What Jesus has to say about life, marriage, race, gender, and materialism *This blog will be updated throughout March of 2024 as we preach through this sermon series. Renew Network Faith Statement: "We believe Jesus’ lordship through Scripture will lead us to be a distinct light in the world. We follow the first and second great commandments where love and loyalty to God comes first and love for others comes second. So we prioritize the gospel and one’s relationship with God, with a strong commitment to love people in their secondary points of need too. The gospel is God’s light for us. It te ..read more

*Note: this blog will be updated as we work through this current sermon series during the month of February "We believe the core mission of the local church is making disciples of Jesus Christ—it is God’s plan A to redeem the world and manifest the reign of his kingdom. We want to be disciples who make disciples because of our love for God and others. We personally seek to become more and more like Jesus through his Spirit so that Jesus would live through us. To help us focus on Jesus, his sacrifice on the cross, our unity in him, and his coming return, we typically share communion in our wee ..read more

“We believe that Jesus is coming back to earth in order to bring this age to an end. Jesus will reward the saved and punish the wicked, and finally destroy God's last enemy, death. He will put all things under the Father, so that God may be all in all forever. That is why we have urgency for the Great Commission—to make disciples of all nations. We like to look at the Great Commission as an inherent part of God’s original command to “be fruitful and multiply.” We want to be disciples of Jesus who love people and help them to be disciples of Jesus. We are a movement of disciples who make disci ..read more

Experiencing God's tangible reign through love and holiness *This article will be updated throughout September of 2023 as we teach on this series. "We believe in the present kingdom reign of God, the power of the Holy Spirit to transform people, and the priority of the local church. God’s holiness should lead our churches to reject lifestyles characterized by pride, sexual immorality, homosexuality, easy divorce, idolatry, greed, materialism, gossip, slander, racism, violence, and the like. God’s love should lead our churches to emphasize love as the distinguishing sign of a true disciple. Lo ..read more

Discerning Christian Convictions: the essential, important, and personal *The following blog will be updated weekly through July of 2023 as we preach through our sermon series on "Convicted Civility" “In matters of faith, unity. In matters of opinion, liberty. In all things, love.” Is it a sin to get a tattoo? Are the “gifts of the Holy Spirit” available for us as Christians today? Should our teens go swimming with boys and girls together? Not every doctrine of scripture is equally important. We must rightly divide the truth of scripture with discernment. Even Jesus drew a distinction in God ..read more

*This blog will be updated weekly throughout June of 2023 as we go through our "Faithful Faith" sermon series. Some see faith as adhering to a set of doctrines. Others see faith as unreasonable guesswork where evidence or careful study is lacking. How can we reclaim Biblical faith from culture and tradition? Do you see God's grace? Can God see your faith? "We believe that people are saved by grace through faith. The gospel of Jesus’ kingdom calls people to both salvation and discipleship—no exceptions, no excuses. Faith is more than mere intellectual agreement or emotional warmth toward God ..read more

*this blog will be continually updated with resources and podcasts as we move through our Gospel series throughout May 2023. When the enthronement of Jesus as king of kings is lost, or the good news is not royal good news, the gospel can become transactional and truncated to simply trusting in the atonement in exchange for a heaven receipt. We want to restore the ancient gospel, because the gospel you preach determines the disciples you make. "We believe God created all things and made human beings in his image, so that we could enjoy a relationship with him and each other. But we lost our wa ..read more

https://youtu.be/zJ7d1Fcx25I DBS ..read more

Have you ever read those Christian articles about the newest statistic of the decline of church attendance? I have. My algorithm knows me well. It seems like every other week another study comes out on how the American church is in decline. I read these articles and I think “Well that makes sense, God is pruning American Christianity”, but truth be told God needs to prune me and my own family of churches just as much. I need to ask if my response to these alarming articles is a sense of urgency, or a sense of complacency for seeking and saving the lost. This article is a collection of many sta ..read more

For the month of July 2022, we will be examining one passage from each chapter of Ephesians in order to organize the Bend church for fullness. Each passage represents a paradigm shift opportunity in the way we do church and how we can more closely align with Paul's church blueprint. Sermon audio will be uploaded and linked here as we go through the series. You can also follow along with the quiet time questions and prayer guides for each sermon below. If you would like a deeper dive into the text, we have more sermon audio and notes linked in each section that gets into the finer details of t ..read more