Church In The Valley - Ontario Ranch Campus

God is always FAITHFUL to His people. In this sermon we will learn how to be FAITHFUL to Him.

Generosity is a lifestyle, not an event. God's ways are different than ours, in this sermon we will learn how that is good for us.

It is important to wisely manage current resources and plan for the future through the Biblical principles of budgeting, saving, and getting out of debt, all while prioritizing God, personal growth, and financial stability. Pastor Thad offers a practical plan to take incremental steps to become debt-free, so that we can honor God and steward our finances with wisdom and responsibility.

Set your heart on being fruitful for the LORD, your hands to being faithful with what He gives you, and you will see the blessing of God on your life.

We are looking at some simple truths found in the Bible and looking ahead.

We can face opposition from our spiritual enemy and also from those who come against us. When opposition rises up - God wants to build courage into us in a new way. The good news is that while we may not fully know what opposition we face - God does and He will protect us. He will lead us in His power of the Holy Spirit and His Word.

Fear provides an opportunity for faith and for us to experience God come through in new ways.

This sermon will look at how we can experience hope - even when things are not what we want or anticipate. When things seem impossible for us - God can do the impossible. This may not be a miracle or the super natural - but it could be we find greater hope in knowing we stayed the course - even when it doesn't make sense. Outcome is God's responsibility. Obedience is yours.

We are to be thankful always and this expresses the mature mindset that... Everything belongs to God. People depend on God for everything. He continually takes care of his followers.

Mature and Complete helps us to focus on what is truly important.

Keep walking forward in faith. Look to God and His people for perspective.

Faith gives us the ability to consider it joy when facing trials because God has a purpose for the painful circumstance.

The next essentials in decision making are learning how to listen to God's voice. It is easy for us to pick up this block and run with it to decide what we are going to do. However, that could lead to some foolish decisions. This block - Prayer and Prompting - Listening to God's voice - comes last because we want to make sure that it is built on the foundation of God's general will and searching out his specific will in our current decision.

Searching for God's specific will is the next step after learning to do His general will. This involves asking for wise counsel on specific decisions and seeking to get a neutral heart before God.

God's general will is lined out for us in scripture and we get to know God's will and ways through experience. This experience requires faith, integrity, and obedience. God's will and ways become clear to us as we choose to live God's way over and over again.

Good decisions flow out of a heart of wisdom. A heart of wisdom will do what is righteous towards God, just towards people, and prudent towards a goal. A heart set on wisdom will then consider the building blocks of God's guidance as they make decisions.

God has a growing family (Eph. 2:19) - His teams accept one another and keep on growing by adding to their number. The church does that by welcoming guests (Rom. 15:7) and continuing to add them into the church (Acts 5:14).

A legendary team stays "sharp" in the way they approach things. Sharp: alert competence and clear understanding shown in a resourceful, enthusiastic way. An important aspect of being "sharp" is that we do the best we can with our resources. This means that we don't compare but focus on what we can do to take care of our responsibilities (Gal. 6:4-5; 2 Cor. 10:12). Then, we let our light shine and give God the glory (Matt. 5:16). The team can accomplish being sharp when they focus on doing everything for the glory of God (1 Cor. 10:31).

A legendary team and its members are proactive - they have a "can do" attitude and take initiative to do right and accomplish God's purpose. Choosing a proactive posture buys up the opportunity (Gal. 6:10) and trusts that we can do anything through Christ (Phil. 4:13).

At CIV, we value a godly cohesion (cohesion: to stick together tightly). A legendary team chooses to be loyal and trust one another which builds unity and brings results to glorify God.