"I tell you, on the day of the judgment, men will render account for every careless word they utter." Really? A number of questions arise immediately when one hears that statement. One has to do with the logistics of accounting. A lot of careless words are spoken. Are we to believe that God (or some of his assistants!) keeps a verbatim record of all of these words and then confronts each person with the ones he or she has spoken at the final reckoning? Another question involves the justice of such a policy ...
"How good and pleasant it is when brothers [and sisters] live together in unity." A good thought...togetherness. That is one of the reasons I enjoy the church. As we gather together for worship, I am reminded that I am not alone. Not only that GOD is with me, but that other PEOPLE are with me...YOU are with me. I need that. It is strange, you know. As important as it is to us, we do not often celebrate togetherness. We gather at Thanksgiving time and express our gratitude for so many things...for food, for ...
Kids are fun. A little girl came home from Sunday School. "What did you learn today?" her father asked. She responded, "All I heard was that the children of Israel did this and the children of Israel did that. Didn't the grown ups do anything?" Another one. The new baby came home from the hospital. The three-year-old met her new brother at the door and tagged along like a shadow as he was carried in and placed in the basinet. Big sister stood and watched in fascination and noticed that the new arrival was ...
This is the season we celebrate Christmas. The shopping has begun. The countdown of days left to make purchases is underway. Jewelry commercials are dominating the airways. People are passing by the Salvation Army bell ringers as they go in and out of the mall looking for just the right gift. It’s Christmas! This is the time of year when we decorate with lights, greenery, and all the symbols of the season. We sing carols. We greet the people we pass with tidings of good cheer, “Merry Christmas!” We rejoice ...
We move now to talk about discipline and means of grace. In my definition of Spiritual Form I chose words very carefully – Listen again: “and appropriating by commitment, discipline and action.” Our discipline is armed at cultivating an awareness of the indwelling Christ. Paul’s words to the Romans make it clear. Listen to Paul in Rom. 12:1-2: “I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your ...
BACKGROUND MATERIAL It is rather strange that Mark is the only Evangelist to record this particular miracle of Jesus. It is believed that the other Gospel writers had Mark's writings in hand when they wrote their Gospels. And this was a double miracle, a healing of both deafness and of a speech impediment. All the more wonder that Mark is the only one to relate this action. Another area of conjecture concerns the man's speech impediment. Although he is often called a deaf-mute, the scriptures refer to his ...
You are no doubt familiar with the name Simon Wiesenthal, the famous Nazi hunter. Wiesenthal was a prisoner in a concentration camp in Poland. One day he was assigned to clean out rubbish from a barn the Germans had improvised into a hospital for wounded soldiers. Toward evening a nurse took Wiesenthal by the hand and led him to a young SS trooper, his face bandaged with filthy rags, eyes tucked behind the gauze. He was perhaps 21 years old. He grabbed Wiesenthal's hand and held on for dear life. He said ...
In Gary Richmond, a zookeeper at the Los Angeles Zoo, remembers the strict instructions he was given when he received the master keys to all the animals' cages. His supervisor made it very clear that constant vigilance was necessary for ensuring the safety of the animals and all the people at the zoo. Gary's greatest responsibility would be to guard his keys and to make sure he used them wisely - only opening or closing those doors that absolutely had to be opened or closed. For the first few months, Gary ...
Year after year Stumpy and Martha attended the fair in their home state, and every summer it was the same story: Stumpy was tantalized by the old-fashioned bi-plane in which anybody could take a ride for ten dollars, and Martha was disgusted by such an obvious waste of money. "Ten dollars is ten dollars," she would always say. And Stumpy would go home without his airplane ride. One year Stumpy said, "Martha, there's that bi-plane again. I am 81 years old and this year I want to go for a ride." Martha ...
There was a man who lived in a small southern town, and after twenty years of shaving himself every morning, he decided he had had enough. He told his wife he wanted to go down to the local barber, just for once, and get shaved himself. When he put on his hat and coat, went to the barbershop, which was owned by the pastor of the Baptist church, the barber's wife, whose name was Grace, was working, so she is the one that shaved him. After she shaved him she said, "That will be $20." Well, he thought the ...
Some of you may remember the most famous advice communist of all time. Her name was Ann Landers. For decades, her answers to every question you could imagine from all over the country was read in hundreds of newspapers. Her byline “Dear Ann”, became famous all over the world. Towards the end of her career, she sat down for an interview with NBC and she was asked this question, “Of all the questions you have received over all of your years what is the most frequent question you have been asked?” Her answer ...
Today's society is a star-saturated society, or should we say star-crazy society? Since we seem to know all about our Earth and face no more earthly frontiers, we have turned our attention to extra-terrestrial bodies. We are interested in the stars: their size, temperature, and whether life exists on them. In 1989 Time magazine had a feature article on the sun, an "ordinary" star 96 million miles from Earth, 865,000 miles in diameter, with a temperature of 27 million degrees Fahrenheit. For 3-and-a-half ...
An old, old story has a minister going from Sunday School class to Sunday School class one morning to meet with the students to see how their studies were going. He came into one first-grade group and began to question them as to what they had been learning. They had been studying about God and eagerly, the youngsters shared their knowledge. One little boy said God created the whole world and everything in it. A little girl said that God loves us very much. Another little girl said that God had a son named ...
Jesus Christ died when he was about thirty-three years old. Other than the fact that he died as a relatively young man, on the surface there seems to be nothing unusual about that statement. The reason why that seems to be a routine statement is because death comes to everyone. When the Irish writer, George Bernard Shaw, completed a statistical study on the subject of death, he said he came to this firm conclusion: "One out of one people dies." Normally that is why biographers seldom spend much time on the ...
It was an ad in Newsweek magazine that caught my attention because of the first two words: In bold print it said, SUNDAY MORNING; but listen to the ad in its entirety: "SUNDAY MORNING: Time to kick back, get comfortable, and perfect the art of doing absolutely nothing. The ideal companion? Pioneers new PD-M710, 6-disc CD player. Now you can enjoy up to six hours of your favorite music without lifting a finger...all of which means you can spend less time changing your music, and more time enjoying it, but ...
If you are from the Deep South especially, you have to like Jeff Foxworthy. He made the word "redneck" universally famous. He was the one who said, "You might be a redneck if all of your salad bowls have "Cool Whip" stamped on them." Nobody knows how to identify a redneck, better than Jeff Foxworthy. I came across some ways you can also identify a workaholic. In case you are wondering whether or not you might be one, just consider the following: If it frustrates you that they don't allow laptops on a ...
Jesus’ Love and the World’s Hatred: Just as it is possible to imagine a stage of the tradition when the only farewell discourse was 13:31–35, so it is possible to imagine a stage when the discourse extended to 14:31 but no further. There is a smooth transition from that verse’s summons to “leave” to the statement in 18:1 that Jesus “left with his disciples and crossed the Kidron Valley.” At the end of chapter 14, the reader expects the group to leave and the discourse to end. Instead, the discourse ...
Jesus’ Love and the World’s Hatred: Just as it is possible to imagine a stage of the tradition when the only farewell discourse was 13:31–35, so it is possible to imagine a stage when the discourse extended to 14:31 but no further. There is a smooth transition from that verse’s summons to “leave” to the statement in 18:1 that Jesus “left with his disciples and crossed the Kidron Valley.” At the end of chapter 14, the reader expects the group to leave and the discourse to end. Instead, the discourse ...
Jonah. Terrific story. One of Sunday School's most memorable hours - it is great drama. As you recall Jonah was a prophet in Israel. God came to him and said that he should leave his nation and go over to the capital of one of his country's fiercest foes...Ninevah in Assyria. Jonah did not want to go. So he went down to the seaport of Joppa and got on a boat headed for Tarshish in Spain. The direction was exactly opposite the one God wanted him to take. Jonah did not want to preach to the Ninevites. After ...
As we left our story last week, the Emperor and Darth Vader had devised a plan to turn the young Jedi, Luke Skywalker, to the Dark Side. While we were gone, Darth Vader revealed his true identity as Luke's father, Anakin Skywalker. Luke has now been captured and is ready to face Darth Vader, not just as his enemy, but also as his Father. We have been in a series of messages called "The Dark Side". I remind you again that what Star Wars calls "The Dark Side" the Bible calls "sin". There really is a dark ...
“Fruit trees of all kinds will grow on both banks of the river. Their leaves will not wither, nor will their fruit fail. Every month they will bear fruit, because the water from the sanctuary flows to them. Their fruit will serve for food and their leaves for healing.” --Ezekiel 47:12 “The sun will no more be your light by day, nor will the brightness of the moon shine on you, for the Lord will be your everlasting light, and your God will be your glory. Your sun will never set again, and your moon will ...
Then all the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron, and said, “Look, we are your bone and flesh. For some time, while Saul was king over us, it was you who led out Israel and brought it in. The Lord said to you: It is you who shall be shepherd of my people Israel.” So all the elders of Israel came to the king at Hebron; and King David made a covenant with them at Hebron before the Lord, and they anointed David king over Israel. David was thirty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned over Judah ...
Now will you hear the word of the Lord as you find it in the 5th chapter of Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians. The 5th chapter of the second letter to the Corinthians, beginning with the 14th and continuing through the 21st verses, the end of the chapter. This is the word of the Lord. “For the love of Christ controls us, because we are convinced that one has died for all, therefore, all have died. And he died for all that those who live might live no longer for themselves, but for him who, for their ...
Not long ago I was driving down the interstate. I saw standing by the road a young man, not very impressive in appearance, who seemed to have all he owned in two bags. As I went by he held up a sign with one word on it: "Home." I wanted to stop and help him get home and yet because of the way things are today I did not even slow down. But I have often wondered where home was - and if he got there and what happened when he arrived. Immediately after his baptism and his time in the wilderness the first thing ...
A group of men celebrated on and on in a sports bar. "Here's to 94," one of them toasted. "Hip-94-Hooray," another of them cheered. "Ninety-four, Ninety-four," "Ninety-four," they chanted in unison. The waitress could take the mystery no longer. When one of them left for the men's room, she intercepted him and asked, "Why the big deal about 94?" "It only took us 94 days to finish this puzzle we've been working on." "What's so special about that?" He replied, "Hey, the box reads 5-7 years." Puzzles are not ...