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Death, Hope, Resurrection, and Rapture

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I preached this sermon at North Village Church on 7/13/2025 discussing 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18   Introduction Good morning everyone.  I want to welcome everyone to North Village Church this morning.  I am very glad to see you all.  For those of you I don’t know my name is Rhesa, and I helped start the church back in the day.  Also, I wanted to acknowledge Jerry Chou.  He was scheduled to teach this morning but became sick at the start of the week, and I am filling in.  I got notice on Tuesday so please bear with me, and thanks to Jerry for sending me his manuscript.  Just know, if anything I say this morning sounds insightful or intelligent, most likely, that is from Jerry’s sermon. This Sunday we are going to go through 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18.  But before we go there, I would like to give a review of what we have learned so far in this book.  This will help us understand what Paul is teaching in this morning’s passage and why he is tea...
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Ten Lessons On U.S. Foreign Policy From "Enough Already"

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  “Enough Already” by Scott Horton is a must read for any American who wants to know the truth about what our government has been up to in the Middle East for the last 35 years.  Horton starts his expose with the terrible 9/11 tragedy, explaining who did this great evil and why they were motivated to do it.  Turns out that the U.S. had been causing major problems in the Middle East going all the way back to the Carter Administration's interventions in Iran in the 1970s. Among all the facts and figures Horton gives us ten important lessons about U.S. foreign policy. Each chapter focuses on a specific country, but these lessons are woven throughout each. Lesson 1 - The U.S. is not loyal to its allies                     “If you want to know who America’s next enemy is, look at who we are funding                     right now,” - Dave Smith (in his old Pa...
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Christians, Nations, And Their Relations

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Christians are having a lively debate discussing what kind of relationship they should have with the state or with the nations in which they live.  On one side you have those who claim that the only nation a Christian belongs to is their spiritu al nation, the universal church.  They minimize familial, social, and ethnic connections.  To them, nationalism of any type should be avoided because it leads to arrogance if not aggression against other nations.  To them, a Christian’s identity is made up solely by their direct relationship to God, their participation in the great commission, and their affiliation with the church.  They say that they have more in common with another Christian who lives on the other side of the world than their next door neighbor who does not believe. On the other side are those who call for Christians to enact laws in the land of their birth and enforce them strictly.  They support political leaders who are willing to coerce nonbel...
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