Yesterday we began our Advent Sermon series: “Future Shock.” We intend to look at the four personal pronouns from Isaiah 9:6 (a prophecy anticipating Jesus of Nazareth), “Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace,” throughout the next four weeks, leading up to Christmas Eve and Christmas Sunday. The topic of the morningContinue reading “Inheritance: Something More from the Sermon”
On Sunday we continued our Parables series and examined an interesting parable in Luke’s gospel: The Pharisee and the Tax-Collector in the Temple. I suggested that this parable was shared by Jesus as he and his followers journeyed through Samaria, where his Jewish friends would’ve felt morally superior to the host Samaritans. In an effortContinue reading “Freaks: Something More From the Sermon”
Yesterday was a big day at Peachtree. At the 10am service, not only did we ordain a new class of Elders, but we also acted upon the recommendation from the Pastoral Nominating Committee’s motion to approve that Rev. Dr. Richard Kannwischer be welcomed as our next Senior Pastor. In the midst of all of that,Continue reading “Something More from the Sermon: Launching Counter Confusion”
Yesterday, we did a soft launch for our parables sermon series, a string of messages that will stretch out over the next few months towards the advent season. I love parables and the Gospel texts so this series is going to be fun. The soft launch sermon sought to address the idea of a parable. Specifically,Continue reading “Something More From the Sermon: Embarrassment”
Yesterday, we kicked off a series that I am looking forward to sharing more about: Storm Stories. We’ll enter the Bible’s most famous storm stories as stand with storm survivors. We are shaped deeply by storms. We talk about them as we share our story. Storms are scary, but we should learn from them, too.Continue reading “Something More From the Sermon: Strangeness”
Yesterday, I had a blast sharing about Daniel and his night in the Lion’s Den. It was the 2nd sermon in a series called “Great Nights of the Bible.” One of the peculiar tasks for a preacher who shares about a familiar text is to not only confirm what the average hearer might already know about it,Continue reading “Something More from the Sermon: Parity”
We began a new series yesterday “Red Letter Jesus” where we’ll spend several weeks examining some of Jesus’ famous and intriguing sayings from the NT Gospels. Louis Klopsch (1899) is credited with the idea of putting the words of Jesus in red. He asked a mentor of his if he thought it would be aContinue reading “Something More from the Sermon: Believing With Jesus”
Recently, we continued in our Vital Signs series and concentrated on the value of Faith Development. I reminded us of Dallas Willard’s important truth: Christianity is not opposed to effort, its opposed to earning. However, not all “church-sanctioned-faith-plans” are created equal… just doing something for Jesus, without careful examination of the way it shapes us,Continue reading “Something More From the Sermon: Permission”
Yesterday, we examined the value of mission and the Christian life, spending time examining Luke 5:17-24, where friends of a paralytic went to extreme measures to have their friend healed by Jesus. I suggested that a gift from a church is to cause the right type of trouble in the world, riffing off the claimContinue reading “Something more from the sermon- Causing the Right Type of Trouble”
Yesterday we started a new series called Vital Signs where we will examine some vital parts of the Christian faith. Yesterday’s topic was “Radical Hospitality,” having a radical openness to “the other” that we encounter. Our primary text was Acts 2:42-47, the first summary statement from Luke concerning the early Church’s habits and patterns ofContinue reading “Something More From the Sermon:Waiters and Servers”
Joe Skillen 