Lifetree Community Church

This week Kate Gutmann shared with us a message she felt God was putting on her heart for Lifetree. She shared that in our own way every single one of us are sent here to represent God whether that be in our families, places of work, community, or abroad. 

Walking the Narrow Way: Part 2

This week we kicked off a new series about following Jesus - Walking the Narrow Way. In this series, we’re going to explore the difference between the Wide and the Narrow Way. We will explore what makes the Narrow Way hard, why it is not commonly chosen, but most importantly, discover where it leads.

This week at Lifetree as we celebrated Easter, Pastor Dan shared about Jesus being our Good Shepherd and how just as sheep NEED a shepherd, we NEED the Good Shepherd.

Home: Part 2

Home

This week, we wrapped up our series on A Great Mystery where we've been exploring our relationship with God through the analogy of marriage and how it impacts all our relationships. In the last message of this series, we looked at the ultimate end, the goal, of our relationship with God.

A Great Mystery: Part 4

This week as we continued our series on A Great Mystery, we examined the beginning of humanity’s story. In that story, a truth is found there that will impact every single relationship in your life including some that haven’t even formed yet.

Guest Speaker: Samantha Copeland

Last week we learned that God loves us perfectly. This week we looked at what our response to God’s love looks like. How do we love God back?

This week, we began a new series called A Great Mystery. For the next few weeks we are going to explore the most powerful mystery of love and how being loved is the single greatest determining factor in the kind of life you live and the kind of relationships you have. The measure to which we accept and believe God really loves us is the measure to which we are able to love anybody else. 

Throughout January, we have been exploring the Greatest Commandment - to love the Lord our God with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind, and all our strength. Together, these four elements help us understand what it means to be Wholeheartedly Devoted to God. This week we looked at the final one - STRENGTH.

Wholehearted Devotion: Part 3

This past October, as a staff we made time to ask God what this next year would hold for our church, and we sensed God revealing 2024 was going to be a Year of Wholehearted Devotion. It’s time to love God with ALL our heart, ALL our soul, ALL our mind, and ALL our strength. This week we looked at what it means to be wholeheartedly devoted with all our soul.

Seasons are a part of life, and they help us know where we’re coming from, where we presently are, and where we are headed towards. As we’re heading into a new season in time we asked God, “God, what are You saying today? Where are You leading us in this year?" So, drumroll please! In this new season of 2024, we believe God is bringing us into a year of Wholehearted Devotion.

Today, on the absolute final day of 2023 we are going to reflect on our theme for this past year - A Year of Awakening. This week's message is a little different. It's participatory. Either create a new note on your phone or get out a piece of paper and a pen. Feel free to pause this message to really take time to reflect on each of the questions asked. Also, pray and ask God for ability to see His hand at work in our lives.

The Morning Light: Awakened to God's Power

During December, we've been going through the Christmas story focusing on a different character every week. This Sunday, we focused on Joseph. He was a normal guy going about his normal life, and God used him in extraordinary ways, yet he didn’t do anything miraculous. God had a unique part for Joseph to play to make Himself known, and just like Joseph, you have a unique role in helping those around you know God as well.

This week we continued our Christmas series looking at Elizabeth's first encounter with Jesus. It wasn't in a fancy temple or on a significant day of the year. Jesus came to her when she was going about her day to day life, and He does the same for us now. You don’t have to be sitting in a certain position or in a church building. Jesus will come to you exactly where you are. The question is this: will you receive Him?

Since the beginning of time, God has been telling us His plans. The hard part is not figuring out what God is doing; it is believing it. God has told us He hears our prayers, but do you believe it? Are there prayers you have stopped praying? Maybe this Christmas season, it's time to start them up again. God is doing more than we think, and the first step is believing what He says He is doing.

They Knew The Times: Christ the Transformer of Culture

The past few weeks we’ve been talking about culture. Culture is what we make of the world. Sometimes as we walk through life and encounter elements of culture, even though we know what is good and right, we just don’t want to do it. We want to experience that part of culture. This week we looked at three stories of people who did just that. While looking at these stories, we see the Paradox of Culture and how good God is that He shows us grace when we get it wrong.

This week we continued our series called Thew Knew the Times. While looking at Daniel’s story we see how God chooses to use his people within culture rather than in opposition to it. Sometimes we wonder if the skills we have are any good to God. However, the truth is that God takes your abilities and makes you extraordinarily useful within culture.

They Knew The Times

This week, we are celebrating 13 years of Lifetree Community Church! Over the past few weeks, we’ve talked about what we do as the church. This week we flipped the question to ask "What is He doing?"

The past few weeks, we've been examining what we are doing as a church. God has created this thing we call the church and has put the map of life inside each of us, but none of us have a complete map. God has broken it up into pieces and given us each a part. Our job, and the THIRD thing we are supposed to do, is collaborate and share the different parts of the map that is in us. As we do that, each of us gets a clearer picture of the whole map. That’s why God has charged us to go share it with others, to go make disciples.

Last week, we kicked off a new series called "What Are We Doing?" where we are re-examining our purpose as a church. While churches do a lot of things, there are three things that stand out as core purposes of our church, and they're found right in our name. This week we looked at the second thing we are here to do. God has called us to be COMMUNITY BUILDERS.

In a few weeks, we will celebrate 13 years of Lifetree Community Church. A lot has happened since October 10, 2010, and over time, it can be easy to forget what we are dong here. So, as we get ready to celebrate our 13th birthday, it's time to remind ourselves What Are We Doing here. Over next few weeks, going to re-discover, to re-awaken, or maybe for you for the first time, to hear why we are a church and what we are doing and how you are a part of it!

This week at Lifetree we had our Kids Takeover Sunday where our Treehouse Kids and ROOTED Youth hosted the service, led us in worship, and shared a message that God has put on their heart. We wrapped up our series on Wisdom From Above by focusing on the last attribute found in James 3: the Wisdom from Above is Always Sincere.

Wisdom From Above: Shows No Favoritism

Wisdom from Above: Full of Mercy & Fruit

Wisdom from Above: Willing to Yield

This week during our series Wisdom from Above, we explored the next quality of God’s Wisdom - being Gentle At All Times. While some might think being gentle is being quiet, soft, or easy, in the Bible we see time and time again that GENTLENESS is the key to POWER.

Two weeks ago Pastor Vic introduced us to a passage from James where the wisdom of the world is contrasted with the Wisdom from Above. We are surrounded by experts - people who know exactly what we should do and how we should do it and why we should do it their way, but how do we know what is wisdom and what is not? Today, we examined what it means that the wisdom from above is Peace Loving which means when you are in the valley of decision, you can trust that the wisdom God gives you will always be they way that leads to peace.

This week, we got a chance to hear the testimonies of our missions team who earlier this month spent a week in Guadalajara, Mexico. While they were there they helped continue the construction of a local community center and orphanage as well as ministered at three different rehab centers. Listen in to hear the funny stories and memories of the trip as well as how God worked in each of their lives while they were in Mexico.

Wisdom From Above

Today we had the honor of hearing from Gail VanBriggle who alongside her family is a missionary to Belgium. She shared about the work God is doing in Belgium and stories about why missions both local and global really matters.

Studies have shown past few years, we are losing trust in other people, and in our institutions. We don't trust our government, schools, banks, or even each other. How many times have you been going through a problem and you’ve heard someone say to you, "You just need to trust God"? Maybe you’ve heard it so many times and want to believe it but hearing it and believing it seem disconnected. If we live in a world where we can’t and maybe have never learned to trust others, how can we trust God?

As we get ready to send our missions team to Tlajomulco next week, we stopped to ask what difference does a one week-long trip really make and is it enough of a difference to justify all the time, energy, and resources it will cost? In this week's message, Pastor Dan spoke about the importance of going and how the the danger is not going is that those who are part of the Far Away eventually become the Forgotten.

Back in January, we took time as a church to pause and listen to what God was saying to us about 2023. God put it on our hearts that this would be a Year of Awakening; there were parts of us that were not awake, and God was going to be speaking to those places like an alarm clock and getting us to wake up. Now, it is end of June - means we are almost exactly half way through 2023. It’s time for us to take a break and call HALFTIME.

Today, we wrapped up our series on Manna by looking at one last way that God provides. This time we focused on something God told Moses to do that related specifically to the next generation. They need to know that not only is there manna for us, but there’s manna for THEM.

During this series, we've been looking at all the different ways God provides. This week, we turned to the New Testament where Jesus teaches us to not be concerned about perishable things like food and to stop being so worried about where our daily needs are coming from. He has it. He will provide. Instead, we should be spending our energy seeking the eternal life He wants to give you.

Guest Speaker: Pastor Ray Tate

During this series, we've been looking at all the different ways God provides in each season of life. There are times you have no means of providing - you are up against it, and God shows up supernaturally. Then there are seasons where God blesses us with family and a job and health and the ability to live in a way that leads to provision. No matter how God provides, everything you have is always from Him. It’s ALL still manna.

Have you ever felt you needed to do something, but there was no juice to do it? We can talk until we’re blue in the face about how there’s manna for that, but some days it feels like there isn’t. God gives you what we need to accomplish what is in front of you, but there are some days when there is no manna for that. It's not because God has failed or forgotten, but instead it's because God is giving you a gift - a rest. God says, "Hey, be still. You have enough to get you through today. No more work."

Manna is a constant reminder that God is always faithful even when we aren’t. God does not send manna because you deserve it, but because He loves you. He knows who we are and what we’ve done and gives us manna anyway.

This week at Lifetree, we had the privilege of hearing the transformative stories from some of the men at Adult & Teen Challenge New Jersey, an organization that helps individuals struggling with addiction find recovery and walk in freedom and God's purpose for their lives. If you would like to learn more about this life-changing program, you can visit their website at https://tcnewjersey.org/

Last week, we explored the truth that God has manna for us whenever we recognize a need. There's manna for that. But, as wonderful and miraculous as manna is, there’s a problem with it - it has a terrible shelf life. Manna is literally only good for one day before it becomes rotten. It is not rotten because what God provided is no longer good; it is rotten because God has new manna for you. Whatever you need, not only is there manna for that, but there is NEW manna for that every day.

We all have needs that are depleted daily and need to be replenished, and the reality of depleting resources creates pressure to provide. This week, Pastor Dan shared one simple statement that can honestly, genuinely relieve the pressure or provision off you. Whatever you have a genuine need for, There’s Manna For That.