060417 | Love Your Neighbor | Part One | Allen Hickman

Love is not what the songs on the radio, Spotify or Pandora say it is.  It is so much greater that those perspectives.  True love is selfless, not an egotistical, humanistic, or manipulative way of thinking and living.  True love thinks of others before itself.  It “esteems” other higher than it does of itself.

Loving God cannot be done without loving your neighbor.  They go hand in hand.  The command Jesus gave to His disciples over 2000 years ago is the same command He has given us as modern day disciples; Love God and love your neighbor.  You might say that is simple and elementary.  However, the things we learned in Elementary School we still use on a regular basis.  Math, basic English, writing, and reading are all essentials to communicating and functioning in our everyday world.  They are basic but necessary.  Loving your neighbor is foundational to our relationship with God and others as true followers of Jesus Christ.

 In order, to love like Jesus we must do three things.  First realize, that kind of love does not happen naturally.  It must be divine and powered by the Holy Spirit.  Paul said, “the love of God has been shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit.”  He is the one that empowers us with true love.  Second, be open, willing and ready to receive love.  You can’t give away what you do not have.  Third and lastly, know deep in your heart of hearts that you are loved first and foremost by you heavenly Father.  When we do these things we are ready to love our neighbor without judgment or critique.

052817 Guard Your Heart | Allen Hickman

Our hearts are the very center of who we are.  The Bible talks about our hearts and how important it is to keep it healthy.  We are not talking about our physical heart but the core, center of our will, emotions, mind, and thoughts.  However, taking care of our physical heart is important our spiritual heart health is paramount to everything else for out of it flows the issues of life.

To guard our heart means that we are paying attention to those things that we don’t normally pay attention to.  Why?  Because we know that things such as bitterness, unforgiveness, anger, hurt and more will slowly seep into our hearts and begin to clog the flow of God’s love.  As that happens we begin to make decisions based on the failing condition of our heart and people around us suffer the consequences. No matter whether you are a Christian are not the condition of your heart will always transfer into how you treat people.

In order to guard your heart first, be quick to forgive, then worship God with all your heart, also, give love in word and in deed no matter whether you deem people worthy of it or not, and lastly fill your heart with God’s thoughts, His words, and His opinion.  When we do this we not only guard our hearts but we strengthen them and are able to give the true love of God to others.

052117 | Must Start at Go | Allen Hickman

How can we love people when we don’t put God first in our life?  We can’t.  Jesus told us to love God and to love others but in order to love others we first must love God.  We don’t love God half-hearted with an reserves left over it is all or nothing.  God gave all and expects us to nothing let than to give our all.

If we are going to truly be the disciples of Jesus and see our world changed we are going to have to go back to “GO”.  There are some simplistic and basic elements that we need to remind ourselves of first of which God wants it ALL.  We don’t negotiate with God.  Why?  Because He is unreasonable?  No, because He knows unless we give Him our ALL we can never be ALL He has destined us to be and we will never be able to love others like He does.

Pastor Allen shares passionately timeless truths that are foundational to walking with God and instrumental in seeing change come to the world in which God has placed us. 

051417 | Awesome Mom | Amy Hickman

To be a mother is one of the greatest callings a woman could ever receive.  Why?  Because she is impacting the world.  As a godly mom, her influence is even greater because she is impacting generations to come through her children with the hope that comes from and through Jesus Christ. 

However, life has its way of bringing disappointment and hurt.  Many moms find it hard to be the godly mom they are to be because of that hurt and disappointment.  Disappointment brings an onslaught of emotions that are not always easy to deal with by yourself.   That is why Jesus told His disciples in John 14:19-27 that He would give them peace, in the midst of the storm.

Many times, we ask God to take away the storm when He wants to take us through the storm.  We don’t always understand why God does what He does but we can rest assured that His love is always there and will guide us through any storm we may encounter.

This week RLM women’s pastor Amy Hickman shares about how God will give moms and others peace in the midst of the storm of life and how she has learned to trust in God while raising 11 boys in today’s topsy turvy world.

050717 | Generation Next | The Journey Youth

Part of Resurrection Life’s DNA is that we believe in the next generation.  We not only believe in them but are willing to allow them to step out in faith and be the generation God wants them to be not the one that we want them to be.  Because of that belief we have opened up our Sunday morning service and allowed them to take over and share the gifts and testimonies that God has given them.

Samantha Burkett shares through an original spoken word she wrote and Joseph Murphy share how God saved him and healed him of deep depression since the time he was 10 years old.  Cole Arthur share how he was simply living his life with no purpose and how He came in a gave him purpose.  Amy Tebow share how God was able to give her a home where people loved and valued her and was able to come to a deeper relationship with God.  Jordan Meyers shared how her family losing their home lead to them living in a hotel for a long time and the close quarter reveal several things about her family that were not healthy but God was able to bring her out of those circumstances and bring her to faith in Him.

Kate Spiers, with her bubbly personality and optimism, reveals the anger and bitterness in her heart towards her father that no one really knew about and how God was able to give her the strength to forgive him and heal their relationship.

You will be blessed and encouraged by these young people’s testimony.  You will see a little of yourself in them.  You will come face to face with the same hope that they have.  You will see that we have a reason to believe in generation next.

043017 | Prophetic Conference | Marc Owings

042917 | Prophetic Conference | Mallory Bassham

042817 | Prophetic Conference | Richard Hinojosa

043017 | Stinkin Thinkin | Mark Jobe

Our thoughts are important to how we live our life.  Our attitudes, reactions, how we treat people, how we view the world, all come from our thought life.  The Bible tells us “as a man thinks in his heart (mind) so is he.”  That is powerful statement that underlines the importance of our thought life.

Paul told the Corinthians to take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ in First Corinthians 10:3-5.  If we don’t our thoughts can run away with us and derail our walk with God and devastate our relationships in the here and now.  Most people don’t really think about what they think about.  They just let thinking happen and that is where our enemy, Satan steps in and begins his work.  We start thinking thought that are not in line with the word of God and those thought start affecting us and our relationship in a negative manner.  Our thinking starts to stink and reek of selfishness, conceit and pride.  That’s exactly what our enemy wants.

How do you change your thinking?  Good friend and Pastor Mark Jobe from Gateway Church shares several steps we need to take in order to position ourselves to hear from God and think His thought thus enabling us to be the sons and daughters of God He has destined us to be.

042317 | Naturally Supernatural | Allen Hickman

Holy Spirit, Holy Ghost, The Spirit, whatever name you use most people are a little apprehensive about Him.  Yes, we said Him.  Why?  Because according to the scripture He is part of the Trinity.  He is the “power” part of the Trinity.  All “power” instances in the Bible are used in reference to the Holy Spirit.  “The Spirit came upon them,” or “The Spirit lead him,” and many other instances.  Usually it was some form of “power act” done by the Holy Spirit. 

These instances happened during the old testament times.  When Jesus came on the scene things started changing and there was a major uptick in the “power acts” of the Holy Spirit in Jesus’ life and through His disciples.  But Jesus wasn’t to stay here on this earth.  He had a specific job to come and do and He would return to the Father.  Enter the Holy Spirit.  Jesus told His disciples He was going away and leaving the Holy Spirit.  The disciples didn’t understand or like the fact Jesus was leaving.  Jesus told them, “it is to your advantage,” that I go and leave the Holy Spirit.

Jesus was not only leaving the disciples He was also leaving them with a task to do.  Jesus has never asked us to do anything that He was not going to give us the power, resources, or ability to do.  This is where the infilling of the Holy Spirit comes in.  We as the Church of Jesus have been redeemed and ransomed by the blood of Jesus giving us the “right” to come into the presence of God and making us a “holy” vessel enabling the Holy Spirit to now “live” inside us and not just come “upon” us.  Our lives should now be lived naturally supernatural.