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Wrapping up a five-week mini-series on how Jesus' disciples approach politics, LeadPastor Matt Sturdevant brings the conversation home by focusing on faithfulness.  Rather than ending with a party, a candidate, or a problem, he anchors the series in what God ultimately requires of a steward — faithfulness. To get there, Pastor Matt offers seven guiding words: pray, think, discern, speak, love, participate, and trust God. Each word carries real weight. Pray before you react — not just "make my side win," but "God, show me where I'm wrong." Think Biblically, refusing to outsource your convictions to a party or a candidate. Discern carefully, especially in an age of social media and AI, by asking whether something is true, whether the source is trustworthy, and whether you've fairly considered the other side. Speak graciously, because as Colossians 4:6 reminds us, there's no political exception to letting your speech always be gracious. Love people — even those who disagree — participate faithfully as a year-round citizen, and then trust God with the outcome. Pastor Matt closes with a powerful reminder for the morning after Election Day: regardless of the results, Jesus will still be King, the Bible will still be true, lost people will still need Jesus, and the Great Commission will still be the mission. Our hope, he declares, is not in who sits in an office — it's in the One who sits on the throne.

This episode of the 3C Podcast opens with team updates, including Matt Sturdevant's return from a Walk Through the Bible conference in Atlanta, where he celebrated their 50th anniversary and was reminded that access to the Bible is different from engaging with it. The team also recaps Pastor Jeremy's Sunday sermon on Romans 7, titled "The Struggle," which walked through four key questions Paul raises about the Old Testament law, sin, and the very personal reality that every believer wrestles with sin throughout their life. A highlight from the recap is the sobering truth that if you're not struggling against sin, you may simply be swimming along with the world. From there, Matt dives deeper into a question Jeremy raised but didn't have time to fully address in the sermon — namely, how Christians should think about the Old Testament law now that they are living under grace. Matt breaks the Mosaic Law into three categories — moral, ceremonial, and civil — and explains how Jesus fulfilled each. The moral law reflects God's unchanging character, the ceremonial law pointed forward to Christ and was fulfilled in Him, and the civil law governed Israel as a specific nation at a specific time. This framework helps believers understand why "thou shalt not murder" still applies today while dietary restrictions no longer carry the same weight. The episode then turns to the question of spiritual growth, with Matt presenting seven reasons why Christians often remain stagnant: neglecting God's Word, consuming too much worldly entertainment, allowing ungodly relationships to shape them, living a prayerless life, isolating from the local church, refusing to serve others, and avoiding Biblical discipleship. The episode closes with the fifth and final week of their "Faithful Citizenship" series, where Matt challenges believers to approach the upcoming election with seven practices — pray, think, discern, speak, love, participate, and trust God — reminding the church that regardless of election results, Jesus is still King, the Bible is still true, and the Great Commission is still the mission.

In this sermon on Romans 7, Pastor Jeremy unpacks Paul's line of questioning about the Old Testament law, sin, and the believer's ongoing struggle. Using a marriage analogy, Paul explains in Romans 7:2-4 that just as death releases a spouse from their marriage vow, death in Christ releases believers from the Old Testament law. But this freedom isn't a license to live however we want — rather, it gives us a higher motivation to follow God, not by checking off boxes, but out of genuine love for Jesus Christ. Pastor Jeremy then addresses Paul's question of whether the law itself is sinful. The answer is a firm "by no means." The law is holy and good, but it serves two important purposes: it shows us what sin is, and it finds us guilty. Referencing James 2:10, Pastor Jeremy reminds the congregation that failing in even one point of the law makes a person guilty of all of it — which means no amount of good works can tip the cosmic scales in our favor. Finally, Pastor Jeremy tackles the question every believer wrestles with: why do we still struggle with sin? Drawing from Romans 7:15-25, he describes this struggle not as failure, but as a constant opposition — like wading upstream against a river's current. The tension exists because when we give our lives to Christ, our spirit is transformed, but our flesh still pulls toward the ways of the world. Pastor Jeremy closes with the truth that no Christian is exempt from this lifelong struggle, and that only Jesus Christ, through the power of the Holy Spirit, can ultimately deliver us from this "body of death."

In this episode of the Three C Podcast, Pastor Matt Sturdevant continues the church's series through Romans with a sermon on Romans 6 titled "The New Life: Dead to Sin, Alive to Christ." The central big idea is that grace doesn't give us permission to keep sinning — it gives us the power to live a new life. Pastor Matt walks through four key truths: salvation gives us a new life, we must understand our new identity in Christ, we must choose to live differently, and we must live under our new master. He also traces the journey of salvation through justification, sanctification, and glorification, reminding listeners that while we've been saved from the penalty of sin instantly, we are being saved from the power of sin progressively, and won't be free from the presence of sin until glorification. A major theme that emerges from the discussion is the difference between trying and training. As Titus 2:11-12 makes clear, grace doesn't just save us — it trains us. Trying focuses on immediate results and relies on willpower alone, while training focuses on long-term transformation through spiritual disciplines, community, and dependence on God's power. The pastors discuss how Philippians 2:12-13 captures this tension beautifully — we work out what God is working in us. The episode wraps up with a conversation on faithful citizenship, challenging believers to vote as an act of stewardship, to evaluate candidates by character, competence, convictions, and policies, and to remember that not voting is not a neutral act when godless policies are on the ballot.

Continuing through Romans, Lead Pastor Matt Sturdevant reaches chapter 6 with a question Paul himself anticipates: "Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?" (Romans 6:1). The answer is a resounding "by no means." Grace, the pastor explains, is not a license to keep living the old life — it is the very power that makes a new life possible. He draws a clear distinction between justification, God's decisive declaration that we are righteous through Christ, and sanctification, God's ongoing work of making us more like Jesus. These two realities are connected but not the same, and understanding both is essential to grasping what salvation actually means for how we live day to day. Paul's imagery of baptism captures this beautifully — going under the water pictures death and burial with Christ, and rising up out of the water pictures resurrection into new life. As 2 Corinthians 5:17 reminds us, we are a new creation, not simply an updated version of our old selves. That means sin is no longer our rightful master. Our identity is no longer rooted in our old patterns and habits but in Jesus Christ. The pastor notes that this doesn't mean temptation disappears, but it does mean sin no longer has the final word. As the memory verse for the week puts it, "You must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus" (Romans 6:11). How we think about ourselves profoundly shapes how we live, and Paul calls us to align our thinking with what God has made true of us through Christ.

This episode of the Three C Podcast picks up where the weekend sermon left off, continuing through Romans chapters 3–5 with lead pastor Matt Sturdivant and the Hope Church pastoral team. The big idea from the sermon was clear: we are made right with God by grace through faith, not by works. Matt digs into Romans chapter 4, where Paul uses Abraham as the defining example of justification by faith. As Matt points out, Abraham believed God, "and it was counted to him as righteousness" (Romans 4:3), and this happened before circumcision, before the law — before any religious work. Salvation, Paul is arguing, has never been a paycheck. It's always been a gift. Matt then takes the team on a deeper theological journey, walking through the full arc of salvation — from conversion through sanctification to glorification — and connecting it to the Protestant Reformation. In honor of Reformation Day on October 31st, Matt explains how Martin Luther's challenge to the Roman Catholic Church centered on this very question: how can sinful people be made right with a holy God? The five solas — Scripture alone, faith alone, grace alone, Christ alone, and glory to God alone — emerged from that Reformation and speak directly to what Paul is teaching in Romans. The team also discusses the meaningful distinction between Protestant and Roman Catholic views of justification, and why that difference is anything but minor. The episode closes with a segment on faithful citizenship, where Matt introduces a helpful framework for thinking about political issues: straight-line issues, where Scripture speaks clearly and directly (such as the sanctity of life, marriage, and religious freedom), and jagged-line issues, where Biblical principles exist but wisdom and complexity are required to reach policy conclusions (such as immigration, healthcare, and economic policy). The team encourages listeners to vote, to know God's Word well enough to spot when it's being misused, and to hold Biblical commands with conviction while approaching wisdom-based judgments with humility.

Pastor Matt Sturdevant opens by returning to where last week's message left off — the courtroom of Romans 3, where every mouth is stopped and every person stands guilty before a holy God. But this week, the tone shifts with two of the most hopeful words in all of Scripture: "But now" (Romans 3:21). From there, Pastor Matt walks through seven truths about righteousness, showing that it is apart from legalism, built on Revelation, acquired by faith, available to all, freely given through grace, accomplished by redemption, and paid by an atoning sacrifice. At the heart of it all is what theologians call the Great Exchange — our sin imputed to Christ, and Christ's righteousness imputed to us — so that God can be simultaneously just and the justifier of those who believe. Moving into Romans 5, Pastor Matt unpacks the blessings that flow from justification: peace with God, the firm ground of grace on which believers stand, hope in God's glory, and even the surprising gift of suffering, which produces endurance, character, and a deeper hope through what he calls the "spiral of sanctification." He closes by making it personal with four responses — stop trying to prove yourself to God, live secure in what Jesus has done, believe that grace is greater than your sin, and let the gospel send you to others. In keeping with that final point, Pastor Matt announces that Hope Church is launching a second campus in the fall of 2028, with Luke Myers named as campus pastor, as a living expression of a church changed by the gospel and sent with the gospel.

Pastor Matt Sturdevant and the pastoral staff of Hope Church gather on the 3C Podcast to reflect on a weighty sermon covering Romans 1:18–3:20, where Paul builds an airtight case that no one — not the openly rebellious, not the moral person, not the religious person — escapes guilt before a holy God. The big idea is clear: everyone is guilty, and no one is beyond the need for grace. The team reflects honestly on what it feels like to sit under that kind of truth, with each pastor sharing how the weight of their own sin makes Jesus' grace all the more staggering. As Pastor Brian put it, looking back over a lifetime of God's patience and protection, "I know that without Jesus I would be a mess." The discussion then turns to Romans 2:4, a verse Pastor Matt didn't have time to unpack on Sunday. Paul's point is that God's kindness, forbearance, and patience toward sinners are not evidence that He approves of sin — they are an extraordinary invitation to repentance. God gives goodness that isn't deserved, withholds the judgment that is deserved, and waits with remarkable long-suffering. The right response, as Pastor Matt summarizes, is not presumption but repentance: "God's kindness isn't permission to continue to sin. It's an invitation to turn from it." The episode closes with part two of a five-part series on faithful citizenship, asking the pointed question: who is discipling your politics? Drawing on Romans 12:2 — "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind" — Pastor Matt challenges listeners to audit how much political content they consume compared to Scripture, and to honestly examine whether their political identity has begun to overshadow their identity in Christ. The bottom line is simple but convicting: disciples of Jesus cannot outsource their thinking to a political tribe, because God and His Word always get the final word.

Pastor Matt continues his series through the book of Romans by diving into Romans 1:18–3:20, where the apostle Paul holds up a mirror to all of humanity. The reflection isn't flattering. Before we can appreciate the cure, Pastor Matt reminds us, we have to understand the disease — and Paul's diagnosis is clear: everyone is guilty before God, and no one escapes the need for grace. Just as a doctor's treatment means nothing until you understand the illness, the good news of the gospel means nothing until you reckon honestly with the bad news. Pastor Matt traces Paul's argument through four movements. First, humanity rejects God's truth, suppressing what He has clearly revealed through creation, and exchanges the glory of the Creator for created things — which is the very definition of idolatry. Idols, Pastor Matt explains, aren't just primitive statues; they are anything we place in the position that belongs to God alone, whether that's money, comfort, approval, or relationships. Three times in Romans 1, Paul writes that "God gave them up," revealing that one form of God's present wrath is simply letting us have what we insist on. From there, Paul tightens the circle. Being moral doesn't make us innocent, because the standard isn't whether we're better than the person sitting next to us — it's the perfect righteousness of God, and compared to that standard, we all fall short. Being religious doesn't make us righteous either, because knowing God's truth is not the same thing as being transformed by it. By the time Paul reaches Romans 3:19, every mouth is stopped. There are no more excuses, no more comparisons, no more religious résumés. The verdict is guilty — and that means every single one of us desperately needs Jesus.

Pastor Matt Sturdevant opens the 3C Podcast with a deep dive into Romans 1:1-17, laying out four main truths from Paul's introduction: the gospel is from God, it's about Jesus, it's for everyone who believes, and it reveals the righteousness of God. The team reflects personally on three "why it matters" takeaways — understanding the real gospel, personally responding to it, and never being ashamed of it. Each pastor shares honestly about where they've struggled, from falling into performance-based faith, to fearing an "unpardonable sin," to staying quiet about Jesus when the crowd pushed back. Pastor Matt then goes deeper into what the Sunday sermon didn't have time to cover, walking through four distortions of the gospel — adding to it (Jesus plus something), removing from it (Jesus minus something essential), changing it (redefining Biblical categories altogether), and combining it with another worldview. From there, he identifies several counterfeit versions of Jesus that grow out of these distortions: the self-help guru Jesus, the political activist Jesus, the prosperity gospel Jesus, the patriotic Jesus, the warm and fuzzy non-confrontational Jesus, and the legalistic Jesus. The team is clear that the antidote to all of these is knowing the real gospel through consistent, personal Bible reading. To close out the episode, the team introduces a new five-week segment on faithful citizenship, with Pastor Matt framing the conversation around the truth that Jesus is King. He challenges listeners to avoid two dangerous extremes — political idolatry on one side and total political withdrawal on the other — and to instead land in the middle with faithful stewardship. Whatever the election results may bring, the mission of Jesus doesn't change, and neither does the One sitting on the throne.

Pastor Matt Sturdevant opens the church's new series through the book of Romans — the final leg of their "Bible in a J.A.R" journey through John, Acts, and Romans — with a clear and compelling introduction to the gospel. Drawing from Romans 1:1–17, he lays out the series' big idea: the gospel isn't simply about salvation; it's about total life transformation. Romans, he explains, is the "why" behind everything — the theological foundation that makes the Christian life make sense, covering everything from sin and grace to justification, sanctification, and the Holy Spirit. From Paul's opening verses, Pastor Matt identifies four defining truths about the gospel. First, the gospel is from God — it wasn't invented by the apostles, and it was never God's Plan B. From Genesis forward, Scripture tells a single unfolding story pointing toward Jesus. Second, the gospel is about Jesus — fully human, descended from David, and fully God, powerfully declared the Son of God through the resurrection. Third, it's for everyone who believes — crossing every human dividing line of culture, class, and background, though it does not teach universal salvation. And fourth, it reveals the righteousness of God — a righteousness that God doesn't merely meet, but defines, which creates the central problem Romans will spend its pages answering: how can unrighteous people ever be made right with a perfectly righteous God? Pastor Matt closes with three personal implications. He challenges the congregation to make sure they understand the real gospel rather than a counterfeit version built on self-effort or religious performance. He urges every person to personally respond to the gospel, because knowing facts about Jesus is not the same as trusting him. And finally, echoing Paul's own declaration in Romans 1:16, he calls believers to never be ashamed of the gospel — reminding them that the power to save people rests in the gospel itself, not in anyone's ability to present it perfectly.

Pastor Matt Sturdevant's sermon on the second half of Esther centers on a powerful big idea: faith is not certainty about the outcome, but confidence in God that enables obedience when the outcome is uncertain. Drawing from ten Biblical principles for navigating uncertainty, the pastoral team (Brian Cropp, Jake Myers, Luke Myers, and Jeremy Good) unpack what it looks like to face life's hard moments God's way rather than defaulting to our natural instincts. Those instincts, Matt points out, can be real but not reliable, shaped by fear, past wounds, personality, and the culture around us. A major thread running through the conversation is the contrast between what we naturally do when uncertainty hits: isolate, hide, worry, pretend, withdraw, and go it alone, and what God's people are called to do: connect, share, bear burdens together, pray, be honest, and walk alongside one another. The team gets refreshingly candid about their own go-to coping mechanisms, from ice cream and YouTube to distraction and procrastination, before landing on the truth that prayer should be our first response, not our last resort. As Martin Luther reportedly said, "I have so much to do that I must spend the first three hours of the day in prayer." The episode also walks through a practical spectrum of decision-making, from what the Bible clearly commands and forbids to a wide middle ground that requires genuine discernment, wisdom, and a close walk with God. The episode closes with a reminder that ultimate certainty isn't a guaranteed happy ending to every story — it's the unshakeable confidence that God wins in the end.

Picking up where last week left off, Pastor Matt Sturdevant continues this two-week series through the book of Esther by shifting the focus from what we believe to how we actually live. The central question he puts before the congregation is this: how do I practically live today in light of God's sovereignty? Using Esther 4:13-16 as his anchor text, Pastor Matt defines faith not as certainty about an outcome, but as confidence in God that enables obedience when the outcome is uncertain — a definition beautifully illustrated by Esther's own words, "If I perish, I perish." From there, Pastor Matt walks through ten practical, Biblical principles for navigating uncertainty. After briefly reviewing the first three from last week — accepting what we cannot control, trusting God even when we can't see what He's doing, and believing God can use us where we are — he unpacks seven more. These include not facing uncertainty alone, praying before panicking, refusing to let fear make our decisions, obeying what God has already made clear, acting wisely rather than recklessly, trusting God with what happens after we obey, and remembering that in the end, God wins. Each principle is grounded in the story of Esther and reinforced with Scripture, drawing from passages like Philippians 4:6-7, John 14:15, Matthew 10:16, and Romans 8:35-37. Pastor Matt closes with a powerful reminder that Esther's story of deliverance ultimately points to the greater deliverance found in Jesus Christ. While not every believer receives an "Esther chapter nine" ending to their struggles in this life, Christians can walk with confidence because the resurrection of Jesus means that sin, suffering, and death do not get the final word. As Hebrews 4:16 reminds us, we can draw near to the throne of grace with confidence — not because we have all the answers, but because we know the One who does.

Pastor Matt Sturdevant and the pastoral staff of Hope Church continue their two-week series through the Book of Esther, using the Three C Podcast to go deeper than Sunday morning allowed. The big idea of the series is this: certainty is not knowing what will happen next — it is knowing who you can trust when you don't know what's coming. The team unpacks three anchoring truths: God is in control even when we are not, God is working even when we cannot see it, and God has a purpose even when we do not understand it. They also offer a crucial warning — the message of Esther is not that trusting God guarantees the outcome we want. The answer to an uncertain world is not a principle; it's a person — Jesus Christ. The podcast then goes several layers deeper into the historical and Biblical context of the story. Pastor Matt draws a fascinating line connecting Haman the Agagite back to Agag, the Amalekite king whom King Saul failed to destroy in 1 Sam. 15, and traces Mordecai's lineage back to the house of Kish in the tribe of Benjamin — the same lineage as Saul himself. This means the conflict between Mordecai and Haman is, in many ways, a generational rematch of Saul versus Agag. Even further, Haman's plot to annihilate every Jew across all 127 provinces is not merely a political threat — it is an assault on God's covenant promise to Abraham in Gen. 12 and Gen. 22, and ultimately an attempt to destroy the messianic line before the Messiah could come. The team then moves into application, wrestling with the tension between trusting God and falling into passivity. Using a framework of opportunity, obedience, and outcome, they make clear that God provides the opportunities and governs the outcomes, while human responsibility lives in the middle — faithful obedience. They walk through a sweeping list of things we can influence but cannot control: other people's decisions, our children's faith, our health, our reputations, and the growth of the church. The takeaway is both humbling and freeing — we are responsible for our response and our faithfulness, and we can trust God with everything else.

Pastor Matt Sturdevant opens a two-week series called Finding Certainty in an Uncertain World by asking a simple but piercing question: what are you uncertain about right now? Whether it's your job, your marriage, your health, your kids, or the economy, Pastor Matt establishes that uncertainty isn't an unusual season of life — it's simply part of life in a broken world. Beneath that uncertainty, he identifies another struggle: our deep desire to be in control. Yet as he points out, there are things we can influence that we simply cannot control, and one of life's most unsettling discoveries is just how little control we actually have. To wrestle with this, Pastor Matt takes the congregation into the Book of Esther — a real account of a young Jewish orphan who found herself living in a world of uncertainty about 2500 years ago. One of the most striking features of Esther is that God's name is never mentioned once in the entire book, yet His fingerprints are everywhere. From this, Pastor Matt draws three certainties: God is in control even when we are not, God is working even when we cannot see it, and God has a purpose even when we do not understand it. As Proverbs 19:21 reminds us, "Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand." The sermon builds toward its most important point: the answer to an uncertain world is not a principle — it's a person. Our deepest problem isn't uncertainty; it's sin. But Romans 5:8 declares, "God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." The cross proves God's love, and the resurrection proves Jesus can save. Because of this, Pastor Matt redefines certainty not as knowing what will happen next, but as knowing who you can trust when you don't — and that trust is grounded in Jesus Christ.