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Kyle Kauffman 6/28/26 Kyle Kauffman 6/28/26

The Gift and Necessity of the Local Church

Kyle Kauffman

What do you think of when you think of the church? It’s likely that many of us think of Sunday Mornings because that’s what we associate church with. And while the gathering of the church is incredibly important, it can also be dangerous if we only start to view church as an event that we attend. It’s common in our own day to view church as good, but not necessary; as nice, but not essential; as a place I go rather than a people I belong to. Part of what we might need in the 21st century is to recover a biblical vision of the church that tends to focus more on the church being a people I belong to then an event that I attend. In 1 Corinthians 12 Paul is making this case in responding to the Corinthian tendency to elevate certain spiritual gifts in a way that dismisses the need for everyone who belongs to the church. Paul makes the case that the church is essential for us because everyone in the church is essential for the spiritual good and health of others. He recognizes that the health and well-being of every member of the church depends on the love, care, and service of others in the church. This passage serves to remind us of how good and necessary the church.

1 Corinthians 12

Kyle Kauffman 5/17/26 Kyle Kauffman 5/17/26

Sacrificial Love for the Sake of the Church and the World

Kyle Kauffman

The Christian life involves sacrifice. It involves being willing to lay down our rights, give up our freedom, and make sacrifices that can prove costly, difficult, uncomfortable, and painful. This can be at odds with a world that tells us to hold onto our rights and freedoms at all costs. We can easily make an idol of our rights and freedoms and forget that rights and freedoms in this world are given to us so that we might use them to glorify God by loving others and advancing the gospel. In 1 Corinthians 8 and 9, Paul is calling the Corinthians to lay down their freedom in order to love one another and he is showing how he lays down his rights in order to advance the gospel. As we consider these chapters we are invited into living a life that reflects our Savior. We are called to consider what sacrifices God might want us to make. And we discover that the gospel gives us the power to make those sacrifices.

1 Corinthians 8:1-9:23

Kyle Kauffman 3/29/26 Kyle Kauffman 3/29/26

Problem-Solving in the Church

Kyle Kauffman

We are going to have problems in the church. Hopefully that’s not a surprise to any of us. This is part of what it means to be a church full of sinful people. We are going to offend, wrong, disappoint, and hurt each other at times. Sometimes in small ways and sometimes in big ways. And part of what we are called to is to work through those problems together with one another. Some in the church at Corinth seem to have developed a bad practice in solving their problems: just take the issue to court. We may not have this issue in our own church, but we still have ways that we deal with our problems in unhealthy ways or ways that just reflect the world outside the church. It’s important for us to see how who we are in Christ should work its way out in how we deal with our problems. We are new people in Christ which involves cutting ties with the old ways we may have been marked by.

1 Corinthians 6:1-11

Kyle Kauffman 6/1/25 Kyle Kauffman 6/1/25

Defending the Gospel

Kyle Kauffman

It is often said that defense wins championships. In Acts 15 we also discover that defense preserves the gospel and the mission of the church. In Acts 15 we read about one of the first major threats to the gospel. It is inevitable that the true gospel will be threatened through addition, subtraction, or simply assumption. Often these threats come from within the church rather than outside the church. We must be prepared to recognize threats to the gospel and to defend and preserve the truth gospel of grace. If we lose the message that we are saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone, then we no longer have a mission that is worth pursuing. But if we hold fast to this true gospel that has been passed onto us and remain unified around it, then we have every reason to continue in the mission to spread this gospel to others.

Acts 15

Joel Wood 5/25/25 Joel Wood 5/25/25

Don’t Give Up

Joel Wood

It’s easy for us to give up on being a part of God’s mission in this world. Perhaps that’s because we feel ill-equipped to be part of God’s mission. Perhaps that’s because we have faced opposition or apathy from others when we have tried to tell them about Jesus. Perhaps it’s because the difficulty and suffering of our lives has left us feeling like we can no longer take part in God’s mission. Whatever it may be, there will always be reasons for us to “give up” on the mission of making disciples. Acts 14 gives us a window into why perseverance is required and how God enables us to persevere in the mission.

Acts 14

Kyle Kauffman 5/18/25 Kyle Kauffman 5/18/25

Sent

Kyle Kauffman

God intends for all Christians to live with a sense of being sent into the world with the gospel. But God also calls the church to send out those who he specifically calls to go across geographic and cultural boundaries with the gospel. In Acts 13 we get a window into the first missionary journey of Paul and Barnabas. We discover that God’s plan to reach the world with the gospel involves using missionaries to advance the gospel in places where it has not been heard before. In this chapter we see not only what is involved in this missionary endeavor, but also what it looks like for us to live with an awareness of being sent by God in our own individual lives.

Acts 13

Kyle Kauffman 5/11/25 Kyle Kauffman 5/11/25

Hope for the Hopeless

Kyle Kauffman

There are areas in our lives or the lives of others that may look or feel hopeless to us on the surface. We may struggle to believe that change is really possible or that things will ever get better. In Acts 12 we read of a time when things may have looked and felt hopeless to the early Christians in Jerusalem. We find God intervening in a powerful and amazing way to bring change. This story can help us in whatever areas we may struggle with hopelessness today by helping us to see that God hears and answers the prayers of his people. And it can help us to see that even when things may feel hopeless to us, God is still good and he can still be trusted.

Acts 12

Kyle Kauffman 5/4/25 Kyle Kauffman 5/4/25

A Church That Changes the World

Kyle Kauffman

God’s mission of making disciples is global. We can see this in the book of Acts. The gospel is spreading all across the known world throughout this book. And sometimes we can become so focused on the Big Names in the book of Acts that we forget God’s mission in Acts involved far more people than Peter, Paul, and Philip. Because God’s mission is so BIG, it’s easy for us to lose or forget what role the local church (and every member in the church) plays in this mission. In Acts 11:19-30 we get a good glimpse into how God intends to use the local church (and every member of the church) as part of the plan to make disciples. As we discover how God used the local church in Antioch to make a big difference, we might be encouraged to hope that God will use the local church in Paradise to make a big difference as well.

Acts 11:19-30; 13:1-3

Kyle Kauffman 4/20/25 Kyle Kauffman 4/20/25

Jesus Unfiltered

Kyle Kauffman

It’s easy to end up with a watered down, domesticated, tame version of Jesus. Whether that is because of our own assumptions about Jesus, all the different things we have heard about him, or the ways we have simply grown accustomed to Jesus over the years. Jesus can quickly just become a background part of our lives. But the actual Jesus, who rose from the dead and is alive today is anything but tame or domesticated. In Acts 9:1-40, we see several glimpses of who Jesus is and what he does in our lives today. And we find that just as Paul’s life was turned upside down by truly coming to know who Jesus is, so too our lives can be transformed by a true understanding of who Jesus is.

Acts 9:1-40

Kyle Kauffman 4/13/25 Kyle Kauffman 4/13/25

Scattered to Gather

Kyle Kauffman

It’s easier for us to speak about the advancement of the gospel then to actually steps in advancing the gospel. We can all too easily seek comfort in the truth that God will advance the gospel in this world without being challenged by the truth that God wants you to be a part of advancing the gospel in this world. God sends disciples to go out with the message of the gospel and be a part of the spread of the gospel. In Acts 8 we see God using Philip to advance the gospel to the Samaritans and an Ethiopian. As we look together at the story of this early disciple and how God used him to spread the gospel we should be challenged to ask whether our own lives are also being lived in seeking to spread the gospel in our world today.

Acts 8:4-32