Ottawa Valley Vineyard Sermons

For Father's Day, Ian brings us a special message on the Father's love. The primary image of our relationship with God in the New Testament is God as our Father. Some of us have good relationships with our fathers, many of us experience brokenness, but all of us need to experience God's fatherly love.

We are brothers and sisters in Christ; we are a family brought together by our allegiance to Christ, working toward a shared purpose. In this sermon, Ahren talks about how God instructs us to interact as a family, and how that plays out in churches today.

To understand what communion is and why we take it, we must also understand what it means to be a communion. We are connected to, and belong with, all believers from all times and places.

In a discussion-style sermon, Ahren teaches about the concept of being "born again." Step into the story of Nicodemus to understand how to be part of what God is doing, the importance of spiritual transformation, and what it means to believe in Jesus.

For Mother's Day, Ahren takes us through the scriptures in which God uses female or mothering images to describe himself before taking us through the story of Hannah to show how God understands the mothering journey.

Paul uses the image of adoption numerous times in his writing to describe our relationship to the family of God. This week, Ahren introduces our new series by exploring what adoption meant in New Testament culture and how that helps us understand our relationship with God.

God wants us to be in relationship with him because we need him - not because he needs us. When he seeks to get our attention, it is often because we really need his attention. But, we can't always stay on top of the mountains in God's presence because it's too much for us to handle. Things in our lives will cause us to experience a disconnect; that is what many call "the dark night of the soul."

What does the Ascension mean for us as believers? So often, we stop the Easter story at the Resurrection, but the Ascension also has major implications on how we live and on our eternity. When the God-Man returned to Heaven in bodily form, he brought a bit of earth (a bit of us) back with Him. And he made a place for us to one day be there with him.

What exactly is grace? And what does God's grace look like when applied in a practical way in our lives? Ian explains 9 key points of grace and how he has seen them manifested in his life and in the lives of people around him.

For Palm Sunday, we are looking at Jesus' statement that he is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. When Thomas asked how to get to where Jesus was going, Jesus said, "I am the way." Much like Jesus' journey into Jerusalem, our journey through life may not always be glorious or easy, but if we follow Jesus as the way, we can rest assured in the hope of our destination.

When Jesus said, "I am the Good Shepherd," he was differentiating himself from those who were shepherding his people, Israel (and from those who shepherd us today). But he was also pointing out an important aspect of our relationship to him: in order to be under his care, we have to be willing to be under his ownership and direction.

Do you know the voice of your saviour? He alone is the door to abundant life, but we can easily be led astray by thieves and robbers if we are not familiar with our Shepherd's voice.

What are we filling up on? That's the question we're asking in part 2 of our discussion on "I am the bread of life." It's also the question at the heart of Lent: are we filling up on God, or something that ultimately won't satisfy?

As we enter into Lent, our desire is to understand who Jesus is and how that changes how we see ourselves. There are 7 "I am" statements that Jesus makes in the book of John. We're beginning with, "I am the bread of life."

Continuing our mini-series, "Epic: Tales from the Old Testament," Ahren leads us on a close examination of the story of Elijah under the broom tree to understand how God meets us where we're at.

Which kind of offering are you giving God? Digging deep into Romans 11:33 - 12:9, Ahren leads a discussion looking at what Paul has to say about our place in the body of Christ and how we are to serve self-sacrificially in gratitude for God's mercies.

We're starting a new series entitled, "Epic: Tales from the Old Testament," looking at obscure or lesser-known stories from the Old Testament and what they have to teach us (after all, they were included in scripture for a reason). First up, Ahren discusses the healing of Naaman in 1 Kings 5:1-19.

This week, Vince brings us a message on the Psalms and how they can be applied to our lives, our prayer time, and our worship.

We're kicking off the new year with our favourite annual trafition: pastor on the hot seat. Ahren fields questions from members of the congregation and does his best to answer them on the spot.

Part 4 of our Advent series is Emmanuel: God with us in the field. Looking at the story of the shepherds who first received the announcement of Jesus' birth, Ahren reminds us that our place of work should be dedicated to God, and our gifts are our sacrifices to Him. How do you respond to this reality?