The Impuritan

Where do your righteousness and good works come from? Are you a part of God’s system for life, or are you trying to work your own system?

Do you ever feel like you don’t really belong to God? Maybe you feel like are always just one sin away from being kicked out? How do you know if you’ve broken your relationship with God beyond repair?

Hebrews says we can outrage the Spirit of grace. Is it really possible to lose our salvation?

The ABC song is great, but what would you think if you went to college and they were still teaching it there?

How is your spiritual digestion? What are you taking in? Is it being distributed to your soul? Is it feeding love or something else?

In a situation of political turmoil and marginalization, when people are frightened for their futures and pressured by the world to conform, why would the author of Hebrews choose to drag an obscure Old Testament figure like Melchizedek into the conversation?

How can I know if I am saved when I feel like an outsider in church? How can I overcome my lack of confidence in my salvation?

Christians in our culture are under increasing pressure to abandon our confession of faith. In times like these, how can we preserve our emotional stamina?

In an operating room everyone present knows what needs to happen and how it's going to happen, but what happens if the surgeon doesn't show up?

We all depend every day on structures - from chairs, to bridges, to worldviews - that we barely think about. But what happens when the structures we depend on begin to disintegrate beneath us? Is there anything sure we can build our lives on?

In our age of competing truth claims we wonder if anyone is telling us the truth. The Bible claims that God is its source and that it carries God's authority. Why in this day and age would we open this book and trust it?

Pop culture images of heaven make it look like a place of eternal boredom. But the Bible reveals something very different - a new and vibrant kind of life.

What does a promise God made to Abraham thousands of years ago have to do with the way we pray today?

Christian freedom means more than just the ability to govern ourselves as individuals. In this week's message, Matthew Raley shows us how Christ frees us from the tyranny of isolation.

Is the American flag the symbol of freedom in Christ? What is the gospel and what freedoms does it give? There is a lot of confusion these days about what it means to be a Christian in America. In this week's message, Pastor Raley untangles the truth from the misconceptions about Christian freedom.

It seems like there is always more to do. Our work is never done. What is it like to enter God's rest, and what keeps us from entering it?

What do we do with the unrest in our hearts? What are the obstacles that keep us from entering God's rest, and how can we overcome them?

Many of us have an unrested heart. Today Pastor Matt goes beyond the band-aids of positive thinking to the source of our spiritual and emotional turmoil.

How does your faith hold up when you see hardships coming your way? Pastor Matt tells us why we sometimes need to look back to understand how to deal with the troubles we see ahead.

Like Christ, the biblical preacher is gentle, but he also issues the warnings people need to save them from the consequences of hard, unbelieving hearts.

The challenge of preaching, like the challenge of any relationship, lies in building the kind of trust that can only come from candor without insult.

Do you think of your Bible, especially the Old Testament, like your crazy uncle and ignore 90% of what it says? Understanding the Bible's focus will help you see it differently.

Too many preachers are trying to combat unbelief with salesmanship. But we can't live on oily, manipulative salesmanship and call it preaching. Biblical preaching calls for something entirely different.

Does fear have you in its grip? What will it take to break it's power in your life? Rather than trying to rise above your humanness, consider instead a human solution.

The scandal of the gospel is that the savior God sent to humanity was not an impervious super-hero, but an innocent human who suffered just like us.

Are you seeking to penetrate the spiritual world and access its remote and inaccessible god? Is Jesus one of the spirit guides who can lead you into that secret world, or is he something else altogether?

What does Mary Magdalene's reaction to meeting the resurrected Jesus tell us about the way He had treated women and others without social power during his years of ministry?

How did Jesus Christ deal with the excluded and powerless in society? How should we?

The Roman Empire allowed its people to worship whatever god they pleased, so long as it remained but one god among the pantheon. American spirituality is little different. We can believe whatever we want generally, but nothing too specific. For Christians, however, having vague beliefs has never been an option.

If you want to change your life, you have to change your mind. If you want to see changes take place in your life, you first have to change your idea of what personal change looks like.

Are you being transformed into the image of Christ? How do you know? Do you know what to look for?

Do limitations mean you aren’t free? That depends on your definition of freedom. Using the Apostle Paul as his example, Pastor Raley shows what freedom looks like in the context of difficult situations and relationships.

When the glory of the things we treasure begins to fade, we become disillusioned. An unfading hope, on the other hand, makes us bold. What kind of glory are you pursuing?

Flowers fade. Superstars dwindle away. Nothing good in this world seems to last. Is there anything that won’t disappoint us in the end? Is there any glory that will last?

When all church seems to do is trigger your fears, where can you put your confidence?

The culture of celebrity is destroying the church. How can Christians recover deep, vital relationships with each other and say no to the spiritual junk food of Christian celebrity culture?

Can we grow in hostile places? The answer from 2 Corinthians is yes.

The Impuritan explains why he fails to be a good evangelical.

The days of drive-by evangelism are behind us. It’s time to invest our lives in bringing God’s grace to the people around us. Matthew Raley delivers straight talk about evangelism.

It’s time to ditch the one-size-fits all evangelism scripts. Salesmanship is simple, but Jesus is calling us to go deeper.

How can we share the gospel when everyone’s talking but no one’s listening?

Americans are leaving churches in droves. We cannot afford to view these people and their motives cynically. Understanding the problem is the first step to becoming a source of healing.

What does Ben Franklin have to do with the modern trend in church youth groups toward therapeutic deism?

How can we feel secure or make any plans at all when we don’t even know what tomorrow will bring?

Considering death makes the things we do in life feel empty. Is there anything permanent that gives this life meaning?

In this series on time, we are asking ourselves how best to use the seasons God has given us.

What does your schedule have to say about your spiritual growth? Is there a place for wisdom in your daily life?

Does time feel like an oppressor that steals the joy from work you once enjoyed? God’s wisdom can set you free from the oppression of time.

What is your fortress? What gives you confidence for the decisions you make in life? Is it money, education, ability, careful planning, or, perhaps, signs from God? What role does faith play in your decision-making?

Today’s proverb promises abundance to the diligent and poverty to the hasty. What kinds of decisions do the diligent make that lead to such an abundant life?