[Propertalk] Fwd: Sermon Resources for June 1 - Part 1

[Joe Parrish]

Sermons for Easter 7
 
John 17:1-11 – “The Peace of Christ in a Chaotic World”
John 17:1-11 –  “A Prayer for Persecuted Christians Everywhere”
 
John 17, the sermon title “The Meaning of Life”   
 
In Act 5 scene 5 of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, the character Macbeth has heard that the queen is dead and he knows his own death is imminent. At this time he delivers his famous soliloquy:
 
Tomorrow, and tomorrow and tomorrow
creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, Out, brief candle
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
and then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot. Full of sound and fury signifying nothing.
 
Is Macbeth right? Is life nothing but a shadow having no substance, no meaning? Writers and philosophers since recorded time have tried to answer the question. I don’t think any of them have been successful in answering the question to everyone’s satisfaction. Someone once said that "Trying to speak about the ultimate reality is like sending a kiss through a messenger." I understand their point: Something of its truth is lost in the translation.
 
What is the meaning of life? A philosophical question to be sure but this is not only the philosopher’s question. It is a genuinely human question and therefore a question that we all ask. It might be a question that is asked in despair or hope, out of cynicism, or out of sincere curiosity and a deep desire to have goals and guidance in life. However we raise the question about the meaning of life, it is our most basic and fundamental question.
 
And so it comes as no surprise that Jesus deals with this question and answers it…
 
The rest of this sermon can be obtained by joining Sermons.com at http://www.sermons.com/signup 
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John 17, the sermon titled “A Prayer for Persecuted Christians Everywhere” 
 
In elementary school we all learned the ditty: “In fourteen hundred and ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” Convinced by Christopher Columbus that a new, faster route to the rich spice regions of India could be found by sailing east instead of south, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain financed an exploratory mission for this new route. Instead of India, Columbus found the New World — the lands that lay across the Atlantic ocean from Europe.
 
In the long run it was a very good deal for Ferdinand and Isabella. But while Columbus was floundering about in the sea, the royalty of Spain had some other big-idea irons in the fire. Ferdinand petitioned the Pope and was granted permission to start a serious investigation into the religious orthodoxy of those under his rule. This ecclesial exercise became known as the “Spanish Inquisition.” It seems 1492 is a year when both new, exciting frontiers and possibilities were discovered. Yet it is also a year when old prejudices, animosities, and cruelties were reborn with a vengeance.
 
Although there were all sorts of free thinkers and some genuine wild-eyed crazies who got caught up in the Inquisitor’s net, the primary focus was on the resident Jews and Muslims residing in Spain. Both Jews and Muslims were rounded up and subjected to questions and the questionable tactics (yes torture) of the “Inquisition.” In the spring of 1492, shortly after Muslims were driven out of Granada, Ferdinand and Isabella expelled all the Jews from Spain. Both groups were basically given a “thumbs up or thumbs down” choice: Convert, leave or die.
 
The Jews who “converted” were dubbed “conversos” and were subject to suspicion and scrutiny for centuries. The Muslims who “converted” were dubbed “Moriscus,” and they too were held at arms’ length within the Christian community for centuries. Not surprisingly both conversos and Moriscus’ had secret underground networks to keep them connected to their heritage and faith, no matter what they had to show to the political powers that might be.
 
But that is a history lesson. That was long ago and far away. Those wrong-headed, wrong-hearted actions are in a past that we as Christians today acknowledge as horrific actions and terrible attitudes. We acknowledge our failures and foibles. We repent and say our confessions.
 
The problem is history happens every day. The problem is that history doesn’t repeat itself, but it does recur. Nothing repeats, but everything recurs…


The rest of this sermon can be obtained by joining Sermons.com at http://www.sermons.com/signup  
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Keepers of the Aquarium

Paul Harvey, the well-known radio broadcaster, once said, "Too many Christians are no longer fishers of men but keepers of the aquarium."

I take that to mean that we Christians are more concerned about preserving the Church than we are about touching the lives of other people, more concerned about preserving our "religion" than we are about helping people discover the source of wholeness, the fountain of living water that wells up to eternal life.

Richard J. Fairchild, The Last Words of Jesus
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Humor: Giving While We Are Alive

I'm sure you've heard the old story of the conversation between a pig and a cow. The pig is complaining to the cow that nobody ever has a kind word for him. "Look at the way I give of myself," he says. "I produce bacon, ham, and pork chops. The bristles of my skin are used for brushes, my hide for luggage. Why, some people even pickle my feet and consider them a delicacy. Why is it then that everyone speaks more kindly of you, the cow, than of me?" To which the cow replied, "My friend, perhaps it is that I give of myself while I am still alive."

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