From Sampler to Sower

Teaching Series: Look Up

Message Title: Elijah Was a Man Just Like Us

Sermon in a Sentence: “Elijah was a a man, just like us. He prayed earnestly (James 5:17a).”

Text(s): Psalm 121:1-2, 1 Kings 16-18, James 5:17

Message Summary:

We started a new series at Water’s Edge this week called Look Up. The theme verse from the series is Psalm 121:1-2:

I lift up my eyes to the mountains—
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the LORD,
the Maker of heaven and earth (NIV).

The Psalmist asks where he can turn for help, and he knows the answer.  “My help comes from the Lord.”  When we need help, we don’t look to other things or other people.  We’re called to lift up our eyes and turn to God.  In this series we’ll be learning what it means to live a life a prayer — a life that looks up.

(more…)

Looking at my analytics, several visitors to the site have come here over the last few days searching for examples of an Ash Wednesday order of service, or guidance as to what to say during the imposition of ashes.  I realize this post is probably too late for most planning 2011 services, for future reference, here is our Ash Wednesday service for 2011.

Prelude

Reflection

We will sing “There is None Like You”.  In between verses, the following Scriptures will be read:

• Deuteronomy 32:3-4
• 1 Chronicles 29:10-11
• Isaiah 40:25-26, 28-29

Then we will sing “I Love You, Lord”

(more…)

Teaching Series: Cultivate

Message Title: Faithfulness and Self-Control

Sermon in a Sentence: Running to win the prize requires a certain trust and disciplined self-control.

Text(s): Galatians 5:22-23, 1 Corinthians 9:24-27

Message Summary:

This week marked the end of our Cultivate series. We’re still playing catch up from all the weeks we had to miss due to the snow and ice this winter.  While the other catch up combination weeks had a bit of logic to them — joy and peace; patience, kindness and gentleness — this mash-up of faithfulness and self-control wasn’t quite as natural.  Hopefully I did them justice, though to be honest I feel as though I may have shortchanged faith.  I would have liked to spend more time on the connection between faith and faithfulness.

(more…)

Weekend Teaching Series: Cultivate

Message Title: Goodness

Sermon in a Sentence: God does not save us because we are good, He saves us so that we can do good.

Text(s): Galatians 5:22-23, Matthew 19:16-22, Micah 6:8

Message Summary:

This week we continue our Cultivate series by looking at the sixth attribute of the Spirit’s fruit: goodness.  This is a difficult topic to address because in modern English the word “good” is almost meaningless.  What is good?

(more…)

Weekend Teaching Series: Cultivate

Message Title: Patience, Kindness, and Gentleness

Sermon in a Sentence: God calls us to bear with those who typically would annoy us, actively offer grace to those who have nothing to offer in return, and to serve those “below” us in our social structure.

Text(s): Galatians 5:22-23, Exodus 34:6-7, 2 Peter 3:9, Luke 6:32-36, Matthew 20:25-28

Message Summary:

This week we continue combining some of the fruit in the hopes of finishing the series on time.  I had already planned on combining kindness and gentleness, since as concepts they are so closely related.  And like any good auctioneer trying to make sure everything has a chance to sell, I threw in patience for good measure.  Just trying to keep up with the weather cancellations.

(more…)

Weather is wreaking havoc on our Cultivate series.  We’ve had to cancel three of our last four services. Normally that wouldn’t be a problem, but our next series starts on Ash Wednesday. That means we have to double up on some of the fruit if we’re going to finish on time.  Therefore this week I bring you joy AND peace.

Weekend Teaching Series: Cultivate

Message Title: Joy and Peace

Sermon in a Sentence: In a world of suffering and injustice, God calls us to make peace and find joy in the grace He gives.

Text(s): Isaiah 65:17-25; Matthew 5:9, Romans 14:17, Galatians 5:22-23

Message Summary:

One of the challenges in preaching this message is the pre-conceptions people have about what joy and peace are. When we think of peace we think of the absence of conflict.  A peacemaker is someone who smooths over the hard feelings in our world and finds a way to keep everyone happy.

And joy is even more difficult because we have to deal with two sets of preconceptions.  On one hand, when we think of joy, we think of happy people.  A joyful person is that annoyingly bubbly person, always bouncing around, naively giddy, filled with the kind of saccharine sentimentality that sets our teeth on edge…

…Or maybe not.  Because you also have the sermons that explain there is a difference between joy and happiness.  Happiness, we’re told, depends on circumstances.  Happiness is affected by what happens to us.  Joy on the other hand is centered in God and manifests itself as an internal confidence that God is in control.  It’s possible, we’re told, to be in unhappy circumstances and still be joyful.

So we approach the subject of peace and joy with these preconceptions.  The question is are any of these concepts what Paul is talking about when he says the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy and peace?

(more…)

Granted, it’s been a while since week in review #20-almost exactly a year to be, well, exact.  So it’s high time to get back to this.

Weekend Teaching Series: Cultivate

Message Title: Love

Sermon in a Sentence: The solution to the problems caused by love is not to give up on love, or to tone love down; it is a radical reorientation of love.

Text(s): Romans 5:1-8; Romans 8:38-39; Galatians 5:13-26; John 15:1-17

Message Summary: This sermon was the second in our Cultivate series for Water’s Edge. It’s all a part of our church’s Homesavers campaign.  From the first of the year through Ash Wednesday, every department of our church, children, youth and adult, are all taking a closer look at the Fruit of the Spirit.

Read more to see our original video The Vegetables of the Spirit and to see a summary of our teaching for this topic.

(more…)

Weekend Teaching Series: Avatar

Message Title: Avatars and Incarnation

Sermon in a Sentence: We do not need to fear rejection when we approach God, because He chose us.

Text(s): Ephesians 1:3-14

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 3 out of 10, Again, a fairly straightforward message that was fun to preach.

Message Summary:

We began by watching the following clip.  (The embedded copy is from YouTube.  We got our clip from WingClips.com.)

(more…)

A busy schedule has kept me from updating my blog recently, but I’m working to get back into the swing of posting regularly.  I’m going to go back a couple of weeks with my reviews to include all three sermons from our Avatar series.

Weekend Teaching Series: Avatar

Message Title: Avatars and Incarnation

Sermon in a Sentence: Avatar provides hints and glimpses of the greatest story ever told, but Jesus Christ is the incarnation of God in whom we can trust.

Text(s): John 1:1-14

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 3 out of 10, A pretty straightforward night with an enjoyable theme.

Message Summary:

In January we launched a three week mini-series inspired by themes from the new blockbuster movie Avatar.  In week one of our series we examined the story of the movie as a whole and asked the question “What makes this movie so compelling?”

(more…)

Weekend Teaching Series: Heroes

Message Title: The Foolish Vow

Sermon in a Sentence: God is not honored when we treat him like the idols that surround us.

Text(s): Judges 10-11

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 3 out of 10, A straightforward night, with one of the tougher stories in the Bible.

Message Summary:

Heroes moved into its sixth week with the story of Jephthah. We’re working our way through the book of Judges with our students, and we’re into the homestretch now.  That’s a good thing, because if you know anything about Judges, you know things are getting bad, fast.

(more…)