RoboPreacher

then why do i keep counting A sermon on that time God's prophet was swallowed by a whale : This is one of those big passages. Isn’t it? And the thing about passages like this is that they sort of appear to be larger than life. Yes, we like them. The snag , though, is they don’t really seem to have much to say to us .   I get it, too. I do. God hasn’t told you or me to go to some foreign country and deliver a dispatch of doom . Most of us, unless we were in the Navy , know absolutely nothing about being caught in a storm at sea. And, for that matter, I can rest assured none of us have ever been swallowed by a whale ! Can’t I?On the whole, this passage is a lot of fun. However , it has little to do with our daily lives. Or does it? Truthfully, this passage is relatable. Why, I’d go so far as to say that it’s more than just relatable. No, this passage is about you . It’s about me. It’s about today . And if you don’t believe me, I’d simply remind you that the nave of our sanctua...

when you give me the whole damn zoo A Pentecost sermon on the fruit of the Spirit : Remember that week before Lent began when I went to Des Moines to talk with other pastors about leadership? Well, one of my extracurriculars was to join Dr. Jones in his “Life and Thought of Martin Luther” class.  That’s where it all began for me … Well, they were working through “Freedom of a Christian.”  Dr. Jones asked about the famous claim; ‘although a Christian may be perfectly free and subject to none , a Christian is also a perfectly dutiful servant, subject to all .’ He asked the students how could that be. One earnest, young man offered the theory that, when you do something good for someone else you feel good about it.  Conventional wisdom at its finest, but not what Luther was after.  As I’ve thought about that, I’ve come to realize the profound challenge Luther and his ilk put to us.  Paul once put it like this, “I could not speak ...