RoboPreacher

i was lifted again A sermon on the Great Commission *SLIDE: Faith and Doubt in the Book of Faith Here at the end of Matthew the resurrected Jesus, the exalted Christ, meets his first disciples . Now, the temptation is to paint this scene as a victory lap…   But , if the resurrection is just the cherry on top of the story of faith, it rings pretty hollow to those of us who worship this Christ nearly two-thousand years later. Doesn’t it? After all, many days victory seems far off, and if all we’re left with is a victory, then we have nothing for our hardest days… Thankfully, Holy Scripture is honest about the way faith actually goes… How Jesus meets disciples amidst the warp and woof of life . Amidst the same kind of trials and tribulations we wrestle… Just notice the details in today’s resurrection account: *SLIDE: ELEVEN Disciples “Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee,” reports Matthew. It’s not twelve anymore. Tha...

with the sunshine in his eyes A sermon from Matthew's Easter Account : Jesus Christ is Risen! (He is risen, indeed!)   Well, a Happy Easter to you all! And it really is a lovely Easter. Isn’t it?   After all, last year it was snowing . So this is about as close to a perfect of an Easter as we’ll get on this side of heaven.   And the icing on the cake this Easter is you all! Here you all are, on time and decked out in your Sunday best! It’s a privilege to preach to the likes of you on an Easter like this ! …And let me tell you, pastors give plenty of thought to preaching to the likes of you, come Easter.   In fact, I’ll let you in on a little secret; for as much Bible study pastors may, or may not, do. For as well as we all know the Easter story; the part of the sermon that always gives the pastor fits, is the illustration … An illustration to hook you in . An illustration to connect the concepts in the sermon to your life. ...

& we were wrong The scripture for Maundy Thursday is John 13 This has easily been one of, if not the most disastrous Lent. Hasn’t it? Truth be told, though, for me and Amanda it actually started way by in Advent . When her beloved grandmother, Jean, died.   I remember how Jeans death put our Advent into a tailspin … And at first, I fought against it. Even though our schedule was upside-down, I struggled to make sure we kept the house in order, got gifts, and even took time to read our Advent devotional… But as time went on, it got to be too much . By the time Christmas rolled around, we were doing everything we could just to keep up…   After Christmas, New Years and Annual Meetings, though , life seemed to have returned to a semblance of normalcy… …But then; well, you know what happened… If I had thought Advent was a mess, this Lent made Advent seem like something straight from Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas.” Take ...

or the flame lit by a spark A Sermon on the   Parable of the Sheep and the Goats : Here at the end of his teaching, Jesus turns to a topic we’re all interested in; The End ; the Final J udgement… Our fascination with The End shows up everywhere .   From the popularity of doomsday bunkers, to survival shows, zombie movies, and even the mega-popular marvel films, where the fate of the world hangs in the balance; we’re always reckoning with The End . Aren’t we? The wild thing, though, is that although we’re always working out our fascination with The End ; we always seem to come to the same conclusion! Whether it is through strength , like in the super-hero films. Tenacity , in zombie movies. Resourcefulness, in survival shows. Or hoarding, in doomsday-bunkers; the conclusion we come to over and over about The End is that you must BE prepared for it! It’s no great surprise this message gets such mileage. After all, being prepared is how...