Mosaic - Erwin McManus

The New: Erwin Raphael McManus

This compelling message from Lead Pastor Erwin McManus reveals to us the price we must pay to live a life of greatness. Beyond our big dreams, do we have what it takes to live a life of greatness in the small details of our lives? Pastor Erwin gives us a roadmap to becoming someone that God can trust with a revolutionary dream.    In Genesis chapter 50, we learn about the life of Joseph. When he was young he was given a big dream to rule over his brothers, but the dream filled him with arrogance and pride. Over the next decade of his life, he grew in character and wisdom as he went through incredible trials including imprisonment and slavery.  Through his life journey, Joseph chose to pursue a path of integrity. He determined within himself to serve the vision of those that surrounded him. Pastor Erwin emphasizes that the mark of true greatness is making others great around us. Joseph was eventually entrusted with delivering Egypt from a great famine and was given great honor as a leader.    If you’ve wondered how to accomplish your dreams and live a life of greatness, this message will remind you that greatness is always found in our capacity to impact those around us for good.

This week, Lead Pastor Erwin McManus compels us to lean into joy in a new way. Often when we are facing challenging times, joy is the last thing on our mind. But in this encouraging message from our ‘Best Of’ series, Pastor Erwin shares that God’s way of strengthening us when we’re struggling is through the power of celebration. Teaching out of James chapter 1, Pastor Erwin highlights Jesus’ words which instruct us to rejoice when we face difficulties of all kinds. Why? Joy creates the character we need for the future God wants to create through us! Though challenges feel frustrating in the moment, we’re reminded that God is building us beautifully from the inside out. That is worth celebrating!  Pastor Erwin asks us how often we question why God’s promises haven’t come true in our lives. He proposes that it may be God that is asking us why we haven’t overcome our doubts when God has continually shown himself to be faithful.  If you have been facing a difficult season and are wondering where God is, this message will encourage you that God is strengthening you with his joy in the middle of the challenge!

In this inspiring message, Lead Pastor Erwin McManus challenges us to see our capacity with new eyes. Many of us struggle with feeling as though we’ve been shortchanged with the set of talents we’ve been given and it may seem as though we don’t have what it takes to create the life we desire. But Pastor Erwin proposes a different perspective. Is it possible that what we have in our hands is exactly what God wants to use to expand our capacity?   In Matthew chapter 15, Jesus and his disciples are surrounded by thousands of hungry people with no way to feed them. After the disciples suggest that the crowd should be turned away, Jesus instead invites the disciples into a moment where their capacity is expanded and their perspective shifts. Jesus asks the disciples to gather the food the crowd does have, and after Jesus prays, the disciples are left with more than enough provision to feed the entire crowd.   In this story, Jesus clearly showed the disciples that they had all of the resources they needed. Pastor Erwin challenges us by asking how often we push away the resources that God wants to use in our lives because we don’t believe they’re enough. Pastor Erwin encourages us to expand our capacity by utilizing the gifts we do have in partnership with Jesus. When we give God what is in our hands, it always turns out to be enough.  If you have been focusing on what you lack instead of the abundance you have been given, this message will encourage you to see that what you have in your hands is always enough for God!

In this week’s message, Lead Pastor Erwin McManus helps us to move away from the idea that success is a bad word. As those who follow Jesus, we have the responsibility to maximize the gifts that God has given us. Growing up, we may have been taught that it was selfish to desire success. Contrary to this idea, Pastor Erwin invites us to discover what the scriptures say about success.    From Ecclesiastes 10:10, Pastor Erwin points out that the scriptures speak clearly about how sharp skill can bring success. But a skill is only sharpened when it is developed. Pastor Erwin encourages us that it is essential to do the hard work to get better at our skills. This requires the courage to fail and continue to improve over time.   Pastor Erwin shares that he previously led worship at Mosaic before eventually realizing that what he was gifted in was communication and that this was where God was asking him to develop his skillset. In the same way, he invites us to explore where we have a natural talent and to do the hard work to develop this skill instead of exhausting ourselves where we do not have natural talent. This sharpening of our edge will then be an open door of opportunity for others as we build something that matters.   If you are wondering what you should be spending your energy on, this message will guide you toward developing the God-given talent he has entrusted to you.

Mosaic Lead Pastor Erwin McManus delivers a message that helps us see the season of Christmas with a new sense of clarity. Out of Isaiah chapter 9, he shares that God did not send Jesus to satisfy his own ego and his needs. Every intention God had for sending his son Jesus to die on a cross was a gift for us! Pastor Erwin shares that in the holiday season, many of us receive gifts that we either don’t like or didn’t know that we needed. And Jesus is the latter - the gift humanity desperately needed, but just didn’t know it yet. Later in Isaiah chapter 9, it refers to the promised messiah as an, “everlasting father.” Pastor Erwin points out that many of us struggle to identify with God as a father because our culture can place a low value on fathers  due to collective bad experiences. But Pastor Erwin encourages us that until we run to God as our father for our sense of identity, we will continue to run back to dysfunctional ‘fixes.’ Thought we long for quick fixes in our lives, Pastor Erwin shares that God is not interested in short-term solutions that lead to long-term dysfunction. The everlasting father is looking at our lives from an eternal perspective. What may seem like a tragedy in the moment to us is simply a small part of a greater story God is working together. If you have been looking for a way to activate God’s gift of Jesus in your life in a tangible way during this Christmas season, this message is for you!

In this week’s insightful new message from Ecclesiastes, Lead Pastor Erwin McManus teaches us the power of choosing others instead of simply living for ourselves. The passage focuses on the life of Solomon, who found that at the end of his time on Earth, the one thing more precious than wisdom or gold was relationship.  Pastor Erwin shares that those who fail are not those who fall down, but those who fall down without having anyone there to pick them up because they never took the time to invest into building those relationships beforehand. We move forward by moving together as a community.  Solomon is a reminder in the scriptures that we can have everything and still have nothing when we live a life of isolation. Pastor Erwin encourages us to be a people who choose to stick with the people God has placed in our lives.  He reminds us as the church, that we were meant to walk through the battles of life together. If you are someone who is waiting for community to come to you, this message will encourage you to instead seek out community!

What are we so afraid of? In this reflective conversation, Mosaic Lead Pastor Erwin McManus helps us unpack how fear impacts our lives and can paralyze us from stepping into the future we long for.  He encourages us to look at fear differently. What if our fear is not situational but simply a reality we have allowed to rule us from the inside-out? What if the things we are most afraid of are simply the objects we project our innermost fears onto? What if living courageously was a choice? In Joshua chapter 1, God commanded Joshua and his people to be strong and courageous. This means choosing courage is not simply a suggestion God gives us, but a command. And though many of us have created lives that are tailor-made around our fears, Pastor Erwin proposes that the life God has for us will force us to walk into the center of our fears. When Jesus died on the cross, he declared to humanity that even death was not something to be feared. When we are aware of how deeply loved we are by God, we experience a boldness that sends us into our deepest fears with a heart full of courage. As we look to the example of Jesus, we are compelled to choose a life filled to the brim with courage and strength.

Can beauty save the world? In this conclusion to ‘The Genius of Jesus’ series, Mosaic Lead Pastor Erwin McManus leads us to discover how the beauty of God is reflected in everything he creates. From the beauty of nature to the intricate textures of different foods, we see that God did not create with a singularly utilitarian perspective. God wove beauty in as an essential part of creation. Though some may struggle with the thought that a good God exists in a world full of tragedy, we see in Ecclesiastes 3 that God makes everything beautiful in its time. The human story is this: God was the author of beauty, and we introduced tragedy into the human story. When we give God permission to enter into our story, we give him the ability to create something beautiful out of our lives - even our most broken pieces. God wants to give us a taste for what is truly beautiful. And this is a life that is fully surrendered to the genius of God’s beauty. At the intersection of humanity’s greatest tragedy and God’s undeniable beauty, the cross became the ultimate expression of the genius of Jesus. Don’t miss this impactful and resonant message that will lead you into the genius that only Jesus can offer – the genius of being fully human again.

In week four of our The Genius of Jesus series, Mosaic Lead Pastor Erwin McManus answers the question of what real truth looks like, and how to find it in your life. Pastor Erwin explains that truth is essential for living a life that is trustworthy. He shares that many of us have been confronted by someone who risked their relationship with us to tell us a hard truth. And though truth can be difficult to hear, he candidly shares that he hopes to never be someone that God thinks cannot handle the truth. In a conversation between Jesus and Pontius Pilate in Matthew 27, Pilate asks Jesus "What is truth?" Jesus had shared with Pilate that his purpose in coming to the earth was to testify to the truth. In that moment, the essence of truth was looking right at Pilate; truth is not simply based on information, but on one person who is the source of all truth. That person is Jesus. Don’t miss this incredible installment in The Genius of Jesus series!