Presby-Musings

Welcome everyone.  This is the place to be on Christmas Eve, clearly.  I want to welcome all those who are visiting tonight--those who have traveled from out of town, those who are coming home to celebrate with family... kids home from college...   To all the children who are here, dying to find out what's under the tree or what's on the way tonight...   And to those who aren't exactly church goers, who were dragged, coerced, bribed, guilt-tripped into coming to church tonight...  I have a special welcome for you because you are my people.  I know what it feels like, I've been there myself.   There was a time when I didn't believe in God, and I believed in less in church and church-y stuff.  But once a year, I would find myself dragging in to church on Christmas Eve because my mom would make me feel guilty.   I have to tell you that even during that time in my life when I was not feeling the whole Christian thing, when I was wounde...

I was scrolling through Facebook the other day and I saw something that made me shake my head sadly. A person was commenting on an article about a prominent Christian leader and author, who she happened to disagree with. Her comment was simply to place a reference of Scripture in the comment line. Her reference of choice was second Peter 2:1, which includes a warning about false prophets and false teachers. She also included the letters SMH which stands for shaking my head. SMH I'm familiar with this passage of scripture because it was quoted numerous times in comments and reactions on news stories and social media posts regarding a story that made the news regarding me and my church. The story made TV news because I bet my congregation if they broke an attendance record for Easter last year I would do something crazy.  The crazy wager was that I would get a tattoo of the church's logo on my leg if they broke the record. Apparently, this was an act of here...

Every Sunday I stand in front of roughly 450 people plus a bunch of people watching church online and I ask for money. I don't come right out and say, "Give us your money," but I imagine if you were looking for that sort of thing, you would probably find it.  You would have to look hard because I spend less than two minutes of a 60-70 minute service talking about money. I shouldn't be hesitant about this, honestly.  It's a shame that I feel like I can only briefly mention the fact that without the generosity of our church members and friends our church wouldn't be able to share the Gospel with our community in amazing ways each and every week. Jesus spent more time talking about money than he did talking about heaven or hell.  So there's that. Even so... I am not going to beg, bribe or berate people into giving money to my church.  But I do feel like this needs to be said:  Why would anyone be upset about being asked to give in order to sup...

Samuel Williamson is tired of children's Sunday school done the same old way. His weary feelings about Sunday school have little to do with styles, format or even space--they stem from what Williamson describes as a general neglect of the Gospel in favor or Moralism . And he has a point. First of all, Williamson believes that having good morals is important, but it's not more important than the Good News that Jesus Christ came to save sinners, and offer them the chance for eternal life--life that begins here and now.  He asserts that from the earliest ages, Christians are taught that if they are simply good, obey, and do what is right that they will be happy, healthy and wise--and that God will be pleased with them.  He cites the simplified stories that are often taught in Sunday school as evidence:  stories about heroes such as David, Esther, Jonah, Daniel and the like. But, according to Williamson, by simplifying the stories we find in the Bible and turni...

This week I am preaching the third installment of our four-part sermon series on the book of Titus , entitled "It's All Good." This week's sermon is entitled, " Good News ," and as you might imagine by the title (or maybe not) we're going to be talking a bit about evangelism.  Come to think of it, it's not that evident by the title exactly what we'll be covering in this sermon.  Oh well, we all need a little mystery, don't we? I am going to start with a parable that I ripped off and paraphrased from the great Peter Rollins , who wrote this in his book The Orthodox Heretic, which will blow your mind if you read it.  So, if you prefer your mind unblown, don't buy it. It seems there was a pastor, who had a gift for preaching.  He was a fiery preacher, who was highly sought for revivals, conferences and the like.  He also had a gift that he kept a secret.  It seemed that whenever he prayed a blessing over someone, they would immediately...

Last week I preached on the Gospel . We learned that the Gospel--the "good news"--is bigger and far more expansive and inclusive than we ever imagined.  We also learned that for many people--especially Christians--it's hard to live into the hope of that good news.  We tend to want to stay in our safe little world where nothing has to change--including us. This week we are taking this a bit father.  Once we finally "get" that the Good News of Jesus Christ is something that is bigger, better and far more transformational than we ever imagined, we should move to embrace it and live into the hope of a Resurrection LIFE.   But what does that look like?  The New Testament writers tended to think it looked like " justification ." What does it mean to us that because we embrace the Good News that God has justified us?  And what is our response to this? I think it comes down to two things.  You have to know Jesus, and then you have to show Jes...

This Sunday I am finishing up the sermon series that I've been preaching on Evangelism. I felt so strongly that this sermon series needed to be preached at my church, and I have been praying that God would use it to spark the desire for evangelism in the hearts of our people.  The first week of our series we talked about how we need to connect with our story and learn to tell it.  The second week we discovered that God doesn't need us to spread the Good News that Jesus is risen and Creation is getting redeemed, but God loves it when we join him in doing just that.  This week we are seeking to answer this "Big Question:" Jesus commanded his disciples to be evangelists and disciple-makers.  What does that look like for us? I think that a lot of Christian-types would agree that Christians should know and tell their story.  There are probably a few more who would agree that God wants us to join him in the work of spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ. ...