Schedule

The starting point of the Christian life is the confession that the incarnate Christ is the resurrected Lord who now sits at God’s right hand to rule and reign over all things. We then embark on a life of discipleship, coming to know Him more and becoming more like Him. This message will explore the basics of Christian discipleship, highlighting that in following Jesus, we are following a way that requires us to deny ourselves and the patterns of the world in ways that may make us look strange to those outside the faith.

In our regeneration and conversion, we receive new hearts and new affections for the things of God. Yet the world, the flesh, and the devil try to draw our hearts away from our love for the Lord and His way. Countering this requires us to continually tap into our source of life, coming to the Father through the Son in the power of the Spirit. This message will stress the importance of prayer in our spiritual pilgrimage, looking at the necessity of both individual and corporate prayer for communing with our Lord and sustaining the Christian life.

When we are redeemed by Christ, we are joined to Him and to everyone else who is united to Him by faith alone. This is practically expressed through membership in the local church, where we are encouraged and challenged to press on in faithfulness as we follow the way of Jesus, believe in Him as the truth, and are sustained by His life. This message will explore the centrality of the local church and consider how our participation in it is essential for growing in Christ and maintaining our distinctness from the world and its ways.

God has graciously given us sacraments—signs and seals that confirm the truth of the gospel and make alive to our senses the core elements of salvation. In baptism and the Lord’s Supper, we see, taste, feel, and smell the truths of our redemption, enabling us to experience deeper gratitude for God’s grace to us and strengthening our faith as we follow Him. This message will give an overview of the role of the sacraments in the Christian faith as we follow the way, the truth, and the life.

The Christian faith is centered on the Word incarnate, Jesus Christ, as He is revealed to us in the Word written, the Holy Scriptures. This makes the preaching of the Word the primary means of grace and our hearing of it essential for growth in grace. This message will remind us of the role of preaching in the Christian life and the way it shapes our hearts and minds so that we may increase in our love for God and follow Christ faithfully in the world.

In corporate worship, we praise the triune God for His lavish grace to us, bring our laments before Him, and encourage one another to follow Him faithfully until the consummation of all things. This message will explore the significance of corporate worship, noting that it is to be conducted according to God’s Word. Particular focus will be given to how corporate worship fortifies us to live faithful Christian lives in the world.

The central affirmation of the Christian faith is that Jesus alone is the way, the truth, and the life. However, perhaps no claim will put us at odds with the world faster than the assertion that Jesus is the only way to be reconciled to God and receive eternal life. This message will focus on the exclusivity of Christ and the conflict that this teaching inevitably creates with the world, exhorting us to never compromise the truth that we find salvation only in Jesus.

We receive all the blessings of God and all that we need for the Christian life through our union with Christ. As our understanding of this union deepens, we experience greater encouragement and joy in the God who has united us to Himself, giving us strength to stand firm as we follow Christ. This message will consider the centrality of union with Christ for the Christian life, helping us to see how the truths that we are in Christ and that Christ is in us give us everything we need to know Him and to be faithful to Him.

Christians are called to be people of the truth—not people of “my truth” or “your truth.” But in a world where the existence of universal truth is called into question, it can be difficult to maintain our commitment to the reality of universally binding truth, let alone declare that it is found in Christ and His Word. This message will look at some of the false understandings of truth in our culture, the difficulty of standing for the truth, and the call for us to stand firm on Christ as He is revealed in God’s Word.

In Christ, we find truth and life as we follow His way. His way has a final destination, and that is life in the glorious new heavens and new earth in the presence of God as we see Him face-to-face. This message will conclude the conference by looking at the final goal of the Christian life, the vision of God in a restored creation. It will also consider some of the ways that following Jesus as the way, the truth, and the life today prepares us for the glorious end that God has prepared for those who love Him.