Christ City Church, Washington DC

Pastor Justin shows how in John 20 the resurrection of Jesus meets people in their real lives—grief, fear, and doubt—bringing new life by calling them by name, offering peace, and inviting honest faith. This same resurrecting love is at work today, breathing life into us and sending us out to embody hope, healing, and love in a broken world.

Pastor Matthew Watson teaches on Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem as both a humble protest against oppression and a proclamation of God’s saving Kingdom, where power is redefined through love, justice, and healing. Through cleansing the temple and welcoming the marginalized, Jesus calls us to embody a faith that resists exploitation, centers restoration, and trusts God enough to both act and rest.

In this closing message on the book of James, Pastor Justin explores what it means to have a faith that endures — one that sees injustice clearly, stays active in waiting, and keeps showing up even when the road is long.

Guest speaker Rev. Dr. Eun K Strawser teaches on the Hebrew word for wisdom, "chokmah," used in the book of James, and how it can sometimes seem like a bad idea to the world, but it is that very wisdom that cultivates more brilliant beauty, stronger faith, and deeper relationships, bringing God's kingdom closer to Earth.

Pastor Lisa Rodriguez-Watson continues our series in James, reminding us of the importance of words, and the importance of wisdom. While the world around us is starting fires, we are invited to plant fields.

Pastor Watson continues our "Enduring Faith" series with a message on James 2, where we are warned against showing favoritism to the wealthy and powerful over the poor and marginalized, and we are reminded of God's mercy and grace when we fall short.

In this opening message of Enduring Faith, Pastor Andrea reflects on the gap between knowing and doing, inviting us into a faith that is practiced, embodied, and formed through real-life pressures. Rooted in the book of James, she calls our community toward endurance that leads to wholeness—an integrated life where belief, integrity, and action align in steady, courageous trust.

In this closing message of our series We Will Be…, Pastor Justin invites us to rediscover our truest identity as beloved children of God—already claimed in love, yet still becoming.

Guest preacher Rev. Mia M. McClain (Riverside Baptist Church) continues our series on who we are becoming, and reminds us that despite trial and tribulation, chaos and calamity, God is inviting us to dream impossible dreams.

When the countless voices, demands, stresses, busyness, and suffering in the world pull us apart, Pastor Lisa Rodriguez Watson talks to us about God's invitation to wholeheartedness and wholehearted living.

As we gathered online due to the inclement weather, Pastor Andrea preached on what it means to be sustained by God in every season, especially the hard ones.

In week three of our series "We Will Be," guest speaker Kat Armas pulls from her latest book, "Liturgies for Resisting Empire," and reminds us that liberation is not just about freedom from the empires around us, but also freedom from the empires within.

Although fear seems to be the defining force of our time, God’s most frequent command to us is "Do not fear." Through the story of Gideon, we can see that God meets us in our fear, and we are invited to be courageous in the knowledge to God is with us.

Pastor Justin starts off our new series, "We Will Be." What kind of people do we want to become in 2026? And who does God say we already are? 

Christmas doesn’t arrive in a vacuum. In this Christmas Day homily, Pastor Justin Fung names what is true: both the weariness many of us are carrying and the deeper truth the Church proclaims at Christmas—that the light has come. He explores what it means to say "Emmanuel, God with us" in a world that is still marked by grief, injustice, and exhaustion. Christmas is not about pretending everything is fine; it is about God choosing to enter human life as it actually is—fragile, complicated, unfinished—and to remain with us there. This message is for those arriving at Christmas in all kinds of ways: joyful, grieving, tired, uncertain, or somewhere in between. Wherever you find yourself today, you are welcome here.

In the fourth week of Advent, Pastor Matthew Watson reflects on the theme of love, naming Jesus’ birth as God’s light breaking into a weary world’s long night, inviting us to receive God’s love and to "punch holes in the darkness" through love.

Advent joy invites you to participate in what God is already doing in setting things right: The desert will bloom. The wilderness will sing. The speechless will find words. The ransomed will return with everlasting joy.

In this second week of the Advent season, Pastor Watson shows us that God's peace is not the absence of conflict, but the presence of wholeness—shalom—breaking into the chaos. It is the presence of God's Spirit that enables us to have peace in the midst of life storms and chaos. It is the presence of God’s Spirit in you that brings the Shalom we are aching for.

In this first Sunday of our Advent series, Pastor Andrea invites us to name our darkness while still daring to await the promised light of Jesus, whose arrival brings hope into places of fear, injustice, and exhaustion. True hope is not passive optimism but a courageous, active refusal to let darkness have the last word, trusting that God is already at work and that the dawn is breaking in.

Acts 28 shows that God meets us in the in-between places, where vulnerability opens us to receive and share the Spirit’s surprising kindness, healing, and love. Even in constraints and uncertainty, like Paul under house arrest, the Spirit remains unhindered—forming us, sending us, and working through ordinary acts of welcome, courage, and faithfulness.