Saddleback Church Weekend Messages

This past weekend marked a season of celebration, calling, and renewal. We looked back with gratitude at all God did through The Return Gathering and heard stories of salvation and life change. Pastor Andy reminded us what we experienced at The Return Gathering was not just a moment, but a movement. Through the story of John the Baptist, we saw how preparation always precedes what God wants to do next. God has each of us in a season of preparation. Every season prepares us for something. The question is not whether we are preparing, but how we will respond. We can ignore it, reject it, or embrace it. This is a season of preparation. Join us as we prepare our hearts, homes, church, and community ready for what God has in store for us.

From the Garden of Eden until now, Scripture tells one story: God’s constant desire to dwell with His people. This past weekend, guest speaker Luke LeFevre called us to be a generation that seeks the face and glory of God. Throughout the Bible we see God pursuing nearness, from the Tabernacle to Jesus to the Church today. We also see how God raised up and walked with people like David, who sought God’s glory and nearness in their lives. But what is God’s glory and how do we experience it? God’s glory is His presence among His people, and Luke asked a piercing question: Are we content to live without His presence? Like David, who longed to dwell in the house of the Lord, we are invited to seek God above all else. As we look ahead to The Return Gathering and what God has next, may we be a church that longs for His glory and seeks His face.

Over the past five weeks, Pastor Andy and Stacy shared what it means to get Back on Track with God’s design for our faith, health, finances, relationships, and work. But how do we stay on track when life gets tough? This past weekend, Pastor Andy shared the answer: community. Pastor Andy reminded us that God has given us three powerful gifts to live out his purpose for our lives: his Word, his Spirit, and his Church. We were never meant to follow Jesus in isolation. God created us to live in community, where walking alongside others helps us go further than we ever could on our own. When we look at the early church in the book of Acts, we see how community fueled deep devotion and a growing closeness to God that no one experienced alone. Don’t walk alone. Take your next step into community by joining a small group today at saddleback.com/groups.

God’s original design for work was never meant to feel like a burden or simply a way to survive. From the very beginning, before sin entered the world, God created work as something good and meaningful, inviting his people to join him in shaping, cultivating, and caring for his creation. Yet for many of us today, work can feel complicated, misaligned, or even painful. In this message, Pastor Andy returns to Genesis to rediscover God’s original, divine design for work and to remind us that the struggle we feel does not mean we missed our calling. Instead, we are invited to receive work as a gift, not an identity. This message challenges us to stop working for pleasure, profit, or pride, and to see our work as an act of worship, offering our best to God and learning how to experience peace, purpose, and freedom in whatever work is in our hands.