Month: April 2025

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 24:33 — 16.9MB)

Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Luke 24:1-12

The Crosses of Lent
The Lamb and The Cross
Luke 24:1-12

The LAMB was the INNOCENT SACRIFICE for the sins of the people.

Why did He allow Himself to SUFFER so? WHY DID HE DIE? Because He loves you so much, that’s why!

All that was over now, ended–by the BLOWS of a ROMAN SOLDIER driving SPIKES through Jesus’ hands and feet into a cross of wood.

Before, when JESUS was with them, they had been PROUD to be HIS FOLLOWERS.

They swung open those locked doors, walked into the streets of the whole world, and proclaimed the GOOD NEWS of GOD’S LOVE.

Jesus believes that you and I CAN make a DIFFERENCE in the world in which we live!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 22:05 — 15.2MB)

Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Matthew 27:40-42, John 19:25-27

The Crosses of Lent
At the Foot of the Cross
Matthew 27:40-42, John 19:25-27

Most of the time, as we talk about the cross, we picture the dreadfulness of that scene.

But I wonder, if you and I had been there, would we have wanted to be near the cross?

Mary’s presence there says to us, “If you dare to stand close to the cross, you’ll find that even though there are times when things don’t go the way you want; and times when your burdens seem too heavy to bear if you stay close to the cross, God will take care of you.”

But Jesus rejected her request, and said to her, “You don’t know what you are asking.”

Jesus had denied her request and yet she was there at the cross. And her presence there shows that she had the loving humility to accept rebuke from Jesus and to continue loving Him.

And now, at the cross, she saw just how much her salvation was costing Him.

Has the Gospel become just another story to you?

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 29:01 — 19.9MB)

Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Mark 14:27-46

The Crosses of Lent
The Cross of Rejection
Mark 14:27-46

This morning, I want to note the contrast between Jesus’ Palm Sunday (Mark 11:1-10) and Garden of Gethsemane experiences.

The conversation must have seemed strange, but then much of what Jesus was saying in those last days before going to the cross seemed odd.

It is one thing when someone for whom you have no connections or feelings rejects you, but it is quite another when it is someone close to you.

I don’t care if your child is three years old or thirty-three years old, when your kid cries it breaks your heart, and you will do anything to rescue your child.

At that moment Jesus felt that God had literally turned his back on him. Jesus felt totally forsaken, totally deserted, totally forgotten, totally rejected, and totally abandoned.

However, the lack of sensitivity demonstrated by his closest friends pales in the face of the blatant rejection he experienced when Judas betrayed him with a kiss.

Judas must have really been ticked because he immediately went and arranged to betray Jesus for the legendary “thirty pieces of silver.”

But when we think someone likes us or even loves us and they reject us in some way that just doesn’t seem right. It hurts.

I wonder if it might be a spiritually healthy and life-giving thing to extend forgiveness to those who have hurt us.