Sermons

Reformation. That's not a word we use often, but it has to do with re-forming something that already exists. Ideally, it is re-forming it in a better, more desirable manner. What we call the "Reformation" of the 16th century didn't create the church or the gospel or the Bible, but it significantly re-formed what many people thought about each of these.

This summer we're preaching a set of sermons that all fit together around this broad topic of Personal Reformation. These three mini-series' are brief and practical, and for each one we have selected a book to recommend if you…

Many passages of Scripture contain significant sub-plots to the stories we know well. Important truths to live by that are better mined in personal Bible study. This text contains a few important reminders about the nature of Christian discipleship.

Last Sunday I looked at John 8 in the sermon and made some comments on 7:53-8:11. I wanted to follow up with a few more details on this issue, because some things about it are a little complex to bring into a Sunday morning. My view here is not the only one, but I'll lay it out for your consideration.

Recently both Daniel and John in their teachings have discussed John the Baptist and his response to the increasing popularity of Jesus away from his ministry. Daniel said that John the Baptist realized and admitted to the fact that he wasn’t “the big deal” (John 1:20). The big deal was Christ. John (McLeod) taught on the passage where one of John the Baptist’s disciples was lamenting that “all are going to him,” referring to the crowds flocking to see and hear Christ. In chapter 3:27-30 John responds to his disciple in a wonderful way ending with “he must increase I must decrease.”

Yesterday we looked at three convictions we need to have about race. They are starting points to begin to love our neighbors as ourselves when they are of different races. We need to grasp at a deep level that (1) we are made in the image of the same God; (2) we are plagued by the same problem: sin; and (3) we are saved by the same Savior. If we miss these three then it won't really be possible to move forward in true racial unity. We will never be able to get past our own racial pride.

Race and racism are complex and controversial topics. Daniel Hays in his book demonstrated this vividly when he said, "Two-thirds of White Christians believe that the situation for Blacks is improving, while two-thirds of Black Christians believe that the situation for Blacks is deteriorating" (From Every People and Nation, 18). That tells you of the complexity of it.

Two Sundays ago Mike Noel preached on the consequences of the Fall from Genesis 3:8-24. He walked us through the guilt and shame and blame-shifting and...grace that the Fall brought. He mentioned that because of sin we can feel "adrift in a sea of shame and guilt." As he was wrapping up his sermon he trimmed off some of what he wanted to say. He mentioned that we'd put his notes into a blog for you. This is it. These are four ways we can respond to the reality of shame and guilt but the even greater reality of the forgiveness and shame-bearing of Jesus Christ.

We work hard at things that we think are important. Of course, some of those things simply aren't—at least, not in the larger sense. Fantasy football is underway for many of us, and beating our cousin or co-worker or neighbor feels great in the moment and seems to justify the hours of research we did before making our draft picks. But this probably won't be remembered on our tombstone...even if we win ESPN's bazillion-dollar prize. Sometimes, though, things that really are most important go uncared for.

What do these have in common? All three will converge this Sunday morning at SGC. At least, that's our hope as we have been talking to Jermaine Powell about the possibility of creating some pieces of art that could embellish our auditorium but also capture some of the essence of what we are preaching.

This Sunday we begin a new sermon series, Wisdom for Suffering. The idea of this series is to take four books in the Wisdom Literature of the Bible and approach them with this question, "What does this have to tell me about suffering?" The sermons will look at the book of Job (Aug. 2), the book of Psalms (Aug. 9, 16), the book of Proverbs (Aug. 23), and the book of Ecclesiastes (Aug. 30).

The issue of suffering is a massive and complex one. This is true at a personal level, because my suffering has unique elements to it that…