Sermons by Matt Heerema (Page 3)
Matt serves as lead pastor, and focuses on teaching, leadership, and theological development. He and his wife Nancy have four daughters. He is a musician and led in Stonebrook’s music ministry for 15 years before putting the guitar down. Matt is an avid reader and massive sci-fi geek. As a bi-vocational pastor, he also directs Mere Agency whose goal is to help the church use the web to impact the world with the gospel. You can connect with him at mattheerema.com.
Luke 8:1-18 – The parable of the soils
Facing increasing rejection and opposition from the religious leaders of the day, Jesus begins “hiding” his teachings in parables, so that only those who really desire to follow and learn from Jesus are able to know his meaning. This week we will focus on the parable of the sower – or, better, the parable of the soils. The parable asks us to examine our attitude toward Jesus – are we believing? connected? rejecting worldly pleasure? holding fast to his word? This parable warns us, corrects us, and shows us the way to a fruitful life of faith.
Luke 7:18-35 – The One Who is and is to Come
While in prison, John the Baptist hears reports of Jesus’s ministry. Many things line up with his expectation of the Messiah, but many things do not. He sends his followers to ask Jesus directly “are you indeed the Messiah, or are we waiting for someone else?” Jesus’s unusual response inspires trust in God for those who believe and repent, but for those who are righteous in their own mind, no response he could give would be sufficient.
Luke 5:1-26 – We Have Seen Extraordinary Things Today!
In this week’s passage, we are introduced to four sets of people: the first disciples, a leper, a paralytic and his friends, and the pharisees. Through his interactions with these four very diverse people, Jesus shows us that he has the power, willingness, and authority to heal and forgive sin for anyone who comes to him in faith.
Luke 4:16-30 – Bring Your Nothing
In this week’s passage, Jesus proclaims that the long awaited “year of the Lord’s favor”, is here! In his very brief sermon he tells his hometown, the people he grew up with, that he is, in fact, the Messiah. In two strange analogies to Old Testament stories, he tells them the surprising nature of his ministry: God’s grace is free, is open to the gentiles, and we should receive it as humbly as a widow and a leper. This shocking claim enrages the town. And we should ask ourselves, how do we respond?
Luke 3:23-4:15 – The Last Adam
In this week’s passage, we will Jesus, the descendant of King David, and of all our “father” Adam, and also, most importantly, the Son of God, face temptation from our adversary, the devil himself. We will be encouraged as Jesus faces temptation, just as Adam did, and just as we do: as a human. Using the same resources we have available to us, the leading and empowering of the Holy Spirit, and reliance on God’s promises and commands in his word.
First of all, Pray. The Effect of the Gospel on the Gathered Church
First I’ll set the stage, the context of the letter. The Apostle Paul had an interesting problem on his hands. He had spent three years with the church he started in Ephesus, living with them and instructing them night and day, imparting to them the whole counsel of God. After this he wrote them a definitive letter reminding them of The Gospel and instructing them in how they were to conduct themselves. Now, just a few short years…
Zechariah 3 – The High Priest’s Dirty Robes
We are continuing our series through the minor prophets this morning in Zechariah. Please turn there with me. Zechariah is the longest of the minor prophets. Same chapter count as Hosea, but more words. It has been called “little Isaiah” – because it picks up on many of the same themes and uses similar imagery. The book is very complex and as far as an efficient summary and outline of the book as a whole, I don’t think I can…
Zephaniah – The Day of the Lord
1 The word of the Lord that came to Zephaniah the son of Cushi, son of Gedaliah, son of Amariah, son of Hezekiah, in the days of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah. Zephaniah 1:1 (ESV) We know a lot about Zephaniah from this one verse! Zephaniah has the most complete genealogical listing of any of the prophets, and it’s here for a reason. He was the great, great, grandson of one of the few faithful kings of…
Let Justice Roll – Amos
This week we will look at the book of Amos, the first prophet to the Northern Kingdom. The nation of Israel hid immorality, greed, oppression of the poor and weak, and many other sins behind a veneer if religious performance. The prophet calls them (and so, us) back to worship of the true God from the heart, evidenced by love for their neighbor and a passion for justice and righteousness.
Unity in disagreement for mission.
The mission of Jesus’s church is to bring glory to God by making disciples. Jesus taught us that unity is a cornerstone of this mission. Three enemies of unity are inaction, improper handling of disagreement, and false doctrine. This week we will examine the scriptures to find out how we can navigate disagreement well in the pursuit of unity and sound doctrine. And in so doing we will learn how to advance the mission: bringing God glory and helping people come to know him.
2 Peter 3 – Judgement Day
Do you ever think about why Jesus is taking so long to return? Has that question ever caused you to doubt the truth and reality of the Christian faith? Has that doubt ever led you to excuse your sin, because “maybe this all isn’t real anyway?” Have you ever had a hard time knowing how to answer a friend or acquaintance who brought up these questions? In the final chapter of his second letter, Peter tackles this question as the…
2 Peter, part 1 – A Fruitful and Effective Life
For the next several weeks, rather than a long walk through a single book of the Bible, or a thematic series, we’re going to take time to preach through some of the shorter books of the new testament. Two years ago we hit some of the shortest letters, 1, 2, 3 John – for the next five weeks we are going to cover 2 Peter, Jude, and Philemon. We’re starting with 2 Peter this AM and doing about a chapter…
The Final Rescue
This Sunday is the second Christmas Sunday! We have four days left! Hooray! 🙂 Christmas is the time of year when we, in a special way, remember and celebrate the birth of Christ, and the beginning of his rescue mission to find and save God’s lost sheep. We carried our Advent series topic, Rescues, on into Christmas as well, because what bigger Rescue is there than Christ’s rescue of us? Last week we talked about Christ’s rescue mission in offering…
Rescue: Famine
This advent season, we are looking at stories of God’s amazing rescues of his people through history. This week we are going to examine the life of Joseph as recounted in Genesis. We will see God’s amazing rescue of Joseph, and then using him to rescue the fledgling nation of Israel, and the whole world from a global famine. In this story we will learn that we can find hope and safety in God’s promises, no matter our circumstances on…
The Twenty-Ninth Chapter
As we look back on the 28 chapters of Luke’s account of the early church, we find Jesus making and keeping a promises to his followers: “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth…” (Acts 1:8) Notice the form of this verse. It’s not a mission statement. It’s not a command. It’s a promise: “You will be my…
Acts 15: Disagreements, Debates, & Decisions
In this week’s section, we examine several conflicts that arose in the church as they spread “to the remotest parts of the earth”. With gentiles now becoming a large part of the community of faith, the chosen people of God, how ought they operate? New situations and clashing cultural habits lead to some difficult conversations and decisions. As we look at how the church handled these situations, we gain insight into how to handle disagreements and decisions in our churches today.
The Conversion of a Christian Killer
This week, as we continue our Acts series, we see how the Holy Spirit worked to further his mission of expanding the church through one of the most dramatic and important conversion stories we see in the Bible: Saul of Tarsus. The “Hebrew of Hebrews”, was so zealous for God that he would not tolerate this new sect of Messianic heretics, followers of “The Way”. They claimed that Jesus, the one who suffered the horrific shame of crucifixion, proving that…
Signs and Wonders
This morning we are in our fifth week of our walkthrough of the book of Acts. Please open your bibles with me to Acts chapter 3. We’ll be covering a fairly large part of scripture today. Chapter 3, about a third of chapter 4, and a bit from chapter 5. There’s a lot going on in this section, and we’ll be making two passes through here at least to cover some important themes. This morning, I want to talk about…
The Beginning of the End
We continue our walk through of Acts this week by looking at the very beginning of “The Last Days” – a period of time foretold by Old Testament Prophets – the age where God’s Holy Spirit is no longer limited to a single location in a single nation, but is now poured out on all who believe in Jesus, God’s Messiah. Luke chronicles the events of the beginning of “The Last Days” – Some amazing things happen! We will discuss how these events relate to us today as a church, and how we too should proclaim the mighty works of God to all nations.