[Propertalk] Fw: Sermon Resources for May 16 - Part 1

[Joe Parrish]

Sermons for Easter 7: 
     John 17:20-26 – “A Strange, New Math” 
     John 17:20-26 – “Fingerprints and Lovemarks” by Leonard Sweet

John 17 the sermon titled "A Strange, New Math" 

We have a wonderful mystery to contemplate this morning, and it is summarized in a strange formula. It's not really all that complicated, but it is worthy of reflection for it has implications for our lives together. Here is the formula, an equation, really: 1 + 1 + 1 = One.

Rather strange math, isn't it? Well, it's God's math, so let's see how it works.

That strange formula really comes from the gospel text for today. For the past several weeks during this Easter season, our gospel readings have come from that section of John's gospel known as the Final Discourse of Jesus. This last speech, if you will, that Jesus makes to his disciples concludes with these verses from the 17th chapter. It is really a prayer of Jesus to his Father in heaven and has often been called the High Priestly Prayer of Jesus. In a sense, it is Jesus' last will and testament, his parting shot, his last effort to teach, to exhort, to encourage, to empower his disciples.

Now for the math part. Listen to Jesus' words: "I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me." Did you hear it? 1 + 1 + 1 = One. It's not too difficult, once we understand the parts of the equation. Let's unravel the mystery slowly.

1. The Father and Son Are United.
2. You and I Are United.
3. The Holy Spirit Unites Father, Son, and Us.

The rest of this sermon following the outline above can be obtained by joining www.eSermons.com.
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John 17:20-26 the sermon titled “Fingerprints and Lovemarks”  

Fingerprints are nothing new. The delicate swirls, ridges, and patterns that lie at the tips of our fingers have long been recognized as a form of personal identification.

The ancients might not have realized the extreme uniqueness of every person’s fingerprints. But as far back as the reign of the Babylonian King Hammurapi (1792-1750 BCE), convicts were fingerprinted. In China as early as 246 BCE, fingerprints were used to “sign” legal contracts. In 1788 a German anatomist, Johann Christoph Andreas Mayer, proved and published that fingerprints are unique to each individual. The idea caught on so fast that by the mid-nineteenth century, data banks of fingerprints were being collected all over the world for identification purposes.

Any CSI buffs here? You know micro-processors race and run at breakneck speed through millions of fingerprints in order to catch the bad guys or exonerate the good guys.

Science has revealed other ways we are unique and singular. Our DNA is our own. Each cell of our body is genetically coded just for us. High tech gadgetry has made it possible for us now to open sealed doors just by looking at them. Okay, more accurately just by looking through a retinal scanner, because the shape, diameter, and surface bumps of your baby blues (or browns, or greens) is completely unique to you.

Oh, if you happen to have an x-ray of your skull lying around, check out the shape of your nasal sinuses. Those too are unrepeated in any other person.

God made us in so many ways wholly and totally different from one another. Yet as Jesus offers up to the Father his own personal “Lord’s Prayer,” he closes by praying for “oneness” among all those who follow him as his disciples. Does this mean that Jesus prays for us all to be the same? To be a body of “beige believers”? Is this a call for “cloned Christians”? A franchise faith? A lemming life? A monotone mission? Is every follower of Jesus expected to keep the same pace, have the same stride, move to the same rhythm?

Read again. When Jesus prayed for “oneness” he was not just looking around the Passover table at twelve individuals — none of whom were learned scholars or Torah experts, by the way. Yes, Jesus was praying for those who had followed him for the past three years. But he was also praying for the next generation and the next. Jesus was also praying for those who would come to faith because of the words and witness of those first twelve. And Jesus was praying for the generation after that one . . . and for the generation after that one . . . and for all future generations . . . until the end of time…

The rest of Leonard Sweet's sermon can be obtained by joining www.Sermons.com
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Human Porcupines

The German philosopher Schopenhauer compared the human race to a bunch of porcupines huddling together on a cold winter’s night. He said, "The colder it gets outside, the more we huddle together for warmth; but the closer we get to one another, the more we hurt one another with our sharp quills. And in the lonely night of earth’s winter eventually we begin to drift apart and wander out on our own and freeze to death in our loneliness."

As humans we have been created with the need for companionship. I am always fascinated how Adam, when He enjoyed sinless fellowship with His Creator, still had a desire for one of his own kind (Gen. 2:20). God has created institutions such as marriage and family and church to meet these needs for human intimacy and belonging….

Jesus was well aware of our need for intimate human companionship, and He was also well aware of the challenges and "sharp quills" we face in the process. So in His final prayer to the Father, just hours before He would be suspended on the cross, Jesus prayed for the unity of His church. Second only to the concern for His glory was this longing that His disciples would be united. He knew how much supernatural help we as sinners need in this area. He also knew how an ununified church would fail to bring Him the glory He so much desires.

Randy Smith, Jesus Prays for His Church
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Futility

A myriad of men are born; they labor and sweat and struggle;...they squabble and scold and fight; they scramble for little mean advantages over each other; age creeps upon them; infirmities follow; ...those they love are taken from them, and the joy of life is turned to aching grief. It (the release) comes at last--the only un-poisoned gift earth ever had for them--and they vanish from a world where they were of no consequence,...a world which will lament them a day and forget them forever.

Mark Twain shortly before his death.

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God and Creation Are Always One

There's a story told of respected astronomers at the Vatican Observatory who presented the church with evidence of another planet having the characteristics of our own, possibly to the extent of supporting sentient life. Two schools of thought emerged: the first advised the immediate dispatch of missionaries to bring the saving Gospel of Jesus Christ to those aliens, presumed to be very much like us. The second school advised against an expedition. Jesus came to us at the right time and place, they argued, and he will go to them when the time is appropriate, too. The astronomers allowed the debate to rage for a while before advising that the light from the new planet had taken so long to reach us that our cousin planet had actually ceased to exist several millions of years ago.
 
If God is immutable, however, can nothing ever change? We know that to be patently untrue. Theologians have a lot to say on these subjects and I suppose the most straightforward answer is that God and creation are always "one" no matter what part of creation we are looking at, or the era we are considering.

Anthony Jewiss 
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