Category: Sermons

Published May 14, 2012

The Parable of the Three Servants

Did you had $100 in 1986? The reason I ask is because I was doing some figuring this week, and I found out that if you had taken $100 in 1986 and deposited it in the bank – the interest rates were about a 5¼% back then -so today, with the compound interest, that $100 would be worth $390.41. That’s an increase of nearly 300%. That’s not too bad, eh?

But then I thought, well, then instead of putting that money in the bank in 1986 – what if we had instead invested it in a reputable company – What if we had invested it in Ford? Well, if we had invested that same $100 in Ford in 1986, today it would be worth $716.38. That’s a little bit better isn’t it? As you see on our little bar graph chart, that’s nearly twice as much as you would have made from the bank. That would have been a much better investment.

Now I know that some of you don’t really appreciate Ford vehicles, so you’re not likely to invest with them. So let’s say instead that you invested in another big name company – General Electric. That same $100 invested in 1986 in General Electric would now be worth some $1552.13. That’s a 1400 percent increase! That’s twice as much as Ford, and four times as much as the bank. If only you had know this back in 1986.

But you know, both Ford and General Electric are pretty ‘safe’ companies. They’ve both been around for a long, long time – over a hundred years now. What if we had been a little more risky and invested in a company that had just formed only ten years prior to 1986? What if we had invested in Apple Computers Inc.? Are you ready for this? Well, believe it or not, that $100 invested in 1986 in Apple Computers Inc, would now be worth… over $45,000. $45,818.81 to be specific. That’s just from a little $100 dollar investment. Isn’t that incredible? If you had $100 in 1986 – you could have done that!

But let me give you just one more scenario.

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Published April 30, 2012

The Sower & the Soils

Turn with me in your Bibles to Luke chapter 8, starting at verse 4.

“One day Jesus told a story in the form of a parable…” Luke 8:4

Now we’re just going to stop right there. Before we go any further, we need to talk about this verse – specifically about this word “parable” that we just read. Now if you don’t speak Christian-ese, this word “parable” might seem a little foreign. It’s not really a common, everyday-language kind of word. The guys in the coffee shop don’t usually tell ‘parables’. But Jesus did. And lots of them. In fact the count in my Bible says that Jesus told 39 different parables in the books of Matthew, Mark, & Luke. And He probably told more that just weren’t recorded.

So what exactly is a parable? Simply speaking, a parable is really just a short story about something very common and very familiar that illustrates a unfamiliar spiritual truth. Jesus would tell a story about something very common like a farmer planting seeds – everybody in that time understood what that was all about – many of his listeners would have been farmers themselves, so they knew about planting seeds. But within that story of a farmer planting seeds, Jesus would have a hidden spiritual truth that would be illustrated by the characters and events that happen in the story.

You could almost think of a parable as a parallel. You know how parallel lines run directly beside each other? Well, the story and the spiritual truth would run parallel to each other – you could compare the two. In fact quite often Jesus would begin his parables by saying something like “The kingdom of heaven is like…. THIS” – then He would tell this story – drawing a parallel between the story and the spiritual truth about the Kingdom of heaven that He wanted His listeners to learn.

So when we read in Luke 8:4 that…. “One day Jesus told a story in the form of a parable…” we know that Jesus is about to tell us a story about something very common and very familiar – something we already understand – and that in that story will be a parallel, hidden spiritual truth that Jesus wants us to learn and understand.

So let’s try this again: Luke chapter 8 – starting at verse 4:

One day Jesus told a story in the form of a parable to a large crowd that had gathered from many towns to hear him: 5 “A farmer went out to plant his seed. As he scattered it across his field, some seed fell on a footpath, where it was stepped on, and the birds ate it.6 Other seed fell among rocks. It began to grow, but the plant soon wilted and died for lack of moisture. 7 Other seed fell among thorns that grew up with it and choked out the tender plants. 8 Still other seed fell on fertile soil. This seed grew and produced a crop that was a hundred times as much as had been planted!” When he had said this, he called out,“Anyone with ears to hear should listen and understand.” Luke 8:4-8

So let’s see if we can wrap our heads around this story.

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Published March 18, 2012

Living Among Pre-Christians

Today we wrap up our study on the book of Colossians and I’ve got to tell you, I’ve really found this series to be a great refresher course for me. For most of us, this hasn’t been ground-breaking new material that we’ve been looking at, but its sure been good to be reminded of some of these principles that you already knew.

We so easily get sidetracked and distracted from the main thing – it’s good to spend some time going back to the basics.

If you’re a football fan, you might know the name “Vince Lombardi”. He was the coach of the Greenbay Packers from 1959-1967. Of the 130 games he coached, his team won 96 of them – including two Superbowl championships. So this guy knew what he was doing.

One of the things that Vince Lombardi was famous for was a speech he gave at every pre-season training camp. He would begin by holding up a football and saying, “Gentlemen, this is a football.”

He would then go over the basics of what a football is and its role in the game. He would then take his team out and show them the field, explaining where the out-of-bounds lines and the end zones were. He would go over the fundamentals of the game – touch downs, tackles, field goals – explaining the rules and organization of players.

Now keep in mind that this was not little leagues. These players were not beginners. They were the seasoned, professional NFL players. They’d known all this stuff for years already. And yet every year, Lombardi would begin with the most basic, fundamental principles of football. Why? Because he knew that to build a winning team, they had to understand the basic fundamentals of the game.

And that’s just what we’ve been doing. As we’ve been looking at Paul’s letter to the Colossians – his Christianity in a Nutshell so to speak, we’ve been reviewing the most basic, fundamental principles of the Christian life.

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Published March 11, 2012

Representing Christ

Today will be our second last message in our series on the book of Colossians. We’ve been looking at Paul’s Christianity in a Nutshell – or at least, that’s what we’ve subtitled it. But it seems to be a fitting title. As we’ve been looking at this letter to the church in Colossae, we’ve answered many of the questions of what Christianity is all about. Who is Jesus? Why did He die on the cross and rise again from the grave? What difference does it make to us? What does it actually mean to be a Christian? How do we live in close relationship with God on a continuing basis? How do we have victory over the sin that so easily gets us off track?

Paul has addressed all of these questions and more in this short little letter to the church in Colossae. So I hope that over these past few weeks, you’ve really been encouraged and spurred on in your own walk with Christ and that you’ve been able to apply some of these principles that we’ve been learning. I know that I sure have.

Now these last couple of weeks, our focus has been on our new nature. That is, the new desires of our heart that we get when Christ comes to dwell within us. It’s our desire to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit and to please God – instead of following our old sinful nature which just wants to please ourselves.

We read two weeks ago how Paul says to “strip off our old sinful nature”, and to “put on“ or “cloth ourselves” with our new nature. And we do that by keeping our focus on Jesus – by setting our sights on the realities of heaven – not getting caught up in the things of this world.

Then last week we dug into that a little deeper and we identified some practical ways to do that. We talked about following the leading of the Holy Spirit every moment of every day – and how, by filling our minds with God’s Word, by teaching and counseling each other with the wisdom God gives, and by worshipping God with a thankful heart – we can actually hear what the Holy Spirit is saying so we can follow Him and walk in our new nature, close to God continuously.

And it’s this idea of continuously walking in our new nature that springboards us into our passage this morning.

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Published March 4, 2012

Putting On Our New Nature – And Keeping It On!

Over the past month we’ve been looking at Christianity in a Nutshell as we’ve been studying the book of Colossians. What are the core basics of Christianity? We’ve looked at who Jesus really is and what He did for us on the cross. We’ve talked about what it really means to be a Christian and just last week we started looking how we can live continuously in a close relationship with God. And this morning we are going to continue on that theme – this is kinda a “part 2” to our message last week.

Last week we talked about the battle between our two natures. We have our old sinful nature that just wants to please me – and we have our new Christ-like nature that wants to please God. And these two natures are constantly in conflict with each other. We always have this struggle between doing what I want – and doing what God wants. And this battle is the reason that so many Christians feel defeated. Time and time again, they really want to do what is right, but they inevitably do what is wrong. So they feel like failures.

But Paul tell us that we don’t have to live that way.

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Published February 27, 2012

A Continuous, Close Relationship with God

These past few weeks we’ve been looking at Christianity in a Nutshell as we’ve examined Paul’s letter to the Colossians. And we’ve been talking about some good stuff. Stuff like who Jesus really is. Stuff like what Jesus really did for us when He died on the cross and rose from the grave. Stuff like what it really means to be a Christian. And if you’ve missed that or just have a poor memory, let me give you a quick 3-point summary: #1. Jesus Christ is the Son of God. #2. He died on a cross and rose from the grave to take away our sin and our punishment so that we could be together with God. #3. Being a Christian means you have accepted what Christ has done for you and now, with Christ living within you, you have life together with God. That’s what we’ve been talking about.

We ended last week on the theme of having a relationship with God. And of course, that leads to the question: How? And not “How do we begin a relationship with God?” – we’ve talked about that already. It begins by confessing with your mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord and believing in your heart that God raised Him from the dead. That’s how we start our relationship with God – But the question I want to talk about today is, how do we live in continuing, close relationship with God? What do we do? What does God do? How does it all work together? What is life together with God supposed to look like?

I don’t know if you’re like me – but I struggle with this. It is difficult for me to understand how exactly to experience a continuing, close relationship with God. And maybe that surprises you, but I’m just being honest. I don’t have it all figured out – but I’m learning.

And one of the greatest privileges I have as your pastor is to be able to stand in front of you week after week and share with you the lessons that I’ve been learning. That’s not to say that I’ve mastered it all. In fact, if you hear me preach on the same topic several times, it’s probably because God hasn’t got through to me yet. But I’m learning, and I’d love to have you learn with me.

Today we begin chapter three of Colossians.

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