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 Faith Seeds
  
Category: Talk - Spiritual
Sermons by Pastor Russ Whaley, Pioneer Memorial UMC, Pembina ND


Previews of Faith Seeds
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    Open Our Eyes That We May See
Thu, 7 Feb 2008 20:24:00 GMT (13.4 Mb)
Humankind has always had a fascination with heroes â people who rise above the âusualâ and do extraordinary things.  They stand out from the crowd by virtue of their acts, or quality of character. 
 
Another thing you often notice about true heroes is that theyâre not interested in getting attention for their deeds.  They just did what their beliefs and personal values told them they should do.
 
In America, since the events of 9-11, our fascination with heroes has really taken off.  Our culture is going to great lengths to declare that heroes are among us.  While there are many persons who probably do qualify as âheroes,â some days it seems that simply showing up for work regularly makes you a hero.
 
Witness many of the TV shows today that are in some way involved with âheroes:â for the adults, Smallville, Heroes, or Journeyman; on Nickelodeon, shows like Jimmy Neutron or Kim Possible show are there for our kids to see characters doing heroic things.
 
These are very popular shows.  In NBCâs drama, Heroes, for example, normal people find that they have superhuman powers, and the fate of th...

    It's MY Life
Sun, 27 Jan 2008 19:25:00 GMT (18.2 Mb)
Thereâs a book (by Po Bronson) called, âWhat Should I Do with My Life?â  The whole focus of the book is not to give advice on how we should change our lives to be happy. Itâs filled with the stories of people who âof those who actually took action, changed their lives, and enjoyed or suffered the consequences.â  Itâs about how they faced their own identity, and learned to ignore the urges of the world to be someone they are not.
 
For example:
â A mother torn between an Olympic career and her adolescent daughter.
â The Cuban immigrant who overcame the strong disapproval of her parents and quit her lucrative career to go into social work.
â The OB/GYN physician who walked away from her lifelong âdestinyâ of being a doctor and was trying to make sense of it all.
â A high-powered IT saleswoman who gave up the certainty of salary to be a massage therapist because she missed a close connection with people.
 
So much of the time, as we think about who it is that we should be â or should have been â we end up looking back to discover who we really are.
 
This is the situation that the prophet Micah sought to ...

    Going, Going, Gone
Sun, 20 Jan 2008 19:55:00 GMT (17.5 Mb)
Often as kids, we would play a game at the beach where we would go under water, and just like the cartoons we watched, we would come up three times before sinking downâ supposedly for the last time.  Oneâ twoâ threeâ goingâ goingâ gone.
 
Whoever was âitâ was the one who would doing the âgoing, going, goneâ routine. After the third âsink,â the rest of us would try and find him or her and provide a good dunking.  Ah, those were the days.
 
Thatâs a lighter way of seeing the teaching of this psalm. The message of Psalm 40 is that one of the greatest joys which follows being restored to new life after a brush with death is the joy of entering oneâs house of worship to declare before all in the community that oneâs life has been saved and restored by God.
 
In other words, the writer has returned to his church to give a witness which praises God for rescue and restoration from hardship.
 
Verse 1 describes how the psalmist waited for the Lord to become aware of his situation and rescue him.
 
In verse 2, God rescues the writer of Psalm 40 from âthe pit.â A Jewish translation of this psalm uses...

    Skipping Christmas
Mon, 19 Nov 2007 16:42:00 GMT (12.6 Mb)
Hereâs a radical idea: what if, right after Thanksgiving Day, we just went back to life as usual and skipped Christmas all together?
 
I know thatâs a pretty radical notion, and it may not even set well with you. But, it is something to think about. Thereâs a called Christmas with the Kranks that floats this idea.
 
The movie was first called called Skipping Christmas, and it considers the notion of skipping Christmas. Tim Allen plays Luther Krank, a man who is furious that the family spent $6,000 on Christmas the year before â and has nothing to show for it. So, since their daughter is gone with the Peace Corp, he and his wife decide they are going to skip Christmas and do something else.
 
The whole story is about how the neighbors react to their choice of action. The neighbor who coordinates the neighborhoodâs Christmas lights becomes upset because the Kranks are not participating. Their daughter comes home for a surprise visit, only to find that the holidays are not being celebrated as usual.  And so on.
 
This movie, at least what I know of the story, asks the question, âWhat really matters during the holidays?â...

    Dirt (2007 Harvest Festival Sermon)
Mon, 19 Nov 2007 16:25:00 GMT (13.0 Mb)
Iâd like to begin today with a question for you to mull over:  âWhat does every one of us have in common with the harvest that we celebrate today?â

Have you ever been to a Jewish cemetery? Ever notice the headstone erected on the grave of a Jewish man or woman? Instead of flowers, you may have seen stones carefully placed on top of the grave marker. Sometimes these stones will be lined up across the top, like some kind of train. These stones have a specific, commemorative meaning, a meaning that binds that individual person to the whole history and people of Israel. They are stone testaments to the ongoing relationship between God and every son or daughter of Israel.

Letâs go back to the question of the day.  Any takers?

Let me offer you a scripture, and letâs see where we go: (Genesis 2:4-7).

Any ideas?  Okâ what you and I have in common with the harvest is that God has brought us from the very same earth â or dirt â in which He has caused our crops to grow.  Our lives are all connected in a very basic and essential way:  the Lord God has given us all life!  And from the life of the harvest, He provides the ...

    DO Sweat the Small Stuff!
Mon, 19 Nov 2007 16:23:00 GMT (10.0 Mb)
The Apostle Paul, in saying, âIf a man will not work, he shall not eat,â is telling us that everyone has a job to do.  Take, for example, putting together a Sunday worship service. Other than a preacher, we have musicians, ushers, custodians, a bell-ringer, communion stewards, and other people who help make each Sunday service happen.
 
If you only look at the big picture, it may not seem like it would be that much of a problem if one or two of the parts of that group were missing. But, if we paid attention, we would notice that things didnât work as well as they should.
 
Thatâs the point of saying, âDO sweat the small stuff.â Weâve been told for a long time that we can reduce our stress levels by not worrying about the little stuff, just worry about the big problems. But is that really the best solution?  Well, it might be for some things, but for life in general, maybe not.
 
Hereâs an example of why this is true. Researchers in the field of crime and urban decay have discovered something interesting: In a neighborhood, if a single broken window is allowed to remain unrepaired, it will slowly lead to a complete breakdown ...

    They Shall Know Us by Our Walk
Mon, 5 Nov 2007 12:00:00 GMT (12.0 Mb)
Did you know that the word âfollowâ is used 87 times in Jesusâ teachings, while He says âBelieve in meâ only three times? 
 
Walking is a very popular image when describing the journey of faith and discipleship. The point is that true discipleship is always going somewhere:  there is a direct connection between believing and putting oneâs faith into action. For the true disciple, it is doing that defines the life.  To put it another way, faith is not strictly an intellectual act. Faith is always busy â it cannot help but clothe itself in good works.
 
What does that have to do with walking?  Well, itâs like this: people can tell things about you by the way you walk.  Thatâs because we all have a unique way of walking that is all our own. Some researchers in the Homeland Security part of our government have figured out ways to identify a person by his or her walk up to 500 feet away â regardless of the time of day or night, or what the weather conditions are. They will know you by your walk.
 
As the song goes, âthey will know we are Christians by our love.â  The world will also know we are Christians...

    Fighting the Good Fight in a Culture of Fear
Tue, 30 Oct 2007 15:18:00 GMT (11.2 Mb)
Paulâs second letter to Timothy is among the later letters of Paul that we have; many scholars think that 2 Timothy was written shortly before Paulâs death â in some ways, this is a âlast will and testamentâ of the Apostle, written as Paul waits in a Roman prison to hear the final word of his fate.
 
In such a significant time of life, itâs interesting that Paul doesnât any time recounting his life accomplishments.  WE donât hear about the churches he planted, or the sermons he preached; thereâs no mention of how many souls were converted â no report card to document his successes.
 
Thatâs the kind of behavior that will confound many in our culture today. Ask a football fan how âhisâ team is doing, and odds are, he will know.  Talk to an athlete about his or her competition, and youâll hear about performance, records, and how hard they are to beat.
In school, we keep track of grades to determine how successful a student is (or isnât).  The report cards come home, and itâs a stressful moment for student and parent as the reckoning is performed.
What do grades really say?  Well, they can be the sole ruler you eval...

    Spiritual Smarts
Mon, 22 Oct 2007 19:40:00 GMT (15.3 Mb)


Letâs
do a little remembering â as best you can today. What was the first phone
number you had when you moved out on your own? 
Now, something more recent: do you know what your carâs license plate
number is? What about your family: what year were your parents born, and what
were the years that your children were born, if you have them?


 


Now,
letâs get âchurchy:â What are the first four books of the New Testament of our
Bible?  Who was the person who betrayed
Jesus? Who was the Apostle Paulâs most famous student?


 


How
did you do?  Howâs your memory today, for
the things you know? If youâre having some trouble, maybe you could use a smart
pill. Donât laugh â there are some very dedicated scientists who are hard at
work on creating new drugs that will help us not just remember, but think
better.


 


Improving
memory is something of great interest to many people. In some cases, the quest
for a cure for diseases like Alzheimerâs has unearthed some new possibilities.
But, there are also man...

    Special: Children of the Harvest Ministry
Sun, 30 Sep 2007 19:15:00 GMT (11.7 Mb)

Children of the Harvest Ministry is an outreach of the Dakotas Annual Conference of The United Methodist Church, serving on the Spirit Lake Reservation near Devil's Lake, North Dakota.

You can learn more about Children of the Harvest through the Dakotas Conference's website: www.dakotasumc.nonprofitoffice.com.

Missionaries Mike and Libby Flowers are the directors of COTH Ministry.  Mike and Libby visited our parish today and brought the message, news of what God is doing with this ministry with and to the Spirit Lake Nation.

Thanks for listening!



    The Great "What-If"
Mon, 17 Sep 2007 11:00:00 GMT (15.3 Mb)
I have a story for you. Two New York entrepreneurs decided to see if some money might be made by introducing bungee-jumping to Mexico. They fronted some venture capital to build a platform, where people who like "extreme sports" could dive off and spring up and down as they do in the states.
 
When it came time for the trial run, the two entrepreneurs climbed up the platform and looked down on the gathering crowd. They knew what they had to "do," but decided to shoot fingers to see who got to "do it."
 
The entrepreneur who "won" (or "lost," depending on how you look at it) put on the harness and dove off. When he came up the first time, his partner noticed that his nose was bloody. When he came up the second time, it was obvious that one eye was turning black. When he came up a third time, part of his ear was missing.
 
He yelled out, "Are you okay?" On his way down a fourth time, his partner yelled back, "What's a piÃata?"
 
Those two entrepreneurs didnât take into account the differences of perspective from New York to Mexico.  For some folks, bungee j...

    Following Jesus with Your Life
Mon, 10 Sep 2007 11:00:00 GMT (13.2 Mb)
Christian discipleship is something that requires that Jesus be the discipleâs primary allegiance; in other words, God wants to have priority in all areas of our lives.
 
How do we put this into effective practice?
 
Part of discipleship is discerning what God desires of us.  We do this by being involved in the community of faith, by giving and receiving encouragement in the community; by offering prayer alone and with others, and listening to Godâs voice.
 
Have you ever made a commitment to an organization or another group without first finding out what would be expected of you?  Have you ever gotten burned because you didnât read the fine print?
 
If you will closely consider what Jesus says in this teaching and elsewhere, you shouldnât be surprised by the requirements.
 
In this passage, Jesus seems very much to be trying to get the crowds to understand what it means to follow Him with their lives and not just their feet!
 
This passage must have seemed just as harsh to the crowds who first heard it as it does to us today a paradox â on the one hand, we are to love our enemies without ...

    A Persevering, Practical Faith
Mon, 3 Sep 2007 11:00:00 GMT (11.8 Mb)
Faith in theory is one thingâ faith practiced in reality is another.  What is it that we each should be doing every day, as followers of Christ Jesus?
Whatâs in the Verses?
 
 Ã¢Loving each other as brothersâ
 

 
The common bond between all believers created by the blood of Christ cannot help but create the ties of family in the Body: love your fellow Christians.
 
âEntertaining strangersââ
 

 
A parallel to Ge 18:1ff and Ge 19:1ff (Abraham and Lot visited by angels).  This is not so much that we should always be hospitable on the off-chance that God is watching (or has sent an angel to watch us), but because God is pleased when believers are hospitable.  Hospitality is an essential element to spreading the Christian faith throughout our world.
 
Prisoners must be actively sought out by Christians because compassion is an essential part of Christian living.
 

 
âThe marriage bedâ
 

 
A euphemism for sexual intercourse.  Historical note: in the first century chastity was a novel concept; any many considere...

    True Worship
Mon, 27 Aug 2007 11:00:00 GMT (14.8 Mb)
I want for us to spend time thinking about worship today â but I want to make sure you know what I mean by that.  This passage from Hebrew IS about worship; but itâs not about the style of worship that you or I might prefer over other styles of worship.  Itâs not about how we express ourselves, but about the substance of true worship.  This passage contains teaching on what God considers true worship.
One of the biggest comparisons that the writer of Hebrews offers in this passage is contrasting the past with the future.  As a matter of fact, we arenât far from a very well-known verse, Hebrews 13:8: âJesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.â (NIV)
This teaching begins with a comparison of two mountains.  Even though the writer doesnât refer to the first mountain by name, we know that it is Sinai as it appears in Exodus 19-20: a mountain of doom, gloom, and unapproachable holiness.  If even an animal touched the mountain, it had to be killed (Exodus 19:12,13).
This mountain was SO scary that even Moses, Godâs chosen spokesman, was rattled to his bones.
The second mountain is completely different.  Look in v...

    Righteous Before God
Mon, 20 Aug 2007 11:00:00 GMT (13.4 Mb)
One of the abiding tensions within the Church is the question of accountability:  To what degree God will hold the people of the Church â the âsavedâ â accountable for the way in which they have lived out the heavenly grace for their sins that they received?
 
Some would say that there will be universal salvation because Godâs grace is all-powerful.  I disagree:  the Bible makes it clear in many ways that, while your sins are forgiven, there are expectations of those who have accepted the call of Christ on their lives.  If you spoke your vows, but your life didnât change, there are consequences. 
 
This part of Isaiahâs prophecy is one of the points in Scripture where God makes this idea clear.  Jesus teaches heavily on this same part of Isaiah in John 15, and also Matthew 21. You might think of it as a scriptural warning label for us so we remember what it means to be members of the body of Christ and not just âspiritual free agents.â
 
The âvineyardâ is a symbol for Godâs people.  In Isaiahâs prophecy, this refers specifically to the nation of Israel, and Jesus expands this to mean all of GodÃ...

    Rich and Foolish
Tue, 7 Aug 2007 18:48:00 GMT (10.6 Mb)
A stingy old lawyer who had been diagnosed with a terminal illness was determined to prove wrong the saying, âYou canât take it with you.â

After much thought and consideration, the old ambulance-chaser finally figured out how to take at least some of his money with him when he died. He instructed his wife to go to the bank and withdraw enough money to fill two pillow cases. He then directed her to take the bags of money to the attic and leave them directly above his bed. His plan: When he passed away, he would reach out and grab the bags on his way to heaven.

Several weeks after the funeral, the deceased lawyerâs wife, up in the attic cleaning came upon the two forgotten pillow cases stuffed with cash. âOh, that darned old fool,â she exclaimed. âI knew he should have had me put the money in the basement.â

We laugh at this story, but I think underneath, it might make us nervous because our Western culture doesnât base its living habits on the teaching underlying this parable.  Whatâs the teaching, in a short sentence?  Try this:

Youâre not a bad person simply because you are wealthy, and youâre not spiritually bankrupt be...

    Praying as We Ought
Mon, 30 Jul 2007 11:00:00 GMT (13.2 Mb)
Take a moment and think about the things you know by heart. This could be anything from phone numbers to your bank accounts; maybe you know the license plates of every car youâve ever owned. The main question is, âwhat do you know by heart?â
 
What about your daily routine? What are the things that you do, that you have done for so long, that you donât even think about it any more? What was once fresh and exciting, meaningful â that is no longer?
 
Now, think about the people around you? How many do you âknow by heart?â If youâre really honest with yourself, whom do you take for granted because you know him or her so well?
 
I guess one of the risks of life is that we could become so familiar with something or someone that we donât spend as much time concentrating on it, him, or her, as we once did.
 
Our religion â that is, the way in which we live out our faith â is just as susceptible to becoming empty ritual. How many times have we found ourselves in church saying the words and going through the motions, but deep inside, our souls are dry? It can happen to any of us â even preachers. I think as we go through the...

    Three Simple Things: Feed, Tend, Feed
Fri, 4 May 2007 17:21:00 GMT (13.0 Mb)
If there is one thing that our world loves, itâs a âsilver bulletâ that provides a one-step, magically complete solution to a problem, a task, or reaching a goal.  Witness all of the products and plans out there which try and sell you one of these silver bullets: With weight loss, controlling the cortisol hormone is the current silver bullet thatâs making people rich. Cortislim and other companies tell you, âitâs not your fault that youâre fat â itâs just stress and that nasty old hormone. Control the hormone, and youâll have the body youâve always wanted but couldnât get!â Riiiiight. Friends, I do have some genetically-inherited tendencies to be heavyâ but I am the one who ate too much and didnât exercise enough. Pure and simple, it IS my fault, and no silver bullet will reverse the weight gain other than exercise, healthy living, and eating fewer calories than I burn. And I donât care how much hair regrowing stuff I could buy, itâs not coming back. Minoxidil, Avacor, whatever. There are better things to worry about.
In the business world, there are all sorts of plans that say we can become rich and powerful with ease â just use the silver bullet! Beauti...

    No Matter How Rotten You Are
Fri, 4 May 2007 17:20:00 GMT (14.4 Mb)
One of the hardest things we have to do as followers of Jesus is to apply the word of God to real life. It would be nice to be able to use all of the beautiful words and grand concepts of scripture without getting into tangles, but thatâs the way life is. When I say that we get into âtangles,â this is what I mean: when we apply the word of God to real life, as we reach our conclusions and attempt to come up with a consistent way of living out those conclusions, traditions almost always result.

What are some of the traditions that we have around here? We have Missions in Motion and harvest festivals in the fall, to give thanks for the harvest and to support some of the ministries we believe are important. Lots of folks in our community canât imagine life without sports in our schools.  Thereâs a bunch of guys who drink coffee at the hardware store (including me, sometimes) and discuss how the world is getting along. As a society, we have a tradition of putting our money in banks instead of burying it in the back yard (or whatever).  Even though we are supposedly a nation that promotes freedom of religion (not âfreedom from religionâ as some advocate) we tra...

    The Positive Side of Doubt
Sun, 15 Apr 2007 21:19:00 GMT (14.2 Mb)
For todayâs sermon, I want to focus in on how this passage really teaches us that sometimes, doubt will help us arrive at a stronger faith.

A lot of the time, when we read this passage, we zero in on Thomas as the one who is the âdoubter,â the one whose faith needs to be firmed up by actually seeing and touching Jesus.  But actually, all of the disciples need some faith firming â because all of them are suffering from some doubt!

On the day of resurrection, Jesusâ words to Mary were not initially sufficient to confirm her faith.  Jesus had to call her by name before she recognized Him.  When she went and told the disciples, âI have seen the Lord,â their faith was still not at full strength.

And now, they are still in the same state of fear and doubt.  Verse 19 says, âOn the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with you!â

They were in fear because of the Jews â and that Jesus suddenly stood among them likely produced some fear, too.  They had forsaken Jesus in His hour of trial,...

    The Case for Living a Deliberately Virtuous Life
Mon, 9 Apr 2007 03:40:00 GMT (13.4 Mb)

Harry Denman, the great Methodist evangelist of the mid-20th Century, is reported to have prayed the Lordâs Prayer with a significant addition:  it was not just âthy will be done,â it was âthy will be done in ME, in ME.â

This world â in fact, all of creation â was brought into existence for the sole purpose of giving glory to God. Further, this was not just the act of an ego-centric God who simply desired someone nearby to worship Him, it was an act of love undertaken that He might have someone to share the joy of life with Him. That is why each one of us is here â to acknowledge the loving glory of the Lord God Almighty, through lives that are fittingly lived as a testament to the reason for our very existence.

That sounds easy enough.  However, with the love of God came freedom.  Each of us was created with the ability to make our own choices.  So, we donât just automatically begin living lives of holiness at the moment of our birth.  The process of overcoming the sinful nature within us begins when we first ask God to help us become a new person, the person that He created us to be.

The journey begins with the real...

    Chosen, Not Frozen (Easter)
Mon, 9 Apr 2007 03:38:00 GMT (15.4 Mb)
Have you ever seen the movie, Forever Young?  Forever Young is the story of a test pilot (played by Mel Gibson) who loses his true love. He is so devastated by his loss that he is heartbroken. Seeing no reason to stick around, he volunteers for a scientific experiment which will cryogenically freeze him.

The way the story unfolds, first, the laboratory is destroyed in a fire â and his scientist friend dies trying to save him â and then, the capsule in which he is frozen falls between the cracks of government paperwork. Forty or fifty years later, I donât remember which, a group of young boys stumble across the capsule when they are playing in the warehouse where it is stored.

Being boys, they start messing around with the capsule, and Mel Gibsonâs character is revived. He befriends one boyâs mother and learns that, against all odds, his old sweetheart is still alive. The permanent coma she was supposedly in lasted only a few years, and she had woken up and continued on with her life. They canât stay together because the process that froze him was not perfect, and once thawed, he begins to rapidly age. But for a moment, he was able to reconnect with hi...

    Letting Jesus be Jesus (Palm Sunday)
Sun, 8 Apr 2007 22:38:00 GMT (9.6 Mb)
âLetting Jesus Be Jesusâ
Luke 19:28-40
April 1, 2007

Think about the annual silliness of the Academy Awards on television.

Silliness? Why would I say a thing like that?

Well, itâs like this. The Academy Awards, or the Oscars, as theyâre called, attract the attention of one-sixth of the human race, according to TV ratings data. Nearly a billion people tune in or attend so they can see their favorite stars on the red carpet. Over the years, all of the gawking and gossip has turned into a world-stopping event. The E! Entertainment network features a multi-hour âpre-showâ before the beginning of the awards show itself so that there can be continuous coverage of the stars arriving for the ceremony.

Hereâs why this strikes me as so much silliness: with all of the attention the Oscars get, youâd think the actors and actresses are the pinnacle of human civilization, destined for immortality and the eternal worship of their fans. But is this true? Well, this year it is â but what about next year? Will the glitter, glamour, and gossip still shine for themâ or will they be yesterdayâs news?

I think the attraction of the whole Hol...

    Who We Really Are
Mon, 5 Mar 2007 05:02:00 GMT (12.5 Mb)
The key verse of this passage to pay attention to is the first verse we read, verse 17.  Paul says, âjoin with others in following my exampleââ and âtake note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you.â (NIV)

Here in Lent, as followers of the Methodist tradition of the Christian faith, we have examples and patterns that we are accustomed to following.  We will in some way follow the church calendar established in early Christian tradition; this means that forty-six days before Easter, we have a day called âAsh Wednesday.â  Forty-three days later, on Good Friday, we remember the death of our Lord, and forty-six days after Ash Wednesday, we have a glorious Sunday celebration of our Lordâs resurrection.  Fifty days after that, itâs Pentecost.  And so on.  But while that is the same for many, the details sometimes vary.

In our country, itâs very common to see our Roman Catholic friends eating fish on Fridays during Lent, foregoing red meat as part of their Lenten discipline.  But in Mexico, sea turtle is often on the menu; in other parts of Latin America, thereâs a green iguana that is the traditional Lenten Ã...

    Conspiracy: Breathing Together
Thu, 22 Feb 2007 20:20:00 GMT (12.1 Mb)
We Americans really like our conspiracies.  For years, we have enjoyed spending time learning about the conspiracies that supposedly occurred at Roswell, New Mexico after space aliens crashed there â and that some say continue today.  If you talk to some folks about the governments of the world, after a while, youâre sure to run into conspiracy theories about âone world government,â and how the âTri-lateral Commissionâ is the power that really runs things in this world. 

The issue of who really killed JFK, and how many shooters there were, is a question that never goes away.  There are many theories of what happened.

Space aliens, the world ruled by a small group of secretive and insanely wealthy old men; the belief that pro wrestling isnât fakeâ (well, maybe that last one isnât a true conspiracy theory) â they go on and on.  If you look around the world, youâll see that we Americans are not the only ones who speculate on who is running things, and what is going on behind the scenes in all of Creation.  Thereâs always someone to see that the âhidden hand of the puppeteerâ is everywhere!

Theodore Sasson, a socio...

    Message in a Bottle
Sun, 4 Feb 2007 20:45:00 GMT (13.3 Mb)
Have you ever thought about the journey that the printed Word of God has gone through, just to get to you here today?

Our reading today from 1 Corinthians has been a long time coming:  Paul sent a message that made it to the church of Corinth in Greece, to churches throughout the Mediterranean, to churches around the world, and finally to our church today. On its journey, this message has been written on papyrus, inked on parchment, printed in Bibles, and posted on the Internet.  It has been passed on in spoken form from time to time, and it has seen every corner of this earth since it was first written.  Not exactly a message in a bottle, but the same idea:  a message from long ago and far away, traveling to communicate with unknown recipients.

Paul begins this last major section of 1 Corinthians with a reminder of what he had preached while in Corinth, and of what he wrote in this letter.  What should not be missed is that Paul received the Gospel and then passed it on:  see verse 3, in the first half: âFor what I received I passed on to you as of first importanceââ

It doesnât matter whether you are dealing with the Wor...

    Blood and Love
Fri, 2 Feb 2007 20:39:00 GMT (13.3 Mb)
Today, we are going to study the âmost excellent wayâ that Paul writes about in this chapter (Chapter 13) of 1 Corinthians.  This âmost excellent wayâ gets right down to the issue of what it is that holds the Christian life and the Christian community together:  love.

The singular feature of love is that it seeks to always build UP, not tear DOWN.  With its partners, faith and hope, it is the most powerful force in the universe.

A college professor was preparing to retire, and was asked what he thought the most important part of his years as a teacher had been.  His response was, âI have spent my career being a traffic officer. Most people who direct traffic are trying to avoid collisions. But I have been trying to arrange them. I have considered it my calling to arrange collisions between the minds of young people and the great truths of our human existence."

Paul was trying to arrange that kind of collision between the love of God and the members of the Corinthian church.

The Corinthiansâ concern over proper beliefs and the distribution of spiritual gifts had worn them out, and they needed to regain their strengt...

    Different Bodies
Sun, 21 Jan 2007 23:56:00 GMT (13.3 Mb)
Everywhere â or maybe anywhere â you go, it seems that life does its best to mold us into something like something else â cut from the same mold with the same cutter.

If you go into Fargo or any other growing area where there are lots of houses being built, there are rows and rows of new houses that are virtually the same. At least to a quick inspection, the major difference is that the builder might have alternated between putting the deck on the left instead of the right!

The fashion industry does its best to keep us wearing what other people are wearing â guys and gals alike.  In the corporate world, even though there are some outfits that have become a little more casual in their dress, pretty much everyone dresses like everyone else for business.

Corporate America many times works very hard to make sure that their representatives look as though they have all come from the same mold. Take McDonalds, for example, and their icon, Ronald McDonald.

Ronald came around in 1963. Do you know who the very first Ronald McDonald was? It was Willard Scott, who spent many years as the Today Showâs weather man. Willard, as Ronald, started out wit...

    All the Same (Part 1)
Mon, 15 Jan 2007 00:49:00 GMT (11.1 Mb)
âAll the Same â Part 1â
1 Corinthians 12:1-11

This is the first installment in a series on living in the body of Christ â the community of faith â and how we each are an important part of the body.

Iâm calling this series âAll the Same,â because that is the focus of what Paul is writing in the 12th Chapter and beyond.

Paul wants to make sure that his readers understand that God has given each and every one of them the gifts that they need to grow into the fullness of their discipleship potential.  As an early Church Father said, spiritual gifts are ââvisible signs that the Holy Spirit is at work in the faithful.â (Theodoret of Cyr).

The important thing to remember about spiritual gifts is that they are intended to glorify God and let others know that God is at work.  They are not intended to make some of us in the Kingdom âstars,â to be lifted up and adored by the rest of the congregation.  We are all the same in the Lord.

Why would Paul be getting this specific with his people?

If you go back and read the sections of this letter before Chapter 12, youâll see why Paul is turning to this topic.&n...

    Reacting in Christian Love
Thu, 14 Dec 2006 01:37:00 GMT (11.5 Mb)
I have the privilege of serving three very generous churches, and part of what I say this morning is out of the desire to express some thankfulness for your discipleship.  When I look at the track record that you folks have built with your work for not only causes in the home town, but continuing the mission of the Kingdom by supporting work done elsewhere, I have to pause and give thanks â and then say, WOW!

The words that Paul wrote to the folks at Philippi were to acknowledge what a giving and generous community of faith they were.

These folks were not just generous â they were generous givers who gave so that the work of the Kingdom might be done, and the Gospel could be heard in new places, reaching new souls with the good news of salvation.

So what is the mark of a faith-filled giver?  If we follow closely what Paul wrote, weâll note in verse 10 that the faith-filled giver is one who FIRST gives with the love that Christ exhibited AND ALSO discerns what is best before giving, so that what he or she does give offers praise and glory to God.

Americans in general are a VERY giving people.  What we give to one cause or another...

    Holy Days -- Or 'Hollow' Days? - 1 Thess 3:9-13
Mon, 4 Dec 2006 18:01:00 GMT (12.3 Mb)
I have always enjoyed learning about words â where they came from; that is, what language started them, what their original meaning and usage was, and how they have changed on their journey to âtoday.â

Ok, Iâm an English major!  It runs with the territory!

Our modern word âholidayâ began in Old English: haligdaeg, a combination of halig (holy) and daeg (day); meaning both âreligious festivalâ and âday of recreation.â[1]

âReligious Festivalâ we understand, but what about ârecreation?â  We think of recreation as something âfun,â but thatâs only been since about 1400.  At first, the word was a Latin word, recreare, meaning âto refresh or restore.â[2]

So, ideally, holy days â such as those of Advent â are meant not only to be those days that remind us of the important things of our faith, but also renew us in our bodies, minds, and souls.

But we know that renewal often is the last thing that comes to us in this season. We so often drive ourselves nuts shopping, cooking, trying to keep up with everything.  Very often, weâre relieved when January 2nd arrives because we can go back to the old grind, bor...

    Finding Value in the Here and Now
Mon, 27 Nov 2006 01:46:00 GMT (13.7 Mb)
Now that weâre done with Thanksgiving and are plunging headlong into the annual insanity known as Advent, itâs time that we, as people of faith, hit the brakes (even for just a moment) and do some thinking of the value of the here-and-now.

âWhatâs that supposed to mean?â someone is going to ask.  Well, itâs like this:  as a people, we are very much future-oriented:  whatâs coming up tomorrow, next week, next year?

At some point, though, we MUST slow down and take stock of whatâs happening NOW.  Itâs a truth that weâre not going to live forever.  Life has a beginning and an end, and we can certainly live as though weâre going to be around foreverâ but that will always rob us of finding some of the meaning in life that awaits us in the here-and-now.

This is not to say we should ignore the future.  Our Christian faith is full of reminders that life not only has a start and a finish, but that there is meaning to be found and experienced in the flow of our days from birth to death and there is a glorious future for the faithful in Godâs plan.

Our church year begins on the first Sunday of Advent, and then move...

    Creating Something Great - Mark 12:38-44
Mon, 13 Nov 2006 03:22:00 GMT (10.3 Mb)
This passage teaches us about giving, and that much is very obvious.  You may have heard this passage used more than once for a financial stewardship sermon; and indeed, this is one âangleâ of the text.

But, God is not a âgive your money and forget the restâ God.  God is an âeverythingâ Creator.  âGod does not love only certain portions of us, but the whole person. 

Therefore, the response that is expected of the faithful is that we would love God in the same fashion ... the bottom line is that we are called to give our whole life to a God who first loved us so dramatically as to send the beloved Son to give His life for us.â[1] 

So really, this passage at its heart offers a contrast between true love for God and the absence of true love for God.  In the early writings of the Christian Church, the widow Father Jerome puts it this way: âThe widowâs gift was measured not by its weight but by the goodwill by which it was offered ... (Jerome) a good will alone suffices for readiness for the kingdom. (Caesarius of Arles)

By having this kind of love for God in our hearts, we are participating the creation of so...

    Saints - Ruth 1:1-18
Mon, 6 Nov 2006 01:06:00 GMT (13.7 Mb)
Today, we thank God for the bounty of this yearâs harvest and for the bounty of lives that have enriched our own through the years â the saints of God. 

As a first order of business, itâs only right that we should consider what it is that makes a saint, a âsaint.â

Whether you are thinking of the Catholic traditionâs definition of sainthood or a saint of God that we in the Protestant neighborhood think of it, it pretty much comes down to a person who lived a life of exceptional holiness.

Uh-oh!  What if someone DIDNâT live a life of âexceptional holiness?â  Now weâre making judgmentsâ better look out!

Itâs hard to say what makes a saint for one group of people that will allow another group to brand that same individual as less-than-righteous.

Take for example some of the comparisons that have been made between the men and women who braved the Depression and fought in and prevailed during World War II â the generation that Tom Brokaw described as âThe Greatest Generation,â and their children, the so-called âBoomers.â

The âgreatest generationâ did some truly great things.  They helped advance...

    Tombstones & Treasures - Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7
Wed, 1 Nov 2006 16:44:00 GMT (15.1 Mb)
Hereâs the message the prophet Jeremiah brought to God's people as they endured exile in Babylon:  No matter where you are, your true home is with the Lord.

The children of Israel had been driven from their homeland and taken as prisoners to a foreign land. It was important that they remember that they had not been driven out as God's people. God was still their Heavenly Father, and they were still His children. The lesson that they had to learn was, God was with them, even when they were not in the Promised Land.

If we interpret this through the teachings of the New Testament, this is what Jeremiahâs message means for us: We are âat homeâ in the body of Christ (regardless of our geography), yet we are also always âin transitâ as we live out our witness in this age.

There had been false prophets telling the Israelites that their exile was about to end â sooner than later. It was stirring up the people, and they were living as short-timers. God speaks to Jeremiah and says, âGo tell them that itâs not over yet.â

So Jeremiah goes and tells the people: âDo the things that you would do at home â because your exile is not yet over.â <...

    Faith in a Storm (Job 38:1-11, 34-41)
Mon, 23 Oct 2006 17:57:00 GMT (12.2 Mb)
In 1992, Hurricane Andrew struck, destroying lives and property where ever it went. A few days after Andrew destroyed her home, a 7-year-old girl asked her father why God let it happen. What happened? 160-mile-per-hour winds ripped the roof from the Mexican familyâs home while they huddled in a stairwell. The girlâs father found himself wanting to defend God. âI didnât want her to think badly of God â but I had no words,â he said. He finally told her, âI donât understand why this happened. But sometimes you have to lose the roof to see the sky.â[1]
Just a few short years ago, we all watched in horror as airliners crashed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon; another airliner was flown into the ground in Pennsylvania on that day. As the death toll went higher and higher and the magnitude of that dayâs loss and suffering began sinking in, many of us turned to God and asked, âWhy? Why did you let this happen?â
Hurricane Katrina rocked our world last year.  There have been so many things that have caused many to ask God, âWhy did you let this happen?â  For those who sincerely believe that God has every moment of life completely planned out, this ...

    When God Doesn't Answer
Mon, 16 Oct 2006 02:31:00 GMT (12.0 Mb)
Text: Job 23:1-9, 16-17

One thing that has challenged the faithful for ages has been the times of silence â not the times when we are silent, but the times when, for us, God is silent.

An anonymous writer once commented on this in a work called The Cloud of Unknowing:[1]

âYou may find a kind of darkness around your mind, as it were a cloud of unknowing.  You seem to feel nothing in your will except a naked intent toward God.  However hard you try to do something about it, this darkness and this cloud remain between you and God.  It seems as though you neither see God by the light of understanding nor feel God in the sweetness of love and affection.  But learn to live with this darkness, crying out always to him who you love.â

The story of Job is a familiar one to many of us: Job is an upright, blameless, God-fearing man. Satan challenges God, saying that Job is so well behaved only because things are going swimmingly for him.

In response, God permits Satan to heap great troubles on Job â including the loss of his property and goods, the death of his children and the affliction of his body.

We know that a...

    Becoming One Flesh
Sun, 15 Oct 2006 05:21:00 GMT (13.6 Mb)
Text: Mark 10:2-16

I think that before I go any further, one thing that I want to make sure that I have said is that this is not so much a sermon against divorce as it is a sermon that is for marriage.

These words that Jesus spoke about divorce are perhaps the most clearly-spoken statements against divorce in the entire Bible.  But, there are other teachings in the Bible that, while considering divorce and remarriage undesirable, do allow for its occurring.

In Genesis, 1:26-27, we read that God created us male and female, made in His image â and, when we read into Genesis 2, itâs also very clear that marriage is a very profound event:  ââ a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.â (Ge 2:24, NIV)  The bond of marriage is seen to be something so strong that divorce is to be avoided; it is seen as something evil that is contrary to Godâs reign over Creation.

But, in Exodus 21, a female Hebrew slave (we assume that she was purchased as a âbrideâ) has the right to âdivorceâ her owner (by leaving) if he fails to provide food, clothing, or marital rights to her.

Th...

    Invite, Welcome, Celebrate
Wed, 27 Sep 2006 18:02:00 GMT (12.0 Mb)
2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19
September 24, 2006
 
The essential lesson of this passage of scripture is that, whether you are picking up the ark of God or moving your church building 35 feet -- whenever you are intending to change, you absolutely must seek Godâs will and be constantly aware of his presence. The ultimate question should never be, âshould we do this?â but, âis this what God wants?â The teaching of this story is about how to invite, welcome, and celebrate Godâs presence.
 
1.     Inviting Godâs Presence: Seeking Godâs Will. 
 
Seeking Godâs will is a process that first directs us to look into the past and then look forward to the future.
 
What looks to the past in this passage is Davidâs bringing of the ark to Jerusalem. His actions recall how God has fulfilled his promises to David, and to Israelâs ancestors before him.
 
The Temple in the center of the city represents the presence of God in the midst of the people.  When we look to the past we are reminded of how God has faithfully kept his promises and helped us to grow in grace. The witness of the faithful wh...

    The Connected Christian
Wed, 27 Sep 2006 18:00:00 GMT (8.8 Mb)
âThe Connected Christianâ
Proverbs 1:20-33

How âconnectedâ are you?  Another way to ask that might be, âhow many ways do you keep in touch with the people in your life?â

Letâs see â how many ways can we think of?

        Conversation, face-to-face
        Telephones (including cell phones)
        Email
        Cards & Letters
        ??

There are so many ways to stay connected today.  It seems like everything IS connected!  Parking meters at the University of California in Santa Barbara, for example, are now part of a network that you can contact by phone. Coming soon are smart, networked parking meters that can talk to each other and report information to a Web site. If you drive into an area and want to know where an open space is, you simply use your cell phone to access the Web site and find an unused meter.

Even better, you will soon be able to punch a button and make a reservation. The meter will flash ...

    Unlocking a Soul (Mark 7:24-37)
Wed, 13 Sep 2006 17:31:00 GMT (12.0 Mb)
Is your soul âunlocked?â
Mark 7:24-37
September 10, 2006

If the Gospel is ever to reach all of the corners of Creation as Christ commanded, each and every person needs to have an unlocked soul.

The people who we seek to share the Good News with need to have their souls unlocked so they can receive the life-changing message.  Of course, this is something that occurs between God and themselves through the work of the Holy Spirit.

The other side of this is that WE disciples must make sure that our souls REMAIN unlocked!  If our souls are locked, it will be hard (if not impossible) for us to hear Godâs leading in our living; if we canât hear Godâs voice, we wonât be able to easily respond to the call.

In this story of Jesus, itâs pretty obvious of how important an unlocked soul is for a person who is seeking the Lordâs assistance.  For both the Syrophoenician woman and her daughter, and the deaf-mute man, hearts and souls had to be unlocked for them to be set free of their problems. 

But itâs equally important that the soul of a disciple be unlocked, too.  The history behind this story illustrates...

    Clay in His Hands - Jeremiah 18:1-11
Tue, 5 Sep 2006 20:50:00 GMT (11.4 Mb)
The essence of the Good News of Godâs gospel is that God can take anything â perfect or imperfect â and reshape and reform it into treasure: something of value, something useful, and something that has a purpose.

The powerful meaning of this passage of scripture comes from the yotzer, or potter, who symbolizes Godâs creative activity in our world. The potter takes something that is common and apparently worthless â clay â and transforms it into something with function, value, and even beauty.

Though we still have potters today, the art of hand-made pottery is not as common in America as it once was. Another way you might think of taking something that is apparently worthless and transforming it into something with function, value, and possibly beauty is recycling.

In the US, we donât always think of recycling as such a profoundly powerful activity. We recycle newspapers, old batteries, printer cartridges, and so on. But if you looked not far from the US, in Cuba, you could find some very creative examples of recycling. Cuba has never been a very rich nation; after the Soviet Union collapsed in the 1990s, things became even grimmer. Since the people...

    A Strong Defense - Ephesians 6:10-20
Mon, 28 Aug 2006 22:55:00 GMT (13.1 Mb)
A popular saying of our culture is that âthe best defense is a strong offenseâ â a âdo unto your enemies before they do unto youâ philosophy of living.  This reflects one of the currents that underlie our way of thinking as a people:  the concept of rightful revenge. If wrong has been done to you, you have permission to get even with them.

I bring this up because todayâs scripture lesson is one that we know very well â perhaps even too well.  We might have gone to Vacation Bible School as a kid and made little swords and helmets while memorizing these verses.  I remember that this passage was the basis for what we taught one of my years as a camp counselor.

The point is, this is a very comfortable passage of scripture for usâ and if we donât pay close attention to what is in the text, and what underlies the text, we could find ourselves falling into a trap:  considering Godâs armor to be an OFFENSIVE weapon, not a DEFENSE against the spiritual trials that come our way.

âA trap â what do you mean by that?â some would ask.  Letâs go through what Paul has written here, and I think youâll understand what I mean.
    Time Well Spent
Tue, 22 Aug 2006 20:38:00 GMT (9.1 Mb)

Text: Ephesians 5:15-20

               The sense of what the Apostle Paul was writing about really hit me this week, late in the week. School is just about to start; the urgency of harvest is upon us.  Once the beet harvest kicks off, things will really be moving! It seems as though the summer didnât last as long this year, and it looks as though fall and winter will be busy, too.
               The key word in this passage is âtime,â taken from the Greek work âkairos.â The New International Version translates it as âevery opportunityâ in verse 16. âKairosâ is a word with many layers of meaning: it can refer to a certain measure of time, past-present-future; or it can point out a decisive moment in time that has been divinely determined as a moment of choice â for example, when you read in the Bible about âa time of the Lordâs favor,â that would be a moment when a decision is expected of you. The way Paul is using the word gives the sense that you have been given a certain amount of time to get things done, so...

    The Marks of the Church
Sun, 6 Aug 2006 22:01:00 GMT (13.7 Mb)
Text: Ephesians 4:1-16

The family of God is held together by ties of grace:
Peace, Shared Values, Spiritual Gifts, and Our Caring

Letâs celebrate one of Godâs gifts to us today:  the family of God that was created through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Family as we usually think of it are persons âwho are descended from a common ancestor,â or âhaving kinship with one another, either through social or genetic connection.â[1]

Another kind of family occurs when you have a group of people who are brought together by common beliefs and activities â like the church.  Thereâs a wonderful description of the family of God written by A.W. Tozer:

âHas it ever occurred to you that 100 pianos all tuned to the same fork are automatically tuned to each other? They are of one accord by being tuned, not to each other, but to another standard to which each one must individually bow. So 100 worshipers [meeting] together, each one looking away to Christ, are in heart nearer to each other than they could possibly be, were they to become âunityâ conscious and turn their eyes away from God to strive for closer fellowship.â
From âThe Pur...

    Faith, Plainly Spoken (Acts 2:1-21)
Mon, 5 Jun 2006 01:26:00 GMT (14.4 Mb)

We love hearing this story of the birth of the church again and again because it is such a powerful moment in the formation of our faith history as Christians.  And rightly so, because it reminds us again and again of how in the coming of the Holy Spirit, God made sure the world would know that the Gospel is for everyone in all of creation. 

Yet, the moment that the Holy Spirit came upon the people is a very small part of this reading.  The true miracles of this moment lie in the miracle of communication God provided. 

 Communication is something very much needed in our world.  In terms of language, and within languages, this important work must be done.  There are transformations that could be going faster were this communication barrier not in existence.    

 The European Union is currently a body of 25 countries with 20 spoken languages.  This means, in practical terms, that EU Parliament now needs to have 57 trilingual interpreters on hand. For another thing, it means that each member nation has the right to require any EU document to be translated into its native tongue. Among other thin...

    The Race
Mon, 29 May 2006 01:57:00 GMT (15.5 Mb)
Text: 1 Kings 2:1-11
 
90 years ago tomorrow, one of the most popular auto races in America will take place -- the Indy 500.  There's a lot of history attached to the race for racing fans -- A.J. Foyt winning four times, the fourth in 1977; Janet Guthrie was the first female driver, also in 1977.  Tom Sneva broke the 200 miles-per-hour barrier in the Indy 500.  Great stuff!
But you need to go back to the first years of the Indy 500 to begin to get a sense of why the race is such an American favorite today, 90 years after its beginnings.
In 1912, something happened that caught America's attention, something that had an effect that has lasted until today.  The funny thing is, what happened had nothing to do with the winner of the race. 
In 1912, a man named Joe Dawson won the race.  But it was the accomplishment of another driver, Ralph DePalma, that was so inspirational.
Ralph led the pack in his Mercedes for nearly the entire race.  In the course of doing so, he broke every existing speedway record for 450 miles.  He had an eight-lap lead -- victory was almost guaranteed -- and his car died -- with...

    Spiritual Victories
Tue, 23 May 2006 14:52:00 GMT (14.4 Mb)


1 John
5:1-6




 What is a
âspiritual victory?â




Be careful
when you answer that question!  Itâs all
well and good to claim âthe victoryâ in the Name of Jesus Christ â but itâs not
a victory if it wasnât achieved for the right reasons, in the right
manner.  This is because the victories of
Godâs people â when rightly achieved â have nothing to do with domination, only
transformation. 




 The first
letter of John also describes Jesus as a victorious Savior, and we need to focus
our attention on WHY His victory is OUR victory.  Hereâs the âwhyâ of the victory: our faith in
Jesus turns us into children of God, and makes us members of Godâs family.




 One way you
can tell this is because in the text, John places a much higher emphasis on
BELIEVING than simply having FAITH.




 Whatâs the
difference?  FAITH does not only BELIEVE
â it literally entrusts itself to the object of oneâs belief.  In doing so, faith frees a person to step out
and...

    Ultimate Truth
Mon, 15 May 2006 00:24:00 GMT (12.5 Mb)


1 John
4:7-21
Love is a
dominant theme in Johnâs letters, but it is not the only one.  The theme of love goes hand in hand with another
essential:  truth.



 What do we
know about truth?  âTruthâ defined is âa
fact that has been verified;â âconforming to reality or actuality.â[1]


 


Truth is
what is REALLY happening, has REALLY occurred, or REALLY exists â and truth is
not just what you or I think it is. 
Truth takes into account reality, without distraction or personal
agenda, in presenting the facts.




 God by very
nature IS truth.  In this
sometimes-confusing world of ours, itâs sometimes hard to separate truth from
less-than-truthful.  Human nature gets in
the way.  Hereâs an example of how that
can happen, and the effects that can proceed from such an event:




 About five
or six years ago, a man named Bryan Winter met a woman in a bar in Washington,
D.C.  They talked; they danced, and
exchanged email addresses.  Nothing more
that tha...

    Righteous Conduct
Mon, 1 May 2006 23:56:00 GMT (11.8 Mb)








âRighteous
Conductâ1
John 3:1-7April
30, 2006




The
passage from Johnâs letter that we read last week had an inward focus: how
confession is an essential part of the Christian life that helps us be
accountable to God and our brothers and sisters in the Body of Christ.




This
week, John takes our focus outward.  A
good way to sum up this all up is to say, âthe treasure of our hearts provides
the basis for our behavior.  If love
lives in our hearts, its qualities will be visible in our lives.â




So
much of the way our society behaves today can be summed up in The Toddler Property Laws:




1.     If I like it, itâs
mine.
2.     If itâs in my hand,
itâs mine.


3.     If I can take it from
you, itâs mine.


4.     If I had it a little
while ago, itâs mine.


5.     If itâs mine, it must
never appear to be yours in any way.


6.&...

    How to Give Life
Sat, 15 Apr 2006 17:58:00 GMT (13.6 Mb)




ÃïïHow to Give LifeÃïï



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    The Fear Factor
Mon, 13 Mar 2006 04:18:00 GMT (13.5 Mb)








âThe Fear Factorâ
















Mark 8:31-38

 

A
TV show thatâs had some high popularity is âFear Factor.â People actually
audition to be on a TV show where the producers will do their best to rattle
them â hard. The contestant who is the most successful at facing his or her
fears â at battling âthe fear factorâ â will move on to the next round.

If
you think about it, there are two ways for you to live out the days of your
life: you can either save your life out of fear, or you can lose your life for
others out of faith.[1]
If you live the first way, you are motivated by fear â the fear of losing, of
not being the most powerful, the most successful, not the best. You see this in
people who are driven to acquire power and status for themselves. Deep down,
they are very afraid of something. Their fear drives them on, and often they
are not able to stop. On the other side of living, the way of life made
possible by faith is a life of giving up status and power so that you can bring
    The Way to Heaven
Sun, 26 Feb 2006 20:26:00 GMT (15.1 Mb)









âThe Thing About Heavenâ











2 Kings
2:1-12

February
26, 2006

 

How do you
get to heaven? Depends on which heaven you are talking about. If you want to travel to the stars, money can
get you there. If you have $20M, you can
be just like California investment banker Dennis Tito. Heâs the one who is the
first person who bankrolled his own ride into space. Mark Shuttleworth, a
millionaire from South Africa, followed in his footsteps not too long after. Both
men took advantage of a Russian government program that is trying to keep their
space program alive. Anyone who can afford $20M and pass the physical gets a
ride to the international space station and back.

 

The prophet
Elijah went to heaven, too, but not in a rocket â it was a whirlwind that gave
him the boost. Along with a chariot of fire and horses of fire, off he went in
a blaze of glory.

 

Instead of
talking about how one generation of leaders passes the mantle to another, letâs
stay ...

    Signs
Wed, 22 Feb 2006 18:47:00 GMT (11.8 Mb)








âSignsâ











âSignsâ

Isaiah
43:18-25

February 19,
2006

 

Consider,
if you will, the role that signs play in our lives. They shape our days!

 

Theyâre
predictable, too. Message never
changes. You can look as many times as
you like, they will be very consistent: the same yesterday, today, and forever!

 

Yet,
signs come with their own set of risks:
once we get used to them, we donât pay so much attention to them. We
know whatâs there, so why spend the energy to look again?

 

What
if there were no more signs?

 

I
bet that bothers some of you! âWhy, we
might feel lost without our signs,â some might say. âHow would we know where to
go?â

 

What
is life without signs? Would we know why
we are alive, or what life means? Would we be able to get out of the âmessesâ
we get ourselves into without signs?

 

Thatâs
an interesting thing to consid...

    Power for Living
Mon, 13 Feb 2006 05:11:00 GMT (12.7 Mb)


Text: Jeremiah 31:31-34


Where do you find your power for daily living?


Sometimes, it's helpful to look to the past to understand who you are today, and why your life is "as it is" today.


Just over 70 years ago, America was in the grips of the Great Depression of the 1930s. Those years indelibly marked our nation, and influenced who we would become.


Jeremiah's prophecy reveals how our past shapes us in terms of how things are with our souls. Israel was under siege from the Babylonians. They had fallen away from God -- again.


The Word of the Lord came to Jeremiah, a word of hope: a new covenant was coming, one that would live in the hearts and minds of the people -- a covenant that would deliver them from their sin and brokenness.


Listen on, and see how this new covenant from God gives us all... power for living.


    The Song Is the Same
Fri, 10 Feb 2006 21:59:00 GMT (13.5 Mb)


Text: Acts 10:44-48


The message of our faith has been the same throughout all of time: God loves all that He has created, and desires that all of Creation would live in harmony with Him. Another way to say this is, "from age to age, the song is the same."


However, from age to age, the way that we sing this song does change -- the song (the message) is still the same, but the tune changes.


Listen on to this account from the Book of the Acts of how God's song for humanity was offered in a new and exciting way as the Church was born -- for all times and all generations.





    We Are What We,,,
Mon, 30 Jan 2006 05:17:00 GMT (13.0 Mb)



Text: 1 Corinthians 8:1-13

This passage of scripture highlights a long-standing debate that has gone on in Christian community since the very beginning: what constitutes âsinfulâ behavior?

Some respond to the debate by arriving at a long list of actions â words, deeds, and so on â that constitute âsinâ and live their lives very legalistically in relationship to the list.

Others will go to the opposite extreme and claim that because sin is âso personalâ you canât possibly define what is sinful, and therefore each person has to decide for him or herself, and live according to that decision.

Actually, the answer lies right in the middle, and the Apostle Paul sums it up well: if what you do causes your weaker brother (or sister) to sin, even if it doesnât cause you personally to sin, you have sinned.

In other words, in contemporary terms, we canât fashion our day-to-day Christian life in such a way that places the individual over the communityâs well-being. The life of a believer should lead others to salvation. Therefore, you and I have some choices to make about how we are going to live.

Making this d...

    Getting Real With Jesus
Mon, 12 Dec 2005 03:37:00 GMT (15.5 Mb)



1 John 1:1-2:2

One of the parts of preparing for the arrival of the Lord in our world is remembering the power of Christian community to aid us in our work of getting ready. Christian community is a partnership of people who have a common experience of Jesus Christ. Christian community is NOT a temporary association of people who have banded together for a cause or through some intellectual agreement that has been arrived at about God. It's all about experiencing God the Father and Christ the Son as believers together. The effect of true Christian community is to bring Christ's vision for new life to the people of our world.


The first requirement of living in Christian community is that we live "rightly" within the community. What does that mean? Let's spend some time on verses 6 and 7: "If we claim to walk in fellowship with God yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his son, purifies us from every sin."
Here is why this idea is so important to John: Individuals in his church were claiming that they had an intima...

    The REAL Reality Show
Mon, 5 Dec 2005 08:25:00 GMT (10.1 Mb)
Scripture Focus: Mark 1:1-8



Reality shows are all the rage in television programming today. It all started with the Survivor series, and it seems like the producers are trying to milk every possible angle before the craze dies out.



One thing that all of these show have in common is that they really don't have much to do with REAL life - they don't have a lot of REALITY to them.



Another example of a reality show that actually might come a little closer to the mark is a recent movie called "The Truman Show." Remember that one? The movie tells a story about an orphan who has been adopted by a corporation and raised in an entirely false environment that is broadcast to the outside world 24/7.



It really doesn't matter if it's real or not. People are lapping this up, and the producers are only happy to cater to them. There are even fake news programs on the air that have a good or even great following.



At one time, you tuned into Saturday Night Live for a humorous look at the news of the week. Now, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart says, "When news breaks, we fix it."



On the interne...

    Are You Ready?
Sun, 27 Nov 2005 23:15:00 GMT (9.1 Mb)
This week on Faith Seeds, Rev. Debra Ball-Kilbourne preaches on being ready for the coming of Christ.

Pastor Debra is the Three Rivers District Superintendent of the Dakotas Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church.


    The Hazards of Risking Nothing - Part 2
Sun, 13 Nov 2005 22:35:00 GMT (19.3 Mb)
Scripture: Matthew 25:14-30

The Parable of the Talents offers a lesson on waiting faithfully for Our Lord Christ's return. In the story of servants who respectively put their master's resources to work well or poorly, we see an indication of how we will be held accountable for those gifts, skills, and abilities God has given us.

Will we take the risk of faithful living so our investing of our "talents" will bear greater fruit? Or will we limit our options and possiblities by only staying where things are comfortable?

The choice is ours!

The notes for this sermon can be read at Mac's Musings.


    The Hazards of Risking Nothing
Fri, 4 Nov 2005 01:18:00 GMT (23.3 Mb)
What kind of a "risker" are you? Are you a person who only plays it safe, regardless of circumstance? Or, are you a person who doesn't mind risk at all -- it just adds spice to life?


As disciples, our attitudes and habits regarding risk directly affect how and how well we reach out to others in the name of Our Lord Christ.


While we all are given different gifts by God to use in our service to the Kingdom, none of us are excluded from reaching out.


Listen on... and learn about the hazards of risking nothing.


The notes for this sermon are available at Mac's Musings.

Thanks for listening!


    Bringing Heaven to the People
Wed, 26 Oct 2005 03:10:00 GMT (21.6 Mb)
Thanks for checking in!

This week's sermon is "Bringing Heaven to the People," and is based on Deuteronomy 34:1-12.

The vision of the Promised Land kept the Israelites going in the wilderness -- in faith, they believed that one day, God would fulfill the covenants made with their patriarchs. Moses, as their leader, "brought heaven to the people" as he relayed the Word of God to his people.

The church has the same work to do today -- to keep the vision of heaven alive until all of creation has embraced it on a personal level.

In other words, we prepare for the reign of God's Kingdom on earth by.... bringing heaven to the people.

The notes for this sermon, as always, are available at Mac's Musings.


    Value and Status - Philippians 3:4b-14
Tue, 4 Oct 2005 03:32:00 GMT (15.9 Mb)
There are many things that our world uses to determine the value and status of a person -- money, clothes, heritage, diamonds.

In this portion of Paul's letter to the Philippian church, we learn that these things mean nothing to God, and we should let them go so we may freely grow toward God, being perfected in his divine grace.

The notes for this sermon are available at Mac's Musings.

The following is extra HTML code so Odeo can scan this podcast and add it to their listings: My Odeo Channel (odeo/6f760d79de5a324e)

Thanks for listening!


    Into the Future
Sun, 25 Sep 2005 18:55:00 GMT (13.0 Mb)
Look to the future and envision what your part in fulfilling God's plan is to be. Now, what is your mission -- how will you fulfill God's call in practical, concrete terms?

Proverbs 29:18 says (in the King James Version), "where there is no vision, the people perish."

This is why it is so important for God's people to not only have a vision of God' work, but a plan for effectively doing God's work.

Notes for this sermon are available at Mac's Musings.


    A Question of Taste - Exodus 16
Thu, 22 Sep 2005 03:56:00 GMT (15.3 Mb)
Scientists are developing chemicals, called "taste enhancers," that won't change the taste of the food we eat -- but will change how we perceive the taste of the food.

Imagine what this could mean -- food could be produced with less unhealthy fat, salt, sugar, and so on, while we could still enjoy the taste of the food as it was before.

Now, think about our "tastes" in our spiritual life: how can God change us so that our perception of the life of faith could be changed so we find satisfaction even when there aren't many "menu options" for us?

The notes for this sermon are available at Mac's Musings.


    Theodicy and the Odyssey of Faith
Sun, 11 Sep 2005 20:27:00 GMT (18.2 Mb)
Theodicy is a term that denotes humanity's attempts to understand why evil is in our world, and what God has to do with evil's existence.

An odyssey is a long journey, physical or spiritual, that often produces change in a person's life through the challenges that surface during the journey.

Part of our odyssey of faith involves understanding the question of theodicy: In events that involve evil, where is God in all of this?

This sermon, preached on Patriot Day 2005, tries to offer some understanding of how God works good even in the face of evil.

You can read the notes for this sermon at Mac's Musings.


    Why "Living Right" Is Important - Romans 13:8-14
Sun, 4 Sep 2005 20:25:00 GMT (17.7 Mb)

God's commandments (all of them) were made out of love for the humanity he created, and with whom he yearns to be in fellowship.

This reaching-out by God shows us how we can best respond to his love -- through love of neighbor.

"Living right" is a way of saying that our lives should be lived in a constant effort to strengthen Christian community by sharing God's love.

Why is "living right" important? The answer is a simple one: to help the next generation of believers come to faith and continue the work of the Kingdom!

You can read the notes for this sermon at Mac's Musings.


    No Matter How Rotten You Are - Mark 7:1-23
Mon, 22 Aug 2005 05:00:00 GMT (14.4 Mb)
This sermon is about traditions -- how they can be good, how they can be shells that keep you from getting closer to God because of walls they have created.

In Jesus' critique of the Pharisees' insistence on maintaining traditions that do not promote holiness, we are challenged to examine our own traditions to see if they are still good for us and our relationship with God, and to make changes if they are not.

You can read the notes for this sermon at Mac's Musings.


    God's Fingerprints - Genesis 45:1-15
Mon, 15 Aug 2005 03:48:00 GMT (14.1 Mb)
A standard way for law enforcement personnel to determine who exactly has been present at a crime scene is to locate fingerprints, and then try and match them to the suspects.

We can look for God's "fingerprints" in much the same way, to look with eyes of faith to see how God is present and at work in our lives.

In the story of Joseph's acts of mercy toward the brothers who tried to be rid of him, we see how this principle plays itself out in real life.

Where are God's "fingerprints" showing up in your life?

You can read the notes for this sermon at Mac's Musings.


    Bridges of Hope - Romans 8:26-39
Mon, 25 Jul 2005 03:59:00 GMT (14.3 Mb)
The most powerful gift that God has given humanity is hope. Hope builds a bridge between God and ourselves and provides a route for us to grow closer to God. This bridge is provided by God in love, and we walk on it in Faith. Thus, Faith, Hope, and Love are always working in our walk with God.

This bridge of hope that God has provided is like a suspension bridge, which gains its strength from flexibility. No matter what storms life may send against this bridge, it will not collapse.

Let us walk together on God's bridges of hope!

You can read the notes for this sermon at Mac's Musings.


    The Mindset of Christ
Tue, 12 Jul 2005 01:27:00 GMT (17.5 Mb)
God's grace provides the means for us to be successful in discipleship and our quest for perfection in God's grace: living in the mindset of Christ, so that all of our thoughts, words, and deeds will reflect God's will and plan for Creation.

You can read the notes for this sermon at Mac's Musings.


    Rescued - Romans 7:15-25a
Sun, 3 Jul 2005 18:35:00 GMT (8.0 Mb)
One of the frustrations of the Christian life is that even though we have been forgiven of our sins and made new by God, we still sometimes do sinful things though we don't want to -- and have troubles doing the good that we know we should. The Apostle Paul teaches that it is the sin of our fleshly bodies that causes this stress, but that it is the God-given regeneration of our souls through the grace of Christ that helps us overcome sin.

Read the notes for this sermon at Mac's Musings .


    Sanctified Slaves
Mon, 27 Jun 2005 05:19:00 GMT (10.1 Mb)
Text: Romans 6:12-23



To be thought of as a slave is something that most or even all of us find offensive. Yet, if we are honest, we will recognize that we do "sell" ourselves for reasons that we find worthwhile or necessary. For example: We support a family by selling our time and our presence to an employer.



The Apostle Paul uses the imagery of being a slave to illustrate how devoting ourselves to God will ultimately bring perfection through His grace, while retaining our connections with a life of sin will only lead to physical and spiritual death.



Read the text notes for this sermon at
Mac's Musings .


    In_All_Things.mp3
Mon, 20 Jun 2005 00:53:00 GMT (7.0 Mb)
Many small communities in eastern North Dakota were struck by flooding the week of July 5, 2005. This sermon seeks to offer comfort by reminding persons of faith that God can work good through all times of life, both good and bad -- and that observing life through the eyes of faith will help us see and understand this. Text: Romans 8:28


    Faith Seeds : Important_or_Powerful.mp3
Mon, 6 Jun 2005 22:32:20 GMT (9.7 Mb)
We often find ourselves concerned with how important or powerful we are. If we examine the calling of Matthew and the healing stories in Matthew 9, we discover that true importance comes from how we make use of what power we have. Jesus used God's power to start a process of healing and progress toward wholeness in those who would believe and do God's will. How is God's power making these changes in you?


    Out With the Junk!
Wed, 1 Jun 2005 05:03:22 GMT (9.5 Mb)
Paul's letter to the Romans is a veritable catalog of the junk (sin) that can accumulate in a person's life -- and how the power of God can help you clear out the junk and find a renewed life in the process! It's time for a spring cleaning! Will you join in?


    The Community of the Trinity
Tue, 24 May 2005 02:16:46 GMT (9.2 Mb)
God's fullness and completeness expressed in the idea of the Trinity -- Father, Son, and Holy Spirit -- provides a basis for the personality and mission of the Body of Christ, the Church.


    A Holy Nation
Tue, 24 May 2005 02:15:01 GMT (10.7 Mb)
God brings His people into a holy nation that grows stronger through mutual encouragement and prayer; as we grow stronger in this fashion, our outreach to the world becomes more effective.



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