RoboPreacher

& somehow, i see / it's free A sermon for the confirmation of Chase & Jack: Chase , Jack, dear brothers in Christ, welcome to the faith ! Did that sound odd ? I bet it did. I bet it did, but I want you to know I meant it. And, what’s more , the peculiarity of that sentence is no accident, either. Herein lies your first lesson today: Faith is not intuitive. On the contrary , faith is counterintuitive . The more strange , the closer you are to that blessed and mysterious beating heart of faith. With any luck, you’ll find yourself saying, “How odd of God” many times.   With that, we’ve come upon our second lesson for today: Faith is not a program. And faith is not a formula, either. Faith is not a way to hide from life. And neither is faith a guide to make the confusing twists and turns of reality fit into a predetermined mold.   No, faith doesn’t tell you what lies ahead . Truth be told, real faith really wants nothing to do with that kind of chicanery . No, fa...

no more amnesty A sermon on information about kingdom consolidation : I suppose the only thing to say about today’s Scripture is, what am I going to do with it?!?! I don’t know if you noticed , but there’s not really anything happening in this passage! There’s no action! Nothing of significance is taking place, not really! Oh sure, David is crowned king of all of Israel. And yes, there’s the no holds barred rejoicing as they take the ark to Jerusalem. But that’s not really all that spicy ! It’d be like saying there’s a war brewing in the Holy Land. It’d be like noting that we’re really going to belt it out when we get to sing, “Praise to the Lord, the Almighty.” Sure, there’s information in those two sentences, but there isn’t much drama to them! Is there? On their own, they’re just facts. And that’s fine and all, but the trouble is, I’ve got to preach an entire sermon here! What am I supposed to do with today’s passage?!? It’s not hard to summarize the gist . After all the twi...

when you shake off / what's weighing down heavily Another sermon on Jesus' (better) Sermon (on the Mount) Who here would like a deeper discipleship, a more satisfying spirituality, or a fuller faith? * Raise hand . … Don’t worry. We all do. There’s not a one of us here who graduated from godliness . Whatever else you make of such a notion, you can at least take comfort from the fact you’re in a good place today.   Now, I don’t mean that you’re making progress in the pursuit of perfection . Don’t hear that by any means! If anything , we’re all in terrible arrears when it comes to that benchmark. And I don’t even mean that you’ve made it to church , either. Although , that is closer to my meaning than some cockamamy Christianity.   No, I’m talking about how holy Scripture has taken us to a good place. Today, by the power of the living word, we find ourselves at the foot of that great mount where Jesus gives his most famous sermon. And in today’s portion of this sermon, ...