[Propertalk] Fwd: Sermon sample for this Sunday, 1 Lent, and illustration

[Joe Parrish]

 Subject: Fwd: Sermon for this Sunday, 1 Lent, and illustration





This week's Illustration:


Experiencing God's grace


When we experience God’s grace, it often comes in the midst of things that seem to wear us down.
                             
Bill Wilson, the founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, experienced grace in this way. He had tried for years to quit drinking. An agnostic, Wilson consulted a friend who counseled him to seek God’s help. Having been treated with hallucinogenic drugs in a hospital, Wilson went to his hotel room after a conversation with the friend. Crying out in desperation, he prayed an unusual prayer, “If there is a God, let him show himself! I am ready to do anything. Anything!” According to his account, his room was bathed in a white light, conveying the presence of God. In his words, “It seemed to me, in the mind’s eye, that I was on a mountain and that a wind not of air, but of spirit was blowing. And then it burst upon me that I was a free man.” That experience enabled him to find a way to stop drinking.
                             
(Source: David Brooks, “Bill Wilson’s Gospel,” New York Times Online, June 28, 2010.)


Proclaim Sermon for this Week


Recalculating, Recalculating, Recalculating ...
February 26, 2012


Mark 1: 9-15
Lent 1


Summary
When we are on the wrong path, we need someone to tell us so - maybe even Jesus!


Excerpt
  Sooner or later, almost everyone experiences that uncomfortable feeling that, no matter how confident we were at the start of a journey, we are now lost.
  The feeling may come on gradually. Something doesn't seem quite right. There's this odd feeling we're traveling the wrong way. The landmarks don't look right. The signs are all wrong.
  Or it may come as a jarring shock: We are way out of our reckoning. Translation? We are good, old-fashioned lost, lost, lost!
  When that happens, we have to get back on the right track. And that may be easy, as easy as making a couple of quick turns, or it may mean having to backtrack for however long we have been going the wrong direction. Either way, there's no use waiting. We've got to start getting "unlost."
  Or, as those little GPS units are fond of saying, "Recalculating, recalculating, recalculating ...."
  Don't we all, at some point, need a loved one, a friend or even an annoying acquaintance, who will tell us what we don't want to hear? Something like, "What were you thinking?" People who tell us we need a course correction may be individuals we love and admire. Or they may be persons we consider adversaries, rivals or even enemies. But if they set us on the right track, we owe them hearty thanks - no matter how much we resent hearing the truth.


>From spiritual high to spiritual low
  In this short passage from Mark, there are not one, but two spiritual forces that set Jesus on a major course correction. At least that's one way of looking at this passage. The four gospels all agree that for Jesus, his baptism was a major turning point. The Father says to him, "You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased...(approximately 1,510 words remaining.)


http://www.proclaimsermons.com/viewSermon.asp?title=Recalculating%2C%20Recalculating%2C%20Recalculating%20...


 
 
 
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