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Archives: Sermons

Psalm 16

June 30, 2024
For most of us, our home is the place we feel the safest, the most secure. That’s pretty normal and to be expected. But home can be taken away from you by any number of events or circumstances. So where then do you look for security, for rest, for peace, for refuge? David points to only one place, one Person who can provide that for us.
David observes that it is the fool who lives as if there is no God, and yet he also observes that 100% of us live that way. Yet, there is a group of people God calls "his own," a group he calls "righteous." So the question becomes, who are those people, why has God chosen them, and how do you move from "all have sinned" to "and are justified freely"?
Sometimes the things we "know" in our heads isn't how we see things actually work out in reality. And sometimes the Truth we read in the Bible isn't what we see (yet) in our reality. Psalm 9 and 10 are perfect Psalms to help us process through this.

Psalm 8

June 9, 2024
“When I observe your heavens, the work of your finger, the moon and the stars you set in place, what is a human being that you remember him?” David asks a great question here, but even David doesn’t know where history is headed. God himself doesn’t just remember humans – he becomes one.
Paul and Barnabas head into Lystra, and when the locals watch a lame man get up and walk in the power of God, they try to make sacrifices to them, thinking they are gods. Paul preaches to them, but before long, hostility arises and Paul is stoned and left for dead.
As Paul finishes up his sermon, the audience responds in two ways – some want to hear more, and ask him to speak again next week. Others, however, start speaking contradictions and insults against him. Some believe, some reject. And yet Paul and Barnabas refuse to let persecution stop the message. Full of joy and the Holy Spirit, they keep pressing forward.
As Paul and Barnabas travel to Antioch, they are invited to speak at a synagogue. Paul launches into his first recorded sermon, and proclaims that God’s promises to Abraham and David are fulfilled in Jesus Christ! The blessing to Abraham in Genesis 12 pointed to Jesus, forgiving our sins and justifying us through his death & resurrection.
The focus now shifts from Peter and James to Barnabas and Saul, with Saul/Paul being the main character from here on out. The gospel continues to spread, made up of these key items – Worship, Obedient Faith, Community, Discipleship, and Readiness for Spiritual Warfare.
King Herod takes out James, and loses Peter thanks to the midnight escape. But political problems have him in a place he doesn't want to be, being lied to by people who just want things from him, but his pride has him so high on power that he forgets who he is.
The church seems to be growing exponentially, when all of a sudden King Herod attacks the church and kills one of the apostles. That seemed to please the Jews, so he arrested the Most Wanted of the Christians – Peter. They hit their knees in an overnight prayer service, and God answered in the most unusual (and humorous) way.