New Bridge Church - Pastors Jeff Lyle & Dustin Pennington

What if King Jesus wrote an assessment letter to your home church? What would He say about the heart of the people? Would Jesus be encouraged, affirming and applauding over the work being accomplished by you and those you serve with? Are there obvious things which need to be corrected? For seven churches in Asia Minor, this is not a what-if scenario. Jesus spoke over who they were and what they were doing. This message unpacks what Jesus said to the church in Philadelphia. From His words we can learn much about what pleases the King, and we can be inspired to commit to the very things which made Jesus grateful for the Philadelphian believers. One day in the future, all of us will go through our own evaluation by Jesus. This passage of Scripture will equip us to be ready for that coming day.

All throughout the Bible, we witness God promoting people in the Kingdom. Whether it is David moving from shepherd-boy to king, or Esther moving from orphan to queen, God delights in exalting His faithful children. So what about us? Are there characteristics that those whom God promotes have in common? Are these characteristics currently in play in our lives? As we continue to look at the life of Elisha, his season of promotion reveals a handful of qualities that God seems pleased to honor in our lives. As we observe them active in his life, we are able to see if they are in our own.

In one sense, all Christians are ministers. We are all called by a King, into a Kingdom where we are assigned our own purpose to fulfill. Some believers are called to do this at an elevated expectation and commitment with their entire lives. These people walk away from every previous purpose and commit themselves wholly to serve God with all that they are and all that they have. They leave hometowns, they resign from their jobs, they often reduce their standard of living and embrace a life of shoe-leather faith. Elisha was an unknown commodity to his generation. Then, out of nowhere, God put his mark on this man, and called him to leave everything to become the next prophet in Israel. This message breaks down what a calling can look like and helps all of us, as children of God, to reacquaint ourselves with the non-negotiable fundamentals of living out our own callings in the Kingdom.

Dustin Pennington

Zeal is an undervalued commodity in the Kingdom. Education is great. Experience is essential. Wisdom is a non-negotiable. Yet those three things could be found sitting in neutral if we do not possess Kingdom-zeal. When passion is added to precision, some wonderful things can happen. Having said that, zeal does not come without its own pitfalls. In this message, we see what happens when some of the disciples had more zeal than they had love. Their zeal also outran their call to unity. See how Jesus responds to His followers when they were very close to committing transgression, all because of their zeal outweighing their humility.

Relationships are precious in the Kingdom…and often fragile. The Apostle Paul was a man of God like no other. Many forget that he was initially an outcast in the church because of his past. A man named Barnabas put his neck on the line for Paul and they became friends and ministry partners. But then things went south in a moment of disagreement. This message takes us through Paul’s journey with Barnabas and helps us all learn how to admit it when we have made mistakes in our relationships with others. Broken fellowship with other believers is no small matter. Observe how Paul chose humility over pride.

People like songs about love, about victory, about heartbreak and about breakthrough. We write and sing of those things about which we are most passionate. Interestingly, there is a very short song in our bible that is all about the topic of…unity. Really? Unity? Yes, the Holy Spirit inspired a song to be written about the powerful blessing which God’s children experience when they do life together in unity. Most people do not know that there is an elevated blessing which only finds those who walk in unity with their spiritual brothers & sisters. Apart from this unity, this blessing on the rest of the Christian’s life will be smothered. If unity is important enough for God to write a song about it, then it must be good enough for us to sing about it. This message is not actually put to music, but it needs to become music to our ears as the Church advances together for the Gospel.

Few chapters in the bible have more greatly impacted Jeff Lyle than Romans 14 & 15. Unintentionally becoming a blind legalist after his conversion, Jeff credits the Holy Spirit’s revelation on Romans 14 as being the key that opened the cell to let Jeff be set free. This message takes the truths of liberty and love from Romans 14 and lays them over our relationships with others in the Church. Our relationships are greatly impacted by whether or not we hold people down or whether we set them free. Romans 14 not only sets you free from the unbiblical expectations of others, it empowers you to allow others go free when they disagree with your own standards, preferences and freedoms. No series on the topic of unity can be complete without a study on these verses.

It’s a little embarrassing to proclaim this, but it is a Kingdom command that Christians are to live with no divisions among us. We aren’t allowed to reject each other. We are not permitted to gossip about one another, or slander each other. The Gospel mandates that we go to each other and work out our differences. ALL of our differences. Yet the discouraging reality is that many Christians ignore this, and actually foster division in the Church with their words, actions, and inactions. This message makes it crystal clear that the Lord Jesus Christ is immeasurably serious concerning His decree that His followers be unified. It is time for heart-inspection, confession, repentance and restoration. Victory comes to believers who fight to remain unified.

One component of Kingdom unity is revealed in how God has designed all of our individual giftings and callings to function together. We are not merely to get along with one another, we are to intertwine ourselves with each other in order to fulfil the mission of God in our generation. As the Holy Spirit has intentionally gifted us differently from each other, He then braids our lives together so that we move in the Kingdom as one body, with Jesus as the head. This message celebrates our diversity, while also emphasizing the seriousness that we intentionally honor, appreciate and cooperate with those whom God has made differently than we are made by Him.

Jeff Lyle

Jeff Lyle

Dustin Pennington

Jeff Lyle

Jeff Lyle

Jeff Lyle

Jeff Lyle

Dustin Pennington

Jesse Digges

Jeff Lyle