Sermons & Worship (Page 34)

The Book of Esther Do you know the song “Baby Shark?”  If you knew it before this last week, you are either the parent of a three year old or a Washington Nationals fan.  Last week was baseball’s World Series which went seven games and was won by the Washington Nationals.  The Nationals, or the Nats, as their fans call them, were the underdogs in the series; they were playing the strong Houston Astros who came into the series with…

Daniel 3; I Peter 1:3-7 King Nebuchadnezzar ordered Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to be thrown into the flaming fiery furnace for their refusal to bow down to his statue.  The Bible doesn’t say what kind of furnace this was, but we can assume it was some sort of pottery kiln or massive oven with a viewing port to check on the progress of whatever it was that was cooking in there, and in the story it was Shadrach, Meshach, and…

Jeremiah 36:20-24 As you know, I have been preaching a series on the important stories of the Hebrew scriptures, our Old Testament, and I chose all of those stories way back at the end of the summer.  Back in August, I spent a few days skimming through the Bible and reviewing commentaries in order to compile the list of stories that I would preach on this fall and I tried to choose a story from each of Israel’s historical periods:…

I Samuel 25 Background to scripture: Saul was the first King of Israel but he wasn’t a very strong King and after some missteps, God tells the prophet Samuel that God has chosen the young man David to be King instead.  Since Saul remains on the throne until his death, we have to assume that God didn’t expect the transfer of power immediately but was talking about succession: instead of the throne passing to Saul’s children after his death, it…

I Samuel 9:1-6, 15-17, 10:14-16 What do donkeys have to do with Kings?   Here in Chapters 9 and 10, we have the story of the anointing of Saul as the first King of Israel, chosen to bring together the twelve tribes under one rule so that they might be strengthened as a people and finally know peace from their enemies.   And we also have the story of Saul, the dutiful son out looking for his Dad’s lost donkeys. …

Judges 13:1-5, 15:1-11 Let’s begin by getting the bad joke out of the way.  Who was the greatest comedian in the Bible?  Samson — because he brought down the house! Most people, even the biblically illiterate, have heard of Samson and the long hair that gave him superhuman strength and many can probably even name his mistress, Delilah.  If they know the full story of Samson and Delilah, or have seen the Cecil B. DeMille film of 1949, they will…

Judges 6:36-40 In 1200 BCE, 1200 years before the birth of Christ, the people of Israel lived unsteadily in the Promised Land.  They had entered under the leadership of Joshua, and eventually the twelve tribes had each settled in different areas of Canaan — modern day Israel — where they mingled with the Canaanites and constantly battled the threat of invaders on their borders, mostly a variety of ‘ites’ — the Hittites, the Moabites, the Amalekites.  Even though the Israelites…

Joshua 20 Way back in the Dark Ages, after I graduated from college and before I had decided what to do with my life, I spent three months traveling the US with a college friend.  When I left on my trip in September, I said goodbye to a family of seven: my mother, father, older brother, and three younger sisters — but when I returned three months later, it was to a family of nine.  During my absence, my parents…

Exodus 3:1-12 When I was a teenager, my family had a dog named Jenny who, in her old age, developed a condition called “selective hearing loss.”  When she was outside, enjoying a walk in the yard smelling all of the animals that had visited the area overnight, we simply had to wait until she was ready to come back in because she couldn’t hear us calling her name.  If she decided to take a nap right in the middle of…

August 25, 2019 Joseph was a brat.  In spite of the glorification of Joseph in our Sunday School lessons, he wasn’t the kind of guy you would have wanted to share a cubicle with.  We are introduced to him with the words, “He was a helper to his older half-brothers and he brought a bad report of them to his father.”  In other words, the first thing we learn about the kid is that he was a tattle tale.  In…