Legend Community Church

In the opening sermon of Between Two Trees, Justin introduces Revelation 21–22 not as a coded roadmap for escaping the world, but as a vision of where God is taking it.

From the Tree of Life in Genesis to the Tree of Life in the New Jerusalem, Scripture tells a story of God making all things new: death defeated, tears wiped away, nations healed, gates thrown open, and God dwelling with humanity. If that is where the story is headed, Revelation asks a much more important question than When will the end come?:

How should that future change the way we live right now?

Justin explores how Christians can begin pulling that promised future into the present through healing, reconciliation, generosity, Sabbath, care for creation, hospitality, and a way of life that refuses the fear, greed, and power of “Babylon.”

What if the deepest truth about you isn’t that you’re a sinner who somehow convinced God to forgive you, but that you are deeply and eternally loved?

As we conclude our six-week journey through Jesus’ prayer in John 17, Jason looks at Jesus’ final request for his followers: “that the love you have for me may be in them.” Before the cross, before empire, before sin and death, even before creation itself, there was love between the Father and the Son. And Jesus prays that we would be brought into that love.

What changes when we actually believe that? What kind of people could we become if we no longer had to protect ourselves, earn our worth, defeat our enemies, or live afraid of losing? And what kind of church could be built around the conviction that God loves us, our neighbors, and even those unlike us with a love older than creation itself?

In the final week of our series on John 17, we explore Jesus’ audacious prayer, the love that carried him toward the cross, and what might happen when that same love becomes the foundation beneath everything we do.

What does Christian unity actually look like?

In John 17, Jesus doesn’t simply pray that his followers will agree or get along. He prays that they will become one in a way that allows the world to see God through them.

In this sermon, Justin explores the difference between a community built around people who already think, vote, live, and believe alike, and the much more interesting community Jesus imagines: people with different stories, backgrounds, convictions, and experiences who choose to share a table, serve one another, forgive each other, and refuse to walk away.

In a world that is remarkably good at uniting people around common enemies, Jesus invites us to become a people united around a common Savior. Through ordinary acts of hospitality, reconciliation, generosity, and love, the church can become the answer to Jesus’ prayer: a community where people encounter us and catch a glimpse of God.

In John 17, Jesus prays, “As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.” But where exactly have we been sent—and what are we supposed to do when we get there?

In this sermon, Jason explores the church’s calling to make Jesus visible through truthful witness, self-giving love, costly presence, and stubborn hope. In a world that constantly demands our attention, outrage, and anxiety, Jesus offers us freedom: we do not have to repair everything, respond to everything, or control every outcome. Instead, we can become faithfully present to the people and places God has entrusted to us—and live as if the resurrection is true.

In week three of our John 17 series, we explore one of Jesus' most misunderstood prayers. As He prepares for the cross, Jesus doesn't ask the Father to remove His followers from the world. Instead, He prays that they would be sanctified—set apart to live differently within it.

Too often, Christians have defined holiness as rule-keeping or escaping culture. But Jesus paints a different picture. His followers are called to reject the world's systems of fear, power, greed, and self-interest, and instead become a community marked by love, truth, generosity, and sacrificial service.

What if holiness isn't about earning God's love, but becoming the kind of people through whom God renews the world?

Join us as we discover why Jesus' prayer is not about withdrawal from culture, but faithful presence within it—and how the Church can become a living witness to a different way of being human.

As Jesus prays His final prayer before the cross, He gives a surprising definition of eternal life: "That they know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent."

In this second message from our John 17 series, we explore what it means to build our lives on knowing God rather than on control, success, politics, security, or fear. Standing inside New York's magnificent St. Patrick's Cathedral raises a larger question: What gives the Church its life? Is it beautiful buildings, cultural influence, or something deeper?

Jesus' answer is both comforting and challenging. The future of the Church has never rested in our hands—it has always rested in the Father's. Our invitation is not to manage God's Kingdom but to trust Him, know Him, and become a community shaped by His love.

If you've ever wrestled with anxiety about the future, disappointment with the Church, or wondered what "eternal life" really means, this message is for you.

What did Jesus pray about in the final moments before His arrest?

Before the cross, before the betrayal, before Gethsemane, Jesus pauses to pray.

In this opening message of our John 17 series, we begin exploring what is often called Jesus' High Priestly Prayer—the longest recorded prayer of Jesus in Scripture. As Jesus prepares to lay down His life, He reveals what matters most.

Justin explores one of the most misunderstood words in the Bible: glory. Rather than power, fame, or victory, biblical glory carries the idea of weight, significance, and the tangible presence of God. From creation, to the tabernacle, to the temple, to Jesus Himself, Scripture traces God's glory moving toward humanity—and then makes the astonishing claim that this same glory is given to Christ's followers.

What would it look like if Christians became people whose lives carried that kind of weight? What if the church wasn't known for winning arguments, but for embodying the presence of Jesus wherever it went?

This message launches a six-week journey through John 17, inviting us to discover Jesus' deepest desires for Himself, His disciples, and for the Church today.

What stories are shaping the way you see the world?

We’re all being trained by something—politics, social media, consumerism, fear, success, nationalism, anxiety. The question isn’t whether we live by stories. The question is: which stories are shaping us?

As we close our series on the parables of Jesus, we look at a story meant to trap Jesus—and his response to people who knew the Scriptures but had forgotten the power of God.

The parables invite us into a world stranger, wider, and more beautiful than the one fear and scarcity tell us is possible. They retrain our imagination for the Kingdom of God: a story of resurrection instead of death, abundance instead of scarcity, hope instead of anxiety, and a God whose mercy is wider and whose power is greater than we dared to believe.

What kingdom is training you—and what story are you telling with your life?

 

What do we do when the world is not the way it’s supposed to be?

We all recognize injustice when we see it. We want wrongs made right, the innocent vindicated, and someone held responsible. But what happens when our systems fail? What happens when nothing can undo the harm that has already been done?

In this week’s message from our Parables of Jesus series, Eric looks at the story of the persistent widow and the unjust judge—and at Jesus’ strange instruction for living in an unjust world: pray, and do not lose heart.

Not because prayer is a substitute for pursuing justice. Not because suffering doesn’t matter. But because the God we cry out to is not a distant, indifferent judge.

The heart of Christianity is that our suffering is not forever—and it is not suffered alone. Jesus has entered into injustice, suffering, and even death itself. And when the world hurts us, we are invited to come to God like children running to a parent: trusting that we are heard, that God is present, and that injustice will not have the final word.

🎧 Parables of Jesus: The Persistent Widow and the Unjust Judge

The parables of Jesus aren't tidy little stories with easy answers. In this message, Justin explores how Jesus used surprising and sometimes unsettling stories to provoke questions, challenge assumptions, and invite his listeners into a deeper understanding of God's kingdom and the transforming way of Jesus.