The big idea of this week's sermon from Psalms 18:1-50 is that Jesus is singing praises to his Father with people from all nations of the world. Psalm 18 reminds us of the breathtaking doctrine of the trinity, God’s glorious purpose and mission to save the world, and the reality of Christ-centered unity. Psalm 18 shows God delivering David from possible death, but fulfilling Psalm 18, God delivered Jesus from actual death, the greater deliverance. Discussion Questions: 1) Have you thought before that Jesus is singing with us to the Father? How do we know this to be true? How does this impact our relationship with him? 2) Do you respond in praise, like David and Jesus, when He works in your life? If no, what do you think contributes to that? 3) Are there times you have had difficulties having unity with others? What do you think contributed to that? 4) What differences in others do you tend to have more struggles with? Why do you think that is? What do you think would help you to love others that are harder to love? 5) Knowing what Jesus has done by dying, rising, and ascending, how does that impact our songs of praise? How does it impact how we engage with others? 6) Do you have a story that produces a song of praise? How do you respond to that story? 7) How can you make sense of the Bible if you don’t believe in the triune God? How does this knowledge impact our daily life? 8) Do we have reasons to hope? How do we know this hope to be true? 9) Do you have questions in regards to where hope comes from? Do you at times feel hopeless? Where do we go in those times? 10) Are you living out the mission of the church to make disciples of all nations? How is that going? If not, what keeps you from doing so? 11) Are there opportunities in your life to humbly sacrifice your ideas in order to love and bring unity in the church? How are you doing with that? 12) How do you see Jesus as head over all in our lives? How does that impact our lives and our praise? 13) What areas in your life do you think are a temptation to lose focus on Jesus? 14) What do you think contributes to the divisions among people and the church? What do you think unites us? 15) Are there things that I am doing to create disunity in the church or are there things I can doing to create unity?

Embassy Church Sermons

“A Song About Jesus’ Deliverance”

The big idea of this week's sermon from Psalms 18:1-50 is that David’s passionate praise is the result of perfection, promises, and protection. As the longest psalm attributed to David, it can be considered David’s magnum opus. Psalm 18, both in structure and in content, teaches us how to speak to God as delivered people who love Him. Ultimately, we see that our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ fulfills Psalm 18. Discussion Questions: 1) How often do you say to God, “I love you?” How often do you sing to God, “I love you?” 2) Do you think we love God to the same degree to what we think we have been rescued from? Is it possible that we might love God little because we think we have been rescued from little? 3) How can we strengthen our souls to have passionate praise like David? 4) Has there been times in your or others’ lives where you cannot help but praise and share your love with God? What was taking place with God and in your life? 5) Do you have passionate love for God when you pray? If not, what do you think contributes to that? 6) What does it look like to have a life that praises God regularly? 7) What would it look like to regularly understand how much we have been saved from and sing praise? How would this impact our lives, our relationship with God, and our relationship with others? 8) What does it look like to praise God and rely upon God, for all He gives to live a life of righteousness and perfection? 9) What keeps us from trusting God to help us to live a holy life and leaning to Him for help? 10) How have you seen God’s promises to be true in your life and in the lives of others? 11) How have you seen God to be a rock in your life and/or the life of others? 12) How does David’s story of deliverance by God impact your/our relationship with God? 13) How has stories of salvation in the Bible impacted your relationship of salvation with God? 14) What does it look like to take refuge in Jesus regularly?

“A Song About David’s Deliverance”

This is a sermon in the Songs of our Savior series preached on Psalms 17:1-15 by Nate Praytor of Gospel Grace Church in Woodstock.

“A Song About Seeking God As Salvation”

The big idea of this week's sermon from Psalms 16:1-11 is that our joy is here because our God is near. In this Psalm, David is crying out to the Lord for preservation as he considers the prospect of death and Sheol. Throughout the song, David moves from expressing fear of death and dread of his circumstances to praising God for the joy of his presence, the promise of his preservation, and the gift of his people. In the New Testament, both Peter and Paul use this Psalm, particularly the final few verses, in order to demonstrate that even though David did eventually die and descend to Sheol, his greater Son, Jesus, overcame the corruption and fear of death by being raised to life.

“A Song About Joy”

The big idea of this week's sermon from Psalms 14 & 15 can be stated as the question: are you going to enter God's presence and be welcomed? Together, these Psalms raise the question of what is needed to enter the presence of God. Throughout these two songs, the answer is clear – no one is righteous, not even one. The totalizing claims of these Psalms is that no person is righteous enough to enter the presence of God. In other words, these two Psalms present the law. That is, what is it that God demands of us. However, they do not stop there because there is also the gospel, which says that God provides all that he requires through the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus. So, all who believe on Jesus are freed from the demands of the law and brought into union with Jesus by the grace of God. Discussion Questions: 1) How do we enter into the presence of God? What occurs when in God's presence? 2) How do you know whether or not you will enter the presence of God? 3) How do you become holy and blameless in the presence of God? 4) How does God respond to our sins? How have you seen this in his word and in your life? 5) How do we know what the law demands? What is the purpose of the law? 6) If we have fallen short of the law, how do we have hope? 7) Why is the difference between law and gospel so important? 8) Do you know how to apply the Bible? How do you know that you are rightly applying it? 9) What are some opportunities God has given you to apply and explain the beauty of the gospel?

“Two Songs About Holiness”

The big idea of this week's sermon from Psalms 13:1-6 is that lament is one of the ways that we as Christians can learn to deal with the suffering and hardship of life without either ignoring them or trying to help ourselves through our own strength. This Psalm exemplifies lament and shows that it involves bringing specific petitions before God with the trust that He is good and that He does hear us. What this Psalm teaches us is that God saves through the prayers of his people. As Jesus similarly teaches in the parable of the persistent widow in Luke's gospel, we may have confidence in approaching the God who truly is there and does care for us.

“A Song About Sorrow”

This was a stand-alone sermon preached on Mark 14:1-11 by Embassy Elder Kenny Eliazer.

“How Do You Worship”

Description: The big idea of this week's sermon from Psalms 12:1-8 is that a deceived world will be saved by a divine word, that of Jesus Himself, the word who became flesh. Through the chiastic structure of Psalm 12, the Psalmist contrasts the words of the wicked with the words of the Lord. The wicked, who with smooth speech boast confidently of their ability to exploit others through the abuse of their power, are challenged by the words of the Lord, who answers with the promise of deliverance in response to the cries of the oppressed. But when did the Lord make good on this promise to rescue? The answer comes in the gospel according to John, where it explains that the Lord did arise to deliver his people by becoming the man Jesus, who through suffering the boasts and oppression of a broken world, defeated the power of sin and death, ultimately being raised in victory and now reigning in heaven. Discussion Questions: 1) How have you seen deception in your life? How did God respond? 2) Are there things in your life that keep you from asking God to bring an end to wickedness? What do you think contributes to that? 3) How have you seen the power of God at work in your life or in other's lives? 4) What connections do you see between our society and that of the one being discussed in Psalm 12? What does the Psalm have to say about these things and what encouragement does it offer? 5) Is it possible that we are living in a society that needs saving? How would we know? How do we respond? 6) How does Jesus incarnation provide the most ultimate answer to the response of God in Psalm 12? 7) How have you seen God respond to the cries of his people?

“A Song About Truth”

The big idea of this week’s message is that we have reasons to confidently trust God even when the bottom of our life falls out. Even when the world around us crumbles and the foundations fade away we can confidently remember where God is, what is he doing, and what he is like.

A Song About Foundations

The big idea of this week's sermon from Psalms 9 & 10 is that the Lord will judge the whole world justly, though often through paradoxical, even ironic means. Psalms 9 & 10 together as a single song are written about God judging his enemies. Within ancient Jewish tradition, this song was also seen as being about God's judgement of Goliath as a particularly boastful enemy of God's people. This song celebrates how the Lord even uses the seeming victories of the wicked as a means of their own downfall, just as he did with Goliath. In a more ultimate sense, the cross is the point where God paradoxically judged sin and death in the body of Jesus, that through Jesus' own death, death itself should be defeated.

“A Song About Injustice”

The big idea of this week's sermon from Colossians 1:15-23 is that Jesus, the Son of God, is supreme over all. When we try to have anything in addition to Jesus, we lose the Jesus of the Bible, the one who created and upholds the universe, because anything added to Jesus is a subtraction from his supremacy as very God of very God.

“The Supremacy of Christ”

The big idea of this week's sermon from Psalm 8:1-9 is that God's power is perfected through weak humans. Through Psalm 8, particularly by focusing in on verse 2, we understand that God hears the cries of those who are weak and vulnerable, especially the cries of infants. We see God's concern for the weak in how God heard the cries of David throughout the Psalms, through how God hears the cries of infants in Scripture, and through how God ultimately heard the cries of Jesus, born as an infant and the Son of David, who died in weakness in order that he might rise in victory and end all suffering and oppression of the weak and vulnerable. Discussion Questions: 1) How have you seen God's power perfected in weakness? 2) What is the purpose of crying out to God? 3) How has God shown that he hears your cries? 4) How and where have you seen God's rest and beauty made known in weakness? 5) How do you view children and their value? How is this evident in your life? 6) Do you listen to the cries of children? 7) How are you caring for children in your life and in the community? What does that look like for you? 8) How is it significant that Jesus became an infant? 9) How does understanding what Psalm 8 says about infants help us to understand more of who God is? 10) How does Jesus becoming weak and dying on a cross impact your understanding of weakness? How does it impact how you think about crying out to him for help?

“A Song About Infants”

The big idea of this week's sermon from Psalm 8:1-9 is that Yahweh is the king of creation and his power is shown to be perfect through weak humans. Psalm 8 is a commentary on the creation account of Genesis and as such it focuses on the amazing role of humans within God's creation and purpose. God created humanity to serve as his rulers over the earth, but humanity failed in this calling and the result is that death reigns. Throughout the rest of Scripture, and particularly Hebrews 2:5-9, we learn that it is Jesus, the true human being, who through his own suffering, weakness, and ultimately death, restores humans to their place as God's rulers over creation and gives victory even over death itself. Discussion Questions: 1) How have you seen God's power perfected through your weakness of the weaknesses of others? 2) Do you know and understand Gen 1-11,Gen 12-22, Ex 2-20, 2 Sam 7, and Isa 53? Why are these passages so significant? 3) How does it impact our relationship to God to know that he is the majestic Lord over all of creation? 4) Do you acknowledge Yahweh as your king? What does that look like in your life? 5) What does it mean that God is mindful of you? How have you seen God be mindful of you in your own life? 6) What does it look like for Christians to have dominion over the earth as God originally intended? 7) What does it look like for Jesus to rule over death in our lives and in the world?

“A Song About Kings”

The big idea of this week's sermon from Psalm 7:1-17 is that David's salvation is rooted in the judgement of David's God. David could pray for deliverance from his adversaries because he trusted that his God was the judge of the whole world and that he would judge justly, recognizing David's innocence from the false accusations being made against him. Now, we as Christians can similarly pray for deliverance from judgment, not on the basis of our own innocence, but because of the innocence of Jesus, the one who bore the judgement of God in order that he might now be our refuge and salvation. Discussion Questions: 1) Do you sing or pray God's Word by yourself or with others? How does this impact your relationship with God? 2) Have you seen God be a refuge in your life and in the lives of others? Have you asked God to be your refuge? 3) What would it look like for us to use Psalm 7 in our lives while understanding it through the lens of the gospel? 4) How does it impact you to know that Jesus is your advocate before God whenever you pray? 5) In light of Psalm 7, What does it mean that Jesus is our shield and refuge? How does knowing this impact your relationship with God?

“A Song About Judgement”

The big idea of this week's sermon from Psalm 6:1-10 is that the Psalms, when rightly applied, can help us as Christians deal with the real difficulties and times of sadness in our lives, over against the false idea that if anything bad happens, it is a judgement by God or the result of his retribution.

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Embassy Church Sermons

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