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Sermon
Michael B. Brown
Perhaps any who ever watched William Shatner's television show Rescue 911 share my feelings of inadequacy. Viewing makes you think that some guy hanging by his ankles off a 40-story building to rescue a stranded window washer is everyday stuff. One episode dealt with a three-year-old who saved his mother from a seizure. Someone told me of a dog who saved his entire family from a burning house. Me?...
Sermon
Alexander H. Wales
"I just knew it was going to be that kind of a day! I got started late. The people I was traveling with decided to go on without me. My donkey came up lame. And the beggar at the gate of the city warned me that the road to Jericho could be a dangerous place. "But I had to go. I was already behind schedule, and you know how those things go. I was supposed to be in Tarsus by the end of the month. I ...
Sermon
W. Robert McClelland
Luke sets the familiar parable of the good Samaritan in the context of two commands: Love God and neighbor; and Go, do likewise! Furthermore, it is clear that by casting the parable with Jewish bad guys and a Samaritan good guy, Jesus wants our love to transcend ideological differences and respond to human suffering and injustice wherever it may be found. Christian spirituality has always been cha...
Sermon
Brett Blair
The parable of the Good Samaritan arises out of a discussion between Jesus and a Pharisee. Here is a religious lawyer and he is asking a question on the nature of the law. The stage is set by Luke with these words: “Behold a lawyer stood up to put him to the test.” Well, it's not the first time and probably won’t be the last time that a lawyer phrased a trick question. It was the kind of question ...
5. The Nearest Hand
Luke 10:25-37
Sermon
Carveth Mitchell
Two women were sitting in church. One woman said to the other, "I’ve always wished that God would touch me, but I suppose that’s too much to ask." The other woman replied, "That sounds like a reasonable desire. Have you prayed about it?""Well, no. Of course not.""Why not? There’s certainly nothing wrong with a prayer like that. You should pray about it.""All right. Maybe I will sometime.""Not some...
6. Compassion
Luke 10:25-37
Sermon
Harold Warlick
One of the pivotal questions in life is this one: "What does it mean to grow up?" How do you know when someone is mature? When is someone real? Most of the time it doesn't have anything to do with age. I've known some 20-year-old girls who live like they're 75-year-old old maids. And occasionally friends will even ask me what I'm going to do when I grow up. What does it mean to grow old? When buyi...
Sermon
Dr. Ronald Love
Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, in his autobiography TREASURE IN CLAY, recounts a visit he made to a leper colony in Buluba, Africa. He intended to give a silver crucifix to each of the 500 lepers residing in Buluba. The first person who came forward, however, was a man so disfigured by the ravages of leprosy that Sheen was repulsed by the sight. The man's left arm was eaten off at the elbow by the di...
Sermon
Leonard Sweet
Love costs. Asking people to personally identify with the story of the Good Samaritan is a little like asking all the children of a picnic-time softball team what position they would like to play. Just as surely as you are going to end up with nine pitchers, you will find yourself with a congregation full of hypothetical Samaritans. Very few of us will voluntarily choose to identify with the...
Sermon
Leonard Sweet
In a world that teaches achievement (doing), Jesus teaches us the values of aliveness (being). The essence of Christianity is being, not doing. As Billy Graham has been preaching to the world for 40 years, if you want to make a difference, you have to be different. This was the error of the lawyer Jesus spoke with in today's gospel text. The lawyer wanted to reach his goal, his desired finis...
Sermon
James Merritt
A businessman was returning to the U.S. from Asia and had a connecting flight in Iran. After deboarding the plane he stopped by the bathroom. After washing his hands he looked down to realize his bag had been stolen. That is a problem for anyone, but for him it was a disaster, because his wallet and passport were in it. He rushed out into the terminal to see if he could spot someone running a...
Sermon
Maurice A. Fetty
"Which of these three, do you think, proved neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?" He said, "The one who showed mercy on him." And Jesus said to him, "Go and do likewise." — Luke 10:36-37 It was a dark, rainy summer night on a remote road. David was driving home to his lake cottage after a movie in the resort village. Going around a corner he thought he saw it. He slowed, wondering if h...
Sermon
Brett Blair
The parable of the Good Samaritan arises out of a discussion between Jesus and a Pharisee. Here is a religious lawyer and he is asking a question on the nature of the law. The stage is set by Luke with these words: “Behold a lawyer stood up to put him to the test.” Well, it's not the first time and probably won’t be the last time that a lawyer phrased a trick question. It was the kind of question ...
Sermon
Robert C. Cochran
As a campus pastor in Kalamazoo, Michigan, I served on a committee that supports the local Lutheran Social Services Ministry foster care program. One Thursday, we heard about a young girl who had run away from home at age fourteen. By the time we heard about her, she was sixteen, and LSSM was trying to get her some help by putting her into an independent care program. She’d lived on her own for tw...
Sermon
King Duncan
A Sunday school teacher was telling her class the story of the Good Samaritan. She told how the man was beaten, robbed and left for dead. She described the situation in vivid detail so her students would catch the drama. Then she asked the class, “If you saw a person lying on the roadside all wounded and bleeding, what would you do?” A thoughtful little girl broke the hushed silence. “I think I’d...
Sermon
King Duncan
In October of 2015 Reader’s Digest carried an article that featured 24 stories about what the editor called “the touching kindness of strangers.” One story was titled “The Man at the Market.” It was contributed by Leslie Wagner from Peel, Arkansas. Ms. Wagner told of being in a supermarket one time. When she checked out, the clerk tallied up her groceries. Much to Ms. Wagner’s surprise she discov...
Sermon
King Duncan
Someone has made a list of what she calls “The World’s Worse Questions.” Are you ready for these? Will you promise not to get mad it I ask you something? Do you have any statistics to back up that statement? You don’t honestly expect me to believe that, do you? Haven’t you any sense of humor? You don’t remember me, do you? Have I kept you waiting? NOW what’s the matter? You asleep? So what? WHEN ...
Sermon
Two women were sitting in church. One woman said to the other, "I’ve always wished that God would touch me, but I suppose that’s too much to ask." The other woman replied, "That sounds like a reasonable desire. Have you prayed about it?" "Well, no. Of course not." "Why not? There’s certainly nothing wrong with a prayer like that. You should pray about it." "All right. Maybe I will sometime." ...
Sermon
King Duncan
Peter Godwin was a bit of an oddity in the African village where he grew up. Though a British citizen, Peter and his family had moved to Rhodesia when he was just a child. His mother, a missionary doctor, was assigned to start a vaccination program. Under her supervision thousands of people were inoculated against tuberculosis, smallpox, and other diseases. For some diseases, a shot was needed, bu...
19. Good Neighbors
Luke 10:25-37
Sermon
King Duncan
During his sermon, a pastor quoted Jesus, "Love your neighbor as yourself." To emphasize the point, he asked three times, with increasing intensity: "Who is my neighbor? Who is my neighbor? Who is my neighbor?!" Each time he asked this, a young boy in the congregation answered quietly: "Mister Rogers! Mister Rogers! Mister Rogers!" (1) Fred Rogers of children's television fame was a good neighbo...
Sermon
King Duncan
Many of us are afraid of dogs. It is a common fear. The immortal scientist Louis Pasteur was far more frightened of dogs than most people. Even a distant bark would terrify him. In his mind he could still see a mad wolf which raged through his boyhood village bringing agony and death to many of his neighbors. "I have always been haunted by the cries of those victims," he said time and again. Yet i...
Sermon
King Duncan
"Why me, Lord? What did I ever do to deserve such treatment? My head's hurting so bad. They even took my clothes. And look at the blood. God, if somebody doesn't come soon, I could bleed to death . . . Is that it, Lord? Is this how my life is going to end? Beaten and bloody, lying naked by the side of the road? What about my family? Who will look after them? What about my wife? I may not deserve t...
22. Sole Brother
Luke 10:25-37
Sermon
It was an hour before conference time. They were getting off to a late start and it looked like speed limit all the way for any chance of making it in time for the opening gavel. The pastor behind the wheel had experienced the inevitable last minute problems relating to Sunday’s bulletin. One of the hymns he’d picked for the service had only the second tune in their hymnals. The congregation wasn’...
Sermon
James Merritt
If you have ever watched the President of the United States deliver the State of the Union Address in recent years, you know that at some point in his speech he will point to the balcony and introduce an ordinary citizen as a real hero in this country. You may not know but that custom began when President Ronald Reagan introduced a man named Lenny Skutnik. To this day reporters will ask presidenti...
Sermon
David R. Cartwright
The situation was this: A young Jewish lawyer wanted to reassure himself that he was doing the right thing. To help him, Jesus took the opportunity to tell him a story. The story was designed to set the young man straight. The story begins the way a lot of stories begin. "A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho" (Luke 10:30). At this point, we aren't told anything about the man. Not his na...
Sermon
James W. Moore
In the church, we talk a lot about love. We teach it, we preach it, we sing about it, we try to live it… and well we should because love is the message of the church and the dominant theme of the scriptures. Love is the Christian faith summed up in one word. Jesus called it the sign of discipleship. Usually, when we talk about love, we lift up love for God and love for other people… and that is w...
Showing 1 to 25 of 51 results