Generations Community Church

Think about your digital life for a moment. What do you actually OWN anymore? Microsoft Office? Music? Movies? Your social media accounts? WRONG! In all of those spaces (and more), you're just a digital sharecropper. Americans have become more like the coal miners and sharecroppers we read about it history - not really owning much of anything and trapped in cycles of debt. God never wanted His people to be trapped in cycles of debt - and God has a lot to say about it. In this message, Max Vanderpool offers practical advice for handling debt.

Because wages have not kept up with the price of housing or healthcare or tuition or groceries or electricity, you and I cannot afford to simply “wing it" when it comes to our finances - when it comes to the money that enters and exits our checking account each month. Winging it leads to these moments at home: (1) "Where did all the money in the checkbook go? I need to pay for Maddie’s field trip." and (2) "Wait. When did we subscribe to Hulu? Did you know anything about this?" Jesus commends someone in the New Testament - for having a PLAN. And it's the SAME reason Joseph is promoted to vice-pharaoh in the Old Testament. As it turns out, having a PLAN is one way we mimick our Heavenly Father.

Since, 2019, groceries prices are up 30.8%, housing prices are UP 60%, healthcare costs are UP 60%, and child-care costs are UP 32%. Want to guess how much wages are up? That's right - ONLY 23%. For the average American, wages simply haven't kept pace with the bigger ticket items in life - and that presents a problems. It's why many young people feel a sense of despair - that they will NEVER get ahead. Ladies & gentlemen, what we have here is an AFFORDABILITY CRISIS! Ironically, God has a LOT to say about money and finances - and God is bothered when the rich and powerful play by a different set of rules or when they systematically oppress the poor, so that they can become richer and more powerful. In this message, Max Vanderpool explains that the rich rule over the poor - it's true - but that doesn't mean God's happy about it.

America has an affordability crisis...in housing, with healthcare, with college tuition, and with child-care. It's just not possible for many families to have the SAME purchasing power as families did a generation ago. And yet, there IS one category that's become more affordable. And that's all the cheap stuff from China. It's filling our dressers, clogging our closets, and filling our cabinets and garages. So what's a person to do? In this message, Max Vanderpool tackles the boats from China - and how you can I can become more free.

Can you learn to love Christians who are NOT like you? That's the questin put to Ananias when God told him to go lay hands on Paul of Tarsus, so that Paul could regain his sight. That's the question put to Peter when he had that vision of a sheet filled with unclean animals. Will you enter the home of Cornelius (a Gentile AND the captain of the Italian reigment), break bread with him, and BAPTIZE him when you see that he is filled with the Holy Spirit? The call to the American church today is, in part, a call to love each other in such a way that the rest of the country asks, "How in the world can these people love each other like that?"

Smartphones. It seems like they're always in our hands - and always making it hard to be fully present with our friends and family. And maybe that's why prayer is hard for us. How do you spend time with an invisible being that you can't see with your eyes? In this message, Max Vanderpool makes a case for why there is another kind of prayer - one where you aren't talking and God's not talking - and that's okay.

In life, you either have authority or you don't. And if you need to tell people that you're in charge, you probably don't have the authority you think you do. And no matter how old you get, you NEVER outgrow authority or authority structures. (The IRS can make you pay taxes, and the Kentucky State Police can make you stay under the speed limit - or, watch out!) In this message, Max Vanderpool makes a case for why ALL authority is God's authority - and that, because God speaks through the Bible, we should listen (and obey).

Be nice. Play nice. Yeah - we've all been told that. And being nice typically means speaking softly, deferring to others, and smiling (even when you're sad or angry). Most of all, being nice means avoiding conflict - don't debate or argue - just get along and go along. But what if Jesus was, in fact, NOT a nice man? And what if it's NOT in God’s character to “be nice” (certainly in ways WE think of the term)? What then? What if walking in the way of Jesus means standing up and speaking out? After all, nice guys aren't crucified.

The Choluteca Bridge stands as a testament to how things can change. Originally built in 1935 and completely rebuilt in 1996 - the Choluteca Bridge no longer spans the Choluteca River. Why is that? Because in 1998, Hurricane Mitch dumped 75 INCHES of rain - and all that water CHANGED the course of the river. The American church faces a similar situation. All our programming and efforts from the 1950s to the 1990s was designed for a river that has MOVED (and that river is American culture). The good news? Jesus is already at work. In fact, he never stopped working in the lives of Americans to redeem and restore humanity - one human being at a time. Are you ready to join Jesus on his mission?

All of us will attend (at one point or another) the “school of hard knocks.” What is the school of hard knocks, you ask? It's the twists & turns of life – the hardship, adversity, difficulty, loss, tragedy, and suffering that life sometimes throws AT us. And here's the thing: winning and achievement do not teach you what kind of human being you should be. Being the most beautiful girl in town or being the boy who can throw a ball the farthest do not teach you what kind of human being you should be. But hardship can. And God often uses the "school of hard knocks" to help transform us into the kind of human being that we see in Jesus. It's the second mark of a disciple - following Jesus means we are being CHANGED by Jesus.

One of the more fascinating things about God - the transdimensional being who made all of created reality, like our entire universe - is that he doesn't force a relationship with the people he made in his image. God doesn't MAKE anyone "walk in the way of Jesus." Instead, God invites. And our response to that invitation is the first mark of a disciple - someone who is (actively) following Jesus. Disiples follow. Jesus leads. But it's not a "one-and-done" thing - it's really a string of decisions woven throughout your entire life - decisions about what to leave behind and what to pick up.

God is actively involved in our lives, and God speaks to us through our desires. It's NOT our fleeting wants - things like that "doo-hickey" we see at Sam's Club and think to ourselves, “Oh, I want that.” But it's the deep, core desires of our heart. In this message, Max Vanderpool makes a case for why our truest desires reflect God’s desires in us and for us - and that God speaks to us through our deepest longings.

If you live with other people, there's always ONE job no one wants to do. Maybe it's cleaning the bathrooms or folding laundry or picking up dog poop. But there's always SOMETHING everyone avoids. Not so with Jesus. There was a job to do - and he did it. In fact, he didn't even blink an eye. It didn't faze him one bit. One of the more profound ways we can live like Jesus is by NOTICING the needs around us. It will require a little humility and service - but it's one big way we LIVE LIKE JESUS.

We have different "windows" of our life. There's the window that we see and know - and that others see and know. We post about it on social media. It's "us" (our love for Star Wars, etc.). And then there's the window that only our spouse or children see - but no one else does. To others, it's hidden (or secret). There's also a window of our lives that others see with clarity - but we don't recognize. Our husband or wife, our parents, our closest friends or co-workers KNOW this about us - but we're oblivious. These things are our blind-spots - and God puts people into our lives to speak to us about our blind-spots.

God parted the Red Sea. Jesus fed the 5,000. Big stuff. Big miracles. Clear and unmistakable. But even though God can and does do "big stuff" from time to time, he actually PREFERS to come to us in disguise - in a way we don't immediately recognize. You could almost say that there is something delightfully playful about God and the way he speaks to us. It's wry. It's coy. And it means we need to be patient with ourselves (and our ability to hear and discern his voice). In this message, Max Vanderpool returns to Luke 24 with an admonition on how we can better position ourselves to recognize the God who often comes to us "disguised as our life."

Pharisees. Got to love 'em, right? They were absolutely CONVINCED that they had God all figured out. They just knew exactly what God loved and what God hated, what God would (or wouldn't) do in a particular set of circumstances, and what everyone else should and shouldn't do. But when God in the flesh (Jesus) shows up on the scene - the Pharisees aren't congratulated. They're challenged. How could they get so many important things wrong? In this message, Max Vanderpool unpacks how to hear God's voice - where it's the clearest - and why Americans are the new Pharisees (regardless of whether or not they're religious).

God is a God who initaties. He makes the first move. He takes the first step. And that's really, really good news, considering the mess we've made of relationships and the world He made. May's virtue focus at Generations is INITIATIVE: seeing what needs to be done and doing it. And when we take initiative, we're reflecting God's nature and character to the world around us.

When we Americans hear the word PROPHET, we tend to think of a fortune teller or someone who can predict the future. But predicting the future is only a SMALL part of what prophecy is in both the Old and New Testaments. Much of what prophets did, particularly in the Old Testament, is speak on God's behalf to remind God's people of the covenant (and the promises) they made with God. Some people want to believe that prophecy died out in the first century of the church. Since we have the Bible, they say, we have all we need. But is that what Scripture says? In this message, Max Vanderpool makes a case for why Biblical prophecy is alive and well today (in 2025) and ways you can discern a word given to you or for you.

Have you ever felt like God was speaking to you? Saying something? Prompting you to do or NOT do something? How did you KNOW it was God? All of us are born with a natural capacity to hear God's voice - but learning to distinguish God's voice from our own - or from other voices in our head is also a SKILL we learn to develop over time. Why? Because learning to hear God's voice is the most important thing you'll ever learn to do. Period. Full stop.

You fall in love. You're captivated. You date, court, propose, and marry. You're IN love. Everything is passionate and real and authentic and natural. But over time, things change. Life happens. And some married people find that their love hasn't been sustained, hasn't deepened. Instead of being in love with their spouse, they're indifference - or worse, find that they've grown to resent or hate them. What's TRUE of married couples is TRUE of all of us when it comes to our relationship with God. Over time, we can become INDIFFERENT, bored, fatigued, and distracted. That's not only a problem, but it's a sin. In this message, Max Vanderpool outlines the greatest threat to the American church and to the average American's "walk" with Jesus. And it isn't lust, greed, or pride. It's ACEDIA.