Posts from 2018 (Page 2)

This is our fourth and final week looking at the book of Jonah. We have discovered that the story of Jonah is not quite what we learned as a child in Sunday School; we have explored the grown-up version of Jonah. In Sunday School, the story of Jonah I heard was this: Jonah was asked by God to do something, he didn’t do it and so he was punished, God sent a big whale to…

Today we are back looking at our friend, Jonah. In Chapter 1 of the book of Jonah, we meet up with this unlikely prophet as he receives instructions from God. “Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai, saying, ‘Go at once to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out against it.” (1:1-2) Which Jonah flat out does not do. Occasionally God’s prophets will come up…

Last week we began a series on the Book of Jonah. In chapter one, we took a trip with Jonah on a boat headed to Tarshish, which was in the exact opposite direction of where God had sent him. Jonah thought that he could get away from “the presence of the Lord.” Perhaps you have never done such a thing, but I know there have been times when I have run from God. But we know…

Jonah! We heard this story or at least part of it when we were children. Now that we are grown ups, I think it is a good time for us to look again at this story. Over the next four weeks we will look at this sometimes humorous, sometimes tragic, tale of God’s prophet Jonah. While we often hear this called the story of “Jonah and the whale” it is less about a fish and more…

MATTHEW 13:44-46 A seminary professor I know teaches that each sermon should have just one point, and that everything should guide you to the one point. In our study of the kingdom parables, I have found that to be challenging. What Jesus says and how he says it in these parables presents us with…

MATTHEW 13:31-33 Last week we started a three Sunday series entitled The Mystery of the Kingdom in which we are looking at some of the Kingdom Parables that Jesus used in his teaching. Last week we thought about how helpful it would be if we had a secret decoder of some sort that could help us…

MARK 1:4-11 (You might recognize parts of this sermon as it was used on January 8, 2017. It is essentially the same with a few changes and bears repeating today as we remember our baptism)   In life, water is the essential element. All plants and animals must have water to survive. Without it, there would be no life on earth. In the human body a mere 2% drop in our…