To be Taught by the Spirit

What does it mean to be taught by the Spirit? 

Why would one need to be taught by the Spirit? 

Let me know what you think!  

Galatians Sermon Number 4 - The Issue

 What was the actual issue that prompted the harsh reaction from the Apostle Paul? In this sermon, I attempt to break down the cultural/historical situation that the Galatians were facing. 

A Christmas Sermon for Pagans

Strand Magazine published this Christmas Sermon by C. S. Lewis in December of 1946. The title: A Christmas Sermon for Pagans.

No. 17 in Luke - Jesus' Authority - Luke 4:31-44

 Listen to the sermon from Edgewood Church on March 28, 2021:

Sermon Number 16 from Luke: Jesus Preaches

 Sermon Number 16 from Luke: Jesus Preaches in Nazareth

Luke 4:13-30

Church Online @ Edgewood Danville for March 22nd, 2020

Part 1 of the Devotional:




Part 2 of the Devotional:

Help and Hope for a Holy Life - Sermon 1

Sunday's Sermon 2017-06-11

Here are the slides for the sermon on Sunday, June 11th, 2017:
(The Sermon Audio)

unnoticed creepers

Jude is an amazingly compact little letter. There are big ideas and mind-blowing examples. There is so much in there... and such passionate words: Jude is eager, under compulsion, appealing, contending, etc. (and that is just in verse 3!)

I am preaching on a portion of Jude tomorrow, verses 3 and 4. It is a portion that I have become passionate about myself. I am hoping to grab a bit of that passion that Jude clearly was overflowing with, and minister a bit of that to Edgewood tomorrow. I am hoping it is like a shot of adrenaline. I am praying, really praying, like literally... right now... that some in the audience, including myself, will walk away ready to contend for the faith because the Church (not just Edgewood) has certain people who have crept in unnoticed, just like in Jude's day:

Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. For certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.
(Jude 1:3-4 ESV)

These unnoticed creepers are, whether they realize it or not, perverting Grace and denying Christ. I don't want to sound over-dramatic, but I really don't want to sound under-dramatic.

Sermon Doodling

I often doodle in order to concentrate. Here is this morning's doodle.

What it Says... What you See?

All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.
(John 6:37 ESV)

What do you hear when you read this statement from Jesus?

The vast majority of Christians today... read the statement of Jesus this way: 'All who come to me the Father will give me.'

In other words... we come... we decide.

'Then the Father recognizes our decision and makes us gifts to his Son.' But that is not the way Jesus taught it. Jesus said, 'The ones whom the Father has given to Me will come to Me -- every one of them."

Sometimes the teachings of Jesus are difficult. Will you listen to them, re-interpret them, or just plain ignore them?

(I preached on this passage of scripture this past Sunday. More than one person walked away questioning... but what I loved was that they weren't questioning me... as far as I could tell... they were questioning Jesus. In a good way!)

Seven Feelings Rise In My Heart

I've received a double punch in my studies over the last couple of weeks.  The first punch came from my study in Ephesians for last week's sermon.  Eph. 2:11-22 deals with race relations and its connection to the cross.  The second punch came through Bloodlines by John Piper.  I received the book as a gift from my wife for Christmas, but didn't pick it up to start reading until I was preparing for the sermon.  I thought it might add some extra insight into my perspective of this passage.

This two-punch combination left me filled with a whirling turmoil of thoughts and feelings in regards to race relations in America.  More importantly, it has stirred up some emotions in regards to race relations in Danville, IL.

Here is a quote from Bloodlines that both explains and furthers my thoughts on this subject:

When I step back from this controversy over personal responsibility versus political and community engagement with systematic racism, I have at least seven different clusters of thoughts and feelings. 

First, I feel regret for my own sinful contributions to the seemingly intractable problems of race relations between black and white in our land.  Second, I feel sorrow over cycles of despair and hopelessness, and over the ruin of so many lives.  Third, I feel anger at the sins I see on every part of the landscape of race relations and race discussions and racial intervention -- all sides.  None of us is righteous, no, not one (Rom. 3:10).  Fourth, I feel frustration over the untold layers of complexity that make every proposal for improvement seem thanklessly embattled.  I empathize with Harvard social scientist Nathan Glazer when he says that behind the racial troubles of our day are "factors in infinite regress."  Fifth, I feel empathy with the truth and the emotion of both sides of the controversy.  Sixth, I feel a great longing to see the gospel of Jesus proclaimed, with the power of the Holy Spirit, into this situation and this controversy.  And seventh, because of the power of the gospel, I feel hope that there are breakthroughs possible that human strategies from either side have not achieved.

How Big is your View of God's Salvation?

New Title Slide for Current Sermon Series

At Edgewood, we have been studying the book of Ephesians.  I think we started last September.  There was a short break in the study over the holidays, but January 1st we jumped back in. 

The theme for the book has been, "How big is your view of God?"  I left it at that through the course of the first 14 verses as Paul discussed all that God has done in Christ.  In verses 15 to 23 the theme was, "How big is your view of God's Church?"  because of the building emphasis on the church in the final two verses.  Paul built up through this prayer for the recipients of the letter, ending in this amazing pronouncement about the church, which, quite frankly, hardly fits what most people would think of the church.  If you would like to listen through either one of those first two mini-series portions of the Book of Ephesians, just visit our church's sermon audio blog.  

We are now in chapter two.  This is one of my favorite portions of the entire Bible.  I was able to preach through the first three verses last week which dealt with man's natural spiritual state.  We are dead, spiritually speaking, and by our very nature we deserve wrath.  That was a difficult message to preach through, mostly because our tendency, when talking about sin, is to deflect, thinking about the sinfulness of others while missing my own sinfulness.  Paul didn't do that.  He used words like "you" and "we" when discussing sin, instead of "them" and "those" as many of us do. 

I am looking forward to this coming week's message which includes two of the most important words in the Bible, "but God..."  Where would we be without these two words?

(image via a Google search)

Praying for Power

I believe that we live in a day where many churches have a form or appearance of godliness, but the thing that they are missing is power.  According to St. Paul in II Timothy 3:5, it is just this in people that will destroy churches.

What if find to be extremely distressing is that I feel that I am lacking in the power department.  I would not consider myself to be one who is filled with God's power.

This last Sunday I explored this topic as I continued preaching through the Epistle to the Ephesians.  I was covering Ephesians 1:19-21.  This was an important message for me, and I really feel like God was impacting me and prompting me through the study in preparation for this message.  If you would like to listen to the final result and give me some thoughts, feel free to listen to it here:




You can also download it and listen to it later.

The Shepherd's Response

The shepherds responded to the Angel's pronouncement.  Does our response match the magnitude of the announcement?  Do we think of Christmas in a way that corresponds adequately to the message of Christmas?

Last Sunday I approached this topic, using the announcement of the Angels as my text.  Consider listening to this message as you consider your own thoughts and actions this Christmas.




Or you can click here to download this message.

Giving

I preached on giving yesterday.  It wasn't as difficult a topic to discuss as I originally thought.  I have heard pastors before talk about the difficulties of giving.  What I actually learned was that this topic is very natural to the very essence of who we are as Christians.  The sermon ended up being a tad bit on the long side, but I will attribute that to the fullness of this topic.  Frankly, I barely scratched the surface of what needed to be discussed.

Anyway, if you are interested in hearing these thoughts on a Biblical perspective of giving, you can listen right here:



You can also download them by right-clicking here and choosing to save the mp3 file.

As a little disclaimer, I felt very much, as I was preparing this message, that my logical flow of thought was a little off.  To some, this may not be an issue, but for some reason, I always feel like I need a precise logical flow.  When it doesn't come together logically, I always feel a little off when I am preaching.  For me, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish the difference between the tangible presence of God's Spirit while studying and the presence of a logical flow of thought.  Though I am sure this is not the case for everyone, it is true for me.

What makes good preaching? (part 2)

I started a post earlier this week and published it two days ago about, "What makes good preaching?"  If you go to part 1, you can read a little more about where this came from and why I am blogging it.  To pick up where I left off, I want to quote the passage of scripture again, and then go on to point #3.

preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching.
(2 Timothy 4:2 ESV)

3) I am going to hone in on those three words, "reprove, rebuke, and exhort" to continue answering the question, "What makes good preaching?"  The word reprove can mean to convict, refute, or convince.  There may be a bit of a legal-feel to this verb; a little like what you might see when a lawyer gives his closing statements.  One might put it this way: Good preaching is convincing.  This doesn't mean that I have to dramatize the proceedings or to simply talk in a convincing fashion.  It also doesn't mean that I have to suck a lot of wind while I'm preaching... The way many TV evangelists tackle the problem: "The Bible says... ah... In John chapter 3... ah... verse 16... ah..."

It means that I am going to appeal to a higher authority.  It means that I will use good reason and logic to draw out of the scriptures meanings and applications for our lives.  It means that I don't build my arguments on preferences or on how things used to be 50 years ago.  If I am going to talk about parenting, for example, the crux of my speech won't be, "... when I was a boy, things didn't used to be that way... We weren't allowed to talk to our parents that way..."  instead I will rely on scripture, "...'children, obey your parents in Lord, for this is right, honor your father and your mother...'"  It isn't that good preaching doesn't contain stories, Jesus used story telling in His teaching and preaching, but he used those stories to illustrate what the scriptures teach.

4) The next word in this passage is rebuke.  To rebuke someone is to lay a charge at their feet.  You might say, Good preaching is personal.  It can get in your face.  It hits home.

As far as I know, nobody in my congregation is struggling with drug addiction.  To my knowledge, there aren't any practicing homosexuals that are regularly attending my church.  It would not make any sense for me to spend the majority of my time preaching about sins that, to my knowledge, nobody within earshot is struggling with.  I need to make it personal.  In wisdom, I need to attempt to talk about and discuss struggles that I and my congregation may be having.  I need to challenge their (and my) sins.

Sadly, many churches do not do this.  A majority of the preaching is focused on the sins of others, leading many in the congregation to develop a sense of superiority ... called pride.  Many preachers end up sounding like the pharisee that Jesus described, who, having seen a sinful tax collector, exclaimed in utter arrogance, "Thank you, Lord, that I am not a sinner like this man!"  I must not preach this way.  Though it seems like it has a show of holiness, there is nothing good about this sort of preaching.

I must preach the gospel!  We are all sinners, and our only hope is the righteousness of Jesus Christ.  That cannot be forgotten, and all good preaching will ultimately preach Christ.

5) Finally, in this blog post, what does it mean to "exhort?"  A couple of Sundays ago I dealt with the word "encourage" during a service.  This is the same greek word that is being used here in this passage.  It is not a word that simply means that we say loads of positive things and build up your self-image.  It is a word that literally means to call to one's side.  To really encourage someone, you don't just tell them what they need to do and give them a pep-talk, instead you pull them up under your arm and say, "You We can do it."  It's a community word!

So, for lack of a better word, one might simply put it this way, Good preaching is encouraging.  Like I said though, it isn't that good preaching says loads of flowery, feel-good statements.  It is a call to action.  That's actually better, Good preaching is a call to action.  Unless you are ignoring the preaching or are simply not paying attention, you should walk away with something to do, something that the church is going to do, the community of believers together.  "Yes.  We will go home and work on our anger!"  "Alright!  Let's all go and be more Biblical in our parenting!" "Together now men, lets pray this week!"

There is more to this passage, so hopefully I will get to it in a part 3, but for now, take these three words together.  Good preaching will lay out a reasonable, believable, defense of the truth.  It will be done in such a way that you may walk away realizing an area where you need to change.  Then it will call together the members and the leadership of the church to face those personal challenges, because we are all in this together.

What makes good preaching? (part 1)

Have you ever heard the phrase, "Preach the word!" used before?  That phrase has meant different things to different people.  I've heard it used to describe the type of church that someone wants to attend, as in, "I really want to go to a church where thy preach the word."  I've also heard it used to describe what a particular preacher was doing when he was really a-rantin' and a-ravin'!

This last Sunday at church I attempted to answer this question by picking apart the passage of scripture where this phrase occurs.  At the same time I figured that we might be able to answer a similar question, "What makes good preaching?"  We had an issue with my microphone, so the entire message didn't record, but this topic is hugely important to me, so I'm going to make an attempt at summarizing some of that material here on this blog.

First, here is the passage of scripture:

preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching.
(2 Timothy 4:2 ESV)

1) The very first thing we have to say is that good preaching is preaching THE WORD.  There's that phrase, but the meaning is actually quite simple. It is not preaching opinion or preference, it is to literally preach the Word of God. This is why I believe in expository preaching.  I try to pick a passage of scripture and work my way through it a verse or a few verses at a time.  Topical preaching is acceptable, but even that must be done in an expository fashion.  In other words, if there is a certain topic that needs to be dealt with or covered, I still need to go to the scripture to see what it has to say.

This means that I cannot preach what some preach when they preach their preferences on music styles or the ever-so-prevalent tendency to preach that the King James Authorized Version of the Bible is the only version that a person should use.  If I am to preach the Word, I cannot preach these (or other) things that aren't truly based in the Word but are based on traditions, opinions, and preferences.

2) The second thing to notice here is that this preaching of the word must be done whether it is popular or not, whether it is convenient or not.  Good preaching is established this way.  One might say that good preaching is timeless.  This doesn't mean that current cultural issues aren't addressed, but that the principles and truths from scripture are always taught.

For example, in much of America it is quite popular and well-liked to preach that one should love their enemies. This wasn't always the case, and in some places in the world it isn't the case at all.  Loving your enemies would be repulsive to some cultures.  Some of those same cultures would really like a preacher who focused on God's judgment or on us showing good judgment, while here in America the teachings of "judge not" are loved.  Cultures  change, but God's truth is timeless.  Good preaching should be the same way. To preach the word rightly one must not avoid those difficult or challenging passages of scripture simply because people won't like it.

St. Augustine, Tertullian, Ignatius, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Jonathan Edwards, and Charles Spurgeon all have writings and letters and sermons that are still applicable today, not because their examples still ring true, but because they all were men who preached the Word, whether it was popular or not.  Their message was timeless because the one whom they preached was timeless.

There is more to this question and more from this verse, but I will handle it in a part 2 because nobody ever reads long blog posts anyway.

The Persevering Preacher

First day back to school.  The break is over and the bubbling over pot that is my life just got put back on the burner of life.  By the time I was on my way home from school I was starting to feel overwhelmed with thoughts of all of the things that I need to deal with each week.  From Sermons and Sunday School to lesson plans and struggling students... and this doesn't include family life, basketball games with my son, working on the house, trying to lose weight because my cholesterol is killing me.  I don't have time for everything.

I needed some encouragement, I needed a "word", don't ask me how, but I found this.  Exactly what I needed.

Living Faith: Manage Your Mouth

This morning I preached through the first part of that famous passage in James where he discusses the tongue. The title I picked was "Manage Your Mouth". I only made it through the first 6 verses this week. You can use the player to listen to this message, or right click here and choose save.




notes

(We had some minor technical difficulty. We missed the first few moments of the message.)