Sermon Archive

Grace!!

Why stay poor? Why live in poverty? Why be empty or hopeless or broken? Why live with guilt or are faithless? This is God’s plea to you and me. It is God’s invitation to those who are indifferent to Him, or apathetic, or who have rejected His right ways. “Come!!” Martin Luther offering a commentary on this says, “As I have said, it is difficult to break a habit, and therefore we must cling to the Word, since this teaching is not like any other. In the doctrine we must constantly remain pupils, because practice and custom are always fighting against us. For that reason we must incline our ears. Come, as if to say, ‘You are always looking, listening, and going elsewhere. But I say to you, unless you incline and come in this direction, you will die of starvation.’” (AE 17:252)

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Just Thistles While You Work

Thorns and thistles come in various forms. The weeds in the parable are probably one of the easiest forms to recognize. One doesn’t have to be a farmer to understand how weeds can be a nuisance and burden. Just being a home owner and wanting to have a nice yard gives one that perspective of weeds. But thorns and thistles can be found in our everyday life experiences and they are not necessarily in plant form. There are those people who can be rather prickly and irritating in our lives. We can find them at school, at work, and in our recreation. They even exist in congregations.

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Fruit of the Spirit

Not long ago, a seasoned marathoner had just crossed the finish line with an impressive time, when he suffered a heart attack and died. From the outside, he looked to be the picture of health, but a fatal condition was hiding on the inside. Every one of us needs a visit to the doctor to make sure everything is working alright and that we don’t have an unknown, serious, internal condition. The same is true with our spiritual lives. Our nature is to be creatures of habit, we tend to go through life on autopilot. We can easily get off the path Jesus has shown us, resulting in our spirit, not enjoying, the good health that God created IT for. John 10:10 Jesus Said “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. In the same way that the doctor evaluates us to diagnose potential physical problems, God has given us a process of evaluating spiritual problems in our lives: Our Text, Galatians 5:22-23: But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness & self-control.

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The Cure

What is your burden? What makes you weary? Maybe life is just hard. Physically you hurt and you don’t know if you can do what you want to do. Maybe demands have been placed upon you that are more than you can handle. Or, for many of us, the burden isn’t our life, it is in the life of the folks that we treasure – they have challenges that we shoulder. You are weary because of the choices of your children or grandchildren. You bear the pain of a friend, or a spouse, or your parents. Your burden for them never goes away.

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A Wise Prayer For a Nation

A wise prayer for a nation, our wise prayer for this nation, is that God would be very present among us. Our nation must be guided by God in the ways that are right and holy. Our nation must be guided by our God in acts that are merciful and gracious. If God is not present, our country, made up of both believers in Jesus and those who aren’t, will suffer.

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No Quick Fixes

Quick fixes usually don’t work. Every plumber or electrician will shake their heads over quick fixes that were no fixes at all – they were called to clean up the mess of some wannabe plumber or electrician. No, this is no quick fix. This is God’s fix. And God’s fix can begin today. It is not too late for it.

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God Is…

There are thick books, thicker than phone books, that is, when there were phone books, which try to take this great teaching of the Bible – the Holy Trinity – and define it. But the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, which is wonderfully true, is also amazingly confusing. We believe there are three separate beings – unique from one another – but there is only one God. But of all the people in the world who have ever written about this, and debated it and defended it, I think that I have the clearest word about who God is. (Talk about arrogance, huh?)

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Insufficient

But this is what I think – They didn’t know what to do next!! For three years they had seen His miracles, listened to His sermons, believed that God had sent the Savior of the world here in Him, and now He left. What would they do? How would they handle life?

Having the feeling of fear or having the knowledge that we are insufficient, or incapable, is a hard reality. The word “can’t”, or the reality that something is too hard or impossible is something that we don’t readily accept. But Pentecost shows us our weakness and our strength at the same time. It will show us our failing and give us our answer.

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The Three “R’s” of Right Relationship

As you remember how far you have fallen, the knowledge of the hope to which you were called opens the door for true repentance. It is sin that breaks the relationship. It is unconfessed sin that keeps that relationship broken. You and I know far too well what happens when someone sins against us and we know what it is like when that offense is never resolved. Yes, we have the responsibility to forgive even if the offender never acknowledges their sin. But forgiveness given is never forgiveness received if the offender never confesses their sin. Thus, as we know the forgiveness given to us in Christ Jesus, we should never fail to confess our sins to Him for when we hold onto our sin we abandon the love of God first shown to us. This is the issue that Christ has with the congregation in Ephesus. They were good, but they were not good as confessing their sins. They were not good at embracing the love of God and receiving the gifts that God desired to give.

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Here I Stand

You are going to be challenged to reject this faith. Your friends, your enemies, some folks who you greatly respect and want their approval, will tell you that believing in a God you can’t see, and confessing the death and resurrection of Jesus as the only way to have forgiveness of sins and eternal life, is foolish. More than one will tell you that you can’t trust the Bible to be true. And someone will try to tempt you to live a life that denies God’s holy ways of life. Someone will try to get you to take stuff into your body that will only harm it. Someone will tell you that you can do stuff sexually with your body that is outside of God’s holy will for you. Someone will say you can do what you want to do anytime and anywhere. You’ll be challenged to reject true faith and true life.

If you say, “Here I stand, this is what I believe”, you may stand alone. You may be rejected.

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