for our daily bread what are we exactly asking the Lord to provide?
Christ commands us to pray, “Our Father who art in heaven.” This is not something that initially seems comforting to us earth dwelling Christians. If God is in heaven while we are here on earth how can His heavenly dwelling be a benefit to us? However, Christ is teaching us to pray this prayer so this is something good. So, what we are we missing? What is the bigger picture that we so often fail to see as struggling humans? How is our praying to our Father in Heaven far more comforting than we could imagine?
Our catechism moves from the law of God that we obey out of gratitude to teaching us about prayer. It does seem a bit strange that as Calvinists we would pray and that our confessional documents would have strong language regarding the necessity of prayer. Why pray if everything is determined? What can prayer do for us in our Christian life? Do we pray to change the will of God or do we pray for another reason?
The Christian life is something that ebbs and flows with ups and downs. There are times when we face tests and struggle to persevere through those tests. There are also times when we face temptations in the weakness of our flesh making it challenging to persevere through this life. How do we keep a proper perspective on heaven? How do we keep our focus on the goal of heaven and glory? Where do we find our strength and power? What can we learn from Christ interacting with his disciples?
In our day and age we do not esteem truth. This is not to say that our days are worse than other days in history, but philosophically there are those who do not believe we can understand truth. In fact, people have appealed to history showing that the winner of a battle is the one who controls the narrative of the battle. So, if this is true then what about the Bible? What do we do with people having different understandings of the Word of God? Is there truth and can we know truth?
There is a certain wisdom in cheating people out of money in terms of worldly wisdom. It would seem that we would get ahead and increase our earnings. We want to believe that if we cheat to get ahead it will not really cost us anything and it will make our business ventures all that much more profitable. This is not what the Lord would have us do. The Lord does not see such deceptive practices as honorable to HIm. In fact, we find that Moses makes explicit that we are not to have two different kinds of weights in our house. Why is Moses concerned about the Israelites having two sets of weights? What is the problem of us having a different weight in a bag and a different weight in the house? How can we use this old standard to learn how to live a pleasing life to the Lord today.
The reality is that Christians are a people set apart unto the Lord and called to honor the Lord as His redeemed people. This notion of living for another being is something that just is so contrary to worldly wisdom. The world desires that we live out and have our best life right now. So, why would we seek to honor the Lord and live for Him instead of self? How is living for the Lord something is actually a way more gratifying way to live than living for self?
Today we think that we have the luxury of evaluating what a Christian home looks like. There is a real temptation to think hat because our day and age is so different from Paul’s time that we can reevaluate the home. There is no doubt that people have abused their roles as husbands and as wives, but does that change what the Lord has ordained? What has the Lord ordained and how is Paul’s model for the home something good and honorable even today? How can we as a family benefit from Paul’s words?
There are many things in this life that can upset us and even overwhelm us. Peter affirms the reality of the hardship in the Christian life as he tells us that we have our own struggles, the world, and Satan is out to destroy us. These things make it pretty difficult for us to maintain a positive outlook in our perseverance. So, how do we know that we will arrive at the goal of heaven? Where do we turn in our darkest moments? Where is our hope in this Christian life?
We are a bible believing church in the Belgrade, MT. We are a Reformed Protestant church who desire to build one another up in love as we sojourn under the sun.
