Opening Video

Pastor Dan Borgelt

Audio [22:51]

Transcription:
“I love that last line in the video we just watched… it says that “The truth that is crying out from the empty tomb, is that no matter where you’ve been, or no matter what you’ve done, LIFE can begin again – BECAUSE OF HIM.”  

Speaking of LIFE, my wife Amanda and I learned very early on in our marriage, that we were not very good at taking care of things that were alive.  In our first year of marriage we had multiple incidences of failure, taking care of things that were alive.

The first one that happened, we were at seminary where we spent our first few years of marriage, and her best friend brought to us a plant… she was going away for a while and wanted us to take care of her plant.

She cared about this plant, well… more than I think anyone should care about a plant, but she cared about this plant, and she brought it to us and we were to take care of it.

I don’t remember all the details but I’m sure that we watered it… for a couple of days.  And then we forgot all about it, until we heard the knock on the door, and we had the Walk of Shame to Brittany, her best friend whose plant had died in our care.

And then some time later, my wife’s sister, who was also at seminary with us, who apparently hadn’t heard about the plant story, brought to us a fish. This was a fish that she cared about, more than I think anyone should care about a fish, but nonetheless she brought us a fish and put it in our care.

I don’t remember all the details.  I’m sure we fed the fish… for the first couple of days.  And then we forgot about the fish until she knocked on the door.  And we had the Walk of Shame having to bring to her… I assume we didn’t bring the dead fish; we probably had done something else with the fish by then, and maybe just brought her the empty bowl of some kind.

But you know, as bad as we are at caring for a living things, one of the things that united Amanda and I early on in our relationship, is the recognition, that as bad as we are at that, we have messed up our own lives, far worse… we have messed up our own lives far worse than that.

And so we love expressions like, the truth of the empty tomb crying out to you and I saying, that “ No matter what you’ve done; no matter where you’ve been, life can begin again.

So I want to talk to you about this whole idea of,

CROSSING OVER TO LIFE

Continue reading Easter – Cross Over to Life →

Pastor Dan Borgelt

Audio: [18:33]

Transcription:
“As we continue through the Gospel of Luke in the twenty third chapter, Luke writes of these events happened in the life of Jesus. Starting now, in verse twenty six the Scripture tells us this,

The Crucifixion of Jesus

^26-43 As the soldiers led him away, they seized Simon from Cyrene, who was on his way in from the country, and put the cross on him and made him carry it behind Jesus.  A large number of people followed him, including women who mourned and wailed for him. Jesus turned and said to them, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me; weep for yourselves and for your children. For the time will come when you will say, ‘Blessed are the childless women, the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!’ ³⁰ Then

“‘they will say to the mountains, “Fall on us!”
    and to the hills, “Cover us!”’

For if people do these things when the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry?”

Two other men, both criminals, were also led out with him to be executed. When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him there, along with the criminals—one on his right, the other on his left. Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”  And they divided up his clothes by casting lots.

The people stood watching, and the rulers even sneered at him. They said, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is God’s Messiah, the Chosen One.”

The soldiers also came up and mocked him. They offered him wine vinegar and said, “If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself.”

There was a written notice above him, which read: this is the king of the jews.

One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: “Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us!”

But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”

Church, this evening, this Good Friday in which we recall Christ’s death on the Cross for our sins… I want to begin by asking you a question.  And that is,

Are you prepared to experience suffering, and not have your faith shaken? 

Are you prepared to experience suffering, and not have your faith shaken?

Continue reading Good Friday – The Prosperity Cross →

Pastor Dan Borgelt

Audio [24:55]

Transcription:
“When I was in college, I was getting my Bible and Theology degree, and training to be in the ministry, when I had a professor give me an assignment… and it was an assignment that God would use to really shape the trajectory and the scope of  my ministry moving forward.

The assignment was this… I just want to hear how you would feel about doing this assignment.  The assignment was to spend twenty four hours in complete solitude, and complete silence. Twenty four hours, completely cut off from all other people, with no media or anything of any kind.

Now, to some of you that sounds like an absolute haven–that sounds great.  But for me, and my personality type, as a college student, that was not an assignment that I was looking forward to.

I had to think, “Where am I going to go to be alone for twenty four hours, first of all?”

But I worked at a church, and I had keys, and I found a room in thewe upstairs of this church, and I spent from four p.m. one afternoon, to four p.m. the next afternoon in this room, and I had no contact with anybody, and no media of any kind, but the professor said we could take a Bible with us.

So we could take a Bible and not only that, but we had one particular passage of Scripture that we were supposed to be focusing on during a twenty four hours. And God used that time and used that passage of Scripture to help me to realize that, up until that point in my relationship with Jesus Christ, I had really become content, I had really settled for something far less than what Christ was offering, and inviting me to experience from Him.

Not only that, but I became convinced and challenged by the reality, that if my ministry was to have any hope for having any fruit that would come out of it, it was going to have to be out of the overflow of my being connected to Jesus Christ.

My prayer this evening as we talk about this passage of Scripture, I’m going to look at at the one that I was invited to look at for those twenty four hours… my prayer is that,

If there’s anyone here this evening who feels like their relationship with Christ is less than what they want it to be, that God will use this passage of Scripture to reveal to you that he is inviting you to something profound and wonderful in a relationship with him, and not to settle or be content for what it is that you might already have.

And also, if you want your life to have any significance and meaning in the eyes of God, that it must come from the overflow of your relationship with Christ and being connected to him.

Continue reading Maundy Thursday-CommUNION with Christ →