[Propertalk] Fw: Sermon Resources for March 20 - Part 2

[Joe Parrish]

Transforming Love 



We need to be able to look into a mirror and not only see, but fully believe, that the reflection we view is a child of God. We need to believe in ourselves and we can with the assistance of another. A good example of such transformation is found in the story of Dulcinea, one of the principal characters in the popular Broadway musical, Man of la Mancha. The audience learns that Don Quixote, the chief protagonist, lives with many illusions, most especially his idea that he is a knight errant who battles dragons in the form of windmills. At the end of the play as he lays dying, Don Quixote has at his side a prostitute, Aldonza, whom he has called throughout the play Dulcinea - Sweet One - much to the laughter of the local townsfolk. But Don Quixote has loved her in a way unlike she has ever experienced. When Quixote breathes his last Aldonza begins to sing "The Impossible Dream." As the echo of the song dies away, someone shouts to her, "Aldonza!" But she pulls away proudly and responds, "My name is Dulcinea." The crazy's knight's love had transformed her. 
 
Richard E. Gribble, Sermons for Sundays: In Lent And Easter: Building Our Foundation On God, CSS Publishing Company

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The Rewards of Risk



A temporary office-help agency in Washington DC recently began offering a $100 bonus to the employee who makes the biggest mistake of the month. He doesn't get a reprimand. He doesn't get demoted. He gets a $100 bonus.  I read about an executive for a company called Sara Lee Direct who thought he was getting a great deal on a shipment of belts, so he acted quickly and bought a whole warehouse full. Only later did he discover that what he bought was not manufacturing belts for the conveyor system at the factory, but a bunch of those three-inch-wide paisley belts from the 1960s. Instead of getting fired, he was awarded a bronze plaque that proudly commemorated the "Worst Buy of the Year."



When I read these stories, I had two reactions. My first was: Are these businesses nuts? Have they gone crazy, or what? And then my second thought was that maybe I could talk the church council into adopting a similar policy. Maybe there could be a bonus for the worst sermon of the month. I could use some extra cash!



Seriously though, there's a strategy behind rewarding mistakes. The president of that temporary help company explained it this way: "The object is to get people to take risks." An official at Sara Lee Direct where the employee got promoted instead of fired for making that terrible purchase put it this way, "If you don't go up to the plate and swing hard, you're never going to hit a home run. If you're not willing to make a mistake, you're not really trying."



The bottom-line is that risk-taking is the only road to success. And companies are finding that it's worth rewarding a few mistakes along the way if it encourages their people to take the kind of risks that can bring huge rewards. And the same is true for people of faith.



How much faith does it take to follow? How much risk are we willing to take? That's the crux of the discussion between Jesus and Nicodemus. That's what Jesus meant when he said you must be reborn.



Lee Griess, Return to The Lord, Your God, CSS Publishing Company, Inc.

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Always Ready  



The great baseball manager Leo Durocher was once asked who was the all-time favorite player he had coached. Lots of people were shocked when he named Dusty Rhodes. Rhodes was a little known pinch hitter, not a really big name player. Durocher was asked, "What was so special about Dusty Rhodes?" He replied, "In a tight game when I looked down the bench for a pinch hitter, some players would avert their gaze and refuse to look in my direction. But Dusty Rhodes would look me right in the eye, smile, and tap on his bat." He was always available. New birth is more likely to happen to persons who make themselves available to God.  



Bill Bouknight, Collected Sermons, www.Sermons.com 

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Taking Risks 



Nicodemus took a huge risk in his secret night time visit to see the Teacher Jesus, but risks are sometimes necessary for growth and change. Alex Haley, the author of "Roots," said this about taking risks, "Nothing is more important. Too often we are taught how not to take risks. When we are children in school...we are told to respect our heroes.... What we are not told is that these leaders...were in fact rule-breakers. They were risk-takers in the best sense of the word; they dared to be different" (Alex Haley quote is taken from Walter Anderson, The Greatest Risk of All). 



Brett Blair, www.eSermons.com  

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The Gift of the Breeze 



I remember growing up in the South, in cotton country, in the summer, before air conditioning became something almost every home had. Several of those summers I spent working on my uncle's cotton farm, down in the Mississippi delta, just outside of my birthplace, Cleveland, Mississippi.  It was hot work, hard work, bringing in a cotton crop. It still is, but technology has made it a lot easier than it was back then. 



When the crop had been tended for another day, the weeds chopped from between the cotton plants, in the evening everyone would gather on the front porch. We would rock and talk and laugh in a futile attempt to escape the ever-present heat and humidity. And sometimes, on a really good day, the leaves of the trees would begin to rustle. And the conversation would die down, and everyone would just sit back and enjoy the summer breeze, the gift of the breeze. We didn't know where it came from. We didn't know where it was going. But we knew it was there, because we could feel it. 



Johnny Dean, www.eSermons.com  

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Ascribing Greatness to God 



Martin Luther summarized the nature of Christian life, what it is like to be born again, very well in one of his lectures in 1535. He reported that his teacher, John von Staupitz, said to him: " 'It pleases me very much that this doctrine of ours gives glory and everything else solely to God and nothing at all to men; for it is as clear as day that it is impossible to ascribe too much glory, goodness, etc., to God.' ... And it is true that the doctrine of the gospel takes away all glory, wisdom, righteousness, etc., from men and gives it solely to the Creator, who makes all things out of nothing. Furthermore, it is far safer to ascribe too much to God than to man." 



Mark Ellingsen, Preparation and Manifestation, CSS Publishing Company, Inc.

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Experiencing Salvation 



Noted evangelist Billy Graham says that he can point back to a definite time in his life when he experienced conversion. But his wife, Ruth, says that she grew gradually into the faith and can point to no definite starting point. Her experience is similar to the testimony of Count Von Zinzendorf to John Wesley. When Wesley asked him if he knew when he was saved, he replied, "I have always been saved!" A very famous churchman's reply to the same question was, "I was saved nearly two thousand years ago, on a hill called Golgotha, outside the city of Jerusalem." And this is the main point of the biblical witness: Our Salvation was accomplished nearly two thousand years ago in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the one true Son of God. The meaning that this past event has for us today, our response to that event, and our willingness to believe is crucial for us. It doesn't matter so much when we come to believe as it does that we believe. 



Robert V. Dodd, Remember That You Are Not Alone, Faith Is for Sharing, CSS Publishing. 

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The Promises of God Are True 



Tom Long says that while he was at Princeton, he went to a nearby Presbyterian church that prides itself on being an academic, intellectual church. Early on, he said, he went to a family night supper and sat down next to a man, introduced himself, told him he was new, and said, "Have you been here long?" 



"Oh yes," the man said. "In fact I was here before this became such a scholarly church. Why I'm probably the only non-intellectual left. I haven't understood a sermon in over 25 years." 



"Then why do you keep coming," Tom asked? 



"Because...



The conclusion to this illustration and for many additional illustrations and sermons for Lent and Easter can be accessed at www.Sermons.com.




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