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Pentecost
John 10:27-28
Second Sunday of Easter
John 20
Maundy Thursday 2020
Maundy Thursday April 9, 2020
You Can Take it with you. September 15, 2019
Sermon on Matthew 6:19-21
August 11, 2019 Sermon How to Love Deuteronomy 7:7-8
Sermon from August 11, 2019 on Deuteronomy 7:7-8. We love in four ways. We find ourselves in love. We fall in love. We choose to love. We love in the power of Christ.
May 26, 2019 Sermon John 5:1-9
May 5, 2019 Sermon Romans 1:11-12
January 27, 2019 Sermon I Corinthians 12
Fellowship in the Fall Video
A quick introduction to Matthew 22 for our home based fellowship groups at Lake Murray Presbyterian Church for October, 2017. Also testing out my camera for its video capacity.
Lovin' some America
I like Willie Nelson's version of patriotism--he can see the strengths in the country, but he certainly isn't blind to the flaws we have. I especially like the line "..bring us your foreign songs, we will sing along." We are so much better as a country when we can embrace the great things about people who come here into our own life together. Food is a kind of trivial illustration. Tacos and General Tsao's Chicken are pretty much American creations by immagrants. Great song (though not a great recording) to celebrate the Fourth of July.
January 3, 2016 ON JEREMIAH 31:7-14 Good News Judgement
The Good News of Christianity grows out of the bracing news of God's judgement. The prophet Jeremiah preaches hope in the middle of God's Judgement. Grace and judgement are not opposites. Both are part of God's work to save.
Pointed words as Good Words? John 15:1-8
Sometimes Jesus says things that are designed to make us unsettled.
"Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into a fire, and burned" (John 15).
Very blunt, this. Thrown away. Withered. Burned. Rather than try to see how Jesus softens the blow of these words with the Gospel, I began to wonder, "What if we take the words of Jesus, even these words, as the Good News?" It is easy to soften the force of these words. Right before Jesus talks of withered and burned, he says, "those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit..." But are his difficult words simply meant as a useful goad to faith in Jesus disciples? It is clear that Jesus is speaking to Christians with these sharp words, not to people who don't follow him. Are these words merely intended to 'awaken anxious inquiry' (J. Calvin)? Jesus' words certainly can act as a bracing call to self reflection. Can they be strange words of hope, too? Are these words Gospel? Perhaps they express Christ's absolute confidence that our lives can be productive in the Kingdom of heaven. No one bothers to prune a vineyard if they don't believe it has the strength to bear fruit. At the turn of each season, I see large fields of vegetable crops that have passed their prime production. The farmer no longer waters or sprays fields that have no hope of useful production. He just plows the plants under, and looks toward the crops of the next season.
But in Jesus comparison, God is still an attentive keeper of his vineyard. God has every confidence that we can bear fruit. Jesus' startling words call our attention to God's hope and expectation that our lives can mean something in the world. God not only expects us to bear fruit, he provides the strength necessary for us to do so:
"I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit,..."
Father: The Lord's Prayer
FATHER We do not just join Jesus as he speaks to God. We address God on the same terms as Jesus himself. The issue of God and gender provokes a great deal of debate. The church has banked on a great deal of unbiblical sexism and misogyny, much of it propped up by the Christian practice of speaking to and of God as father. Here, we want to notice the direct teaching of Jesus. Together, we address God on the same basis as Jesus does: a Son speaking to his Father. This carries all the weight of a child speaking to a parent. Good parents pay more attention to their own children that to other children. Parents have a special obligation, duty and joy in attending to their own children. So by the grace of Jesus, we speak to God as a child to a parent. But that is not quite precise. Jesus teaches us to speak to God as a Son does to a Father. First, we should observe the way this teaching breaks down the ancient (and still modern) concepts of gender, privledge and power. Jesus teaches men and women to address God as if they are the beloved Son. The great American theologian, Johnny Cash, uses a similar verbal move in "The Man Comes around." He describes the end of the age as "When the father hen calls his chickens home."
This peculiar collison of words helps us understand the relationship into which Jesus calls us. Very early in Luke's Gospel we see the infant Jesus identified as the Son of the Most High (Luke 1:32, 35). As a twelve year old boy, Jesus clearly expresses an understanding of the LORD God as his Father (Luke 1:49). In teaching us to pray, Jesus teaches us that we approach God on the same basis and standing as he does. Here is how that matters as we pray: when we pray, we join Jesus in Speaking to God. As he prays, "Father....," we pray, "Father..." Our Father. We don't pray in a way that is similar to Jesus; we come to God in the same way Jesus comes to God.
Januray 8, 2013 on Ruth I
COVENANT BONDS
In this sermon, I seek to explain and illustrate the Biblical principal of covenant. At about 13 minutes, I use a comparison of two pieces of metal joined by two different methods-bolting and welding. That is what you hear clanking as well.
Rocky, but not the one with Adrienne.
Check out my buddy, Rocky's stuff: http://yorocko.com/
I think Rocky may be my other half, if once we were a single semi-evangelical presbyterian lazer, shot through a beam splitter. He zigged left of center; I zagged right of center. We are both about half a bubble off level. He bounced to Southern California; I bounced to South Carolina. We are both bouncing off the walls. He and a friend publish a monthly mix of new music. I quote Johnny Cash cover tunes. Neither of us is a musical genius. Check him out, pass him on.
Holy Spirit
The Holy Spirit is baffling. That seems part of God's plan. Christians believe God's Spirit caused the inspiration of scripture and works to let us understand scripture as we read it. The first idea is called the doctrine of inspiration. This second point is the doctrine of illumination. We could think of the ancient monks who not only coped the words of scripture with immeasurable care and precision, they often drew pictures, or surrounded the text with design (The Book of Kells may be the most well know example). These were not just decorations. The art work is intended to help the reader understand the scripture more clearly, and to inspire devotion. The drawings are given to illuminate the meaning of the scripture. We believe the Holy Spirit illuminates the meaning of the scripture, as the ancient artists illustrated the scripture.
But the working of the Holy Spirit in Scripture itself is very puzzling. Luke tells us about Jesus' baptism (Luke 3): the heaven was opened, the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus in bodily form like a dove. The strange descriptive 'bodily' surely must mean that the Spirit made himself visible to the eye. But the dove is a peculiar image. It might remind us of the dove that Noah sent our from the ark. It returned with a fresh olive leaf on its second journey. So the dove is an image of assurance. Or it may call to mind the doves that the very poor could use to participate in the sacrificial system of Ancient Israel. The dove is a clear but always unresolved assurance of God's presence. The Holy Spirit is definitely the presence of God, but never in a way that we can define absolutely. Like fog or smoke or the flames of a fire, the Spirit is present but in ways that are difficult to name.
Or we might take the curious work of the Spirit when Peter and John visit the new church in Samaria (Acts 8). Even though Jesus told his disciples they would carry the Gospel to the Samaritans, they likely looked on going to Samaria like we might consider being missionaries to aliens on another planet (thanks to Stan Mast for the wonderfully kooky link to books about Christian missionaries to other worlds!) The Spirit once again moves the church in surprising ways, and not for the last time. Peter and John lay hands on the new Christians. The work of the Spirit is so powerful that a local magician, Simon, attempts to purchase this power from the disciples. Why do we get no description of this manifestation of the Spirit? We do not learn what actually happens. Not only is that a curious choice by the author, it is spiritually puzzling. Does the Holy Spirit not want us to focus on the particulars of how God works in one group of believers? Is the passage meant to drive us to ask the Holy Spirit for gifts particular to our lives?
June 7, 2015 on Psalm 100. Why Praise the LORD
The 100th Psalm teaches us both how and why to give praise to God.
One Gospel
This article combines two things I usually have no interest in--GQ magazine and Justing Bieber. But it a remarkable article on the Hillsong church in Manhatan.
I've heard some of the music from Hillsong. Clearly they are doing something remarkable as a church. It might be loads of fun to criticize them: cult of personality, worship-tainment, acceptance of the world. Without exception, I find that my enjoyment in criticizing others, especially in churches, reveals far more of my shortcomings than there's. Here are some questions of myself and church my tribe, that the article raised.
- Do I care as much for the people of my local community as the church leader's do for the city of New York?
- How often do I precipitate a conversation of faith so powerful that people are moved to tears, and are glad about it?
- Can my church name sin and honestly welcome people?
- How often do we hold out some aspect of a life shaped by the Gospel, that it makes the world about us simultaneously attracted and angry? Whether the characteristic is holiness or justice, mercy or righteousness, how often do we get a response?
I've only given it a quick look, but Hillsong's beliefs don't fundamentally differ from the the expression of faith of my denomination, the Presbyterian Church (USA). The one notable exception is the same disagreement we have with most Baptist. We emphasize God's choice to save us as more important than anything else. So where does their useful passion come from?
Thanks to Rocky Supinger for sharing this article. You can check him out at yorocko.com
Our: The Lord's Prayer
When Jesus teaches prayer, he begins by having us to assume the same relationship with God that he has. He tells us to join him in praying to God, his Father. He easily could have taken his start from the Psalms. The Psalms often have us direct our words to God (Ps. 54,55) or to the Lord (Ps. 18, 104, 105). In fact, the disciples around Jesus probably knew many (all?) the Psalms by heart. Jewish people of the first century had a pretty clear pattern of prayer ("They devoted themselves....to.. the prayers" Acts 2:42). So when they asked Jesus how to pray, both he and they knew they were asking for something distinct. Jesus teaches us to adress and call upon God's attention by saying "Our Father,..."
OUR It is easy and correct to see that Jesus is teaching us, his disciples, to pray together. This is a wonderful encouragement--we are never praying by ourselves. Even when praying feels lonely or boring or futile, Jesus teaches a truth that is larger than the truth we feel at a particular moment. We are not alone. We do not pray alone. Other people are praying as well, and with us. But even more importantly we are praying with Jesus. Jesus is praying with us. We unite our voice with Jesus in address God. When his disciples pray, we are joining Jesus in prayer.