Sermons Archive

The Book of Ruth is one of my favorite books in the Bible, but it certainly starts out darkly; famine, forced immigration and unfortunate deaths.  By verse 5, Naomi and Ruth have already become widows; Naomi losing her husband and her 2 sons.  Then Ruth and Naomi find themselves traveling back to Bethlehem.  The Book...

Our passage from Mark is well known to most of us. Many here have probably heard a dozen sermons or more on this blind man who regains his sight by trusting God.  But today, I would like to focus on the other characters in this story; the nation Israel, the crowd and Jesus.  What do these other characters say and do and in this ancient story?...

Do you have a situation in your life which you wish would change, one that you neither bargained for nor expected? 

Or, is there something that you long to have happen, something which you wish for which has not happened yet? 

Difficulties in life fall into these two categories: those we wish weren’t happening, but are, and those ...

A man, described as young and rich here, and a ruler in the parallel story in Luke 18, kneels before Jesus, calls him Good Teacher, and asks the question of the ages, “What must I do to inherit perpetual life?”  We might ask the question this way in our time, “What must I do to live forever?”  That’s THE ultimate  question—how do I beat death...

Will you please join with me in a word of prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable in your sight O God, our rock and our redeemer.

Today’s scripture takes us into 2 entirely different types of encounters that Jesus had with the people around him, and present two stories  which seem, at first...

After working our way this month through the book of James, we turn now to a reading from Mark’s gospel. This is not an easy text. It seems to be a compilation of a number of different ideas that Mark has brought together. We have first section on exorcism, a second section on sin and temptation and a third on salt. For our time here together I...

For the third week now, we are studying in the book of James, a folksy and
pragmatic letter aimed at helping people get along with one another in
community.  James is not full of high-sounding theological doctrine and
academic theory.  Instead, James is full of real down-to-earth
recommendations for everyday life in the...

Well James hits the news right smack in the center again, doesn't he?  A
teacher strike in Chicago and James warns us about how hard it is to be a
teacher.  He also challenges me personally about how hard it is to be a
teacher of the Word.  And, as James says, you all do hold me to strict
standards in my teaching, and I...

So, I wonder if James was writing for the front page of the New York Times?
"My dear friends, don't let public opinion influence how you live out your
faith."  I think James understands how politicians are pushed around by
public opinion these days.  You would think James been watching TV the last
two weeks, staggering...

During the next few weeks, we will be using the Epistle of James to
investigate our modern world.  James is a unique letter in the New
Testament.  The best scholarship now attributes the writing to James the
Just, who was Jesus' brother and one of the leaders in the first Jerusalem
church.  The letter was not written to one...