Sermons on Matthew (Page 3)
On These Two Commandments
This is the last of the sermons I’ll preach in 2018 on the theme for the year: Love God. Love People. Change the World. I will try to wrap it up, summarizing the theme as we end the year and look toward a new one. There’s plenty of evidence around us that loving God and the people he created will need to be a continual emphasis of Christians everywhere. We’re surrounded by hate and violence and political division. What the…
Love Your Enemies
It’s hard to love people who make us angry, isn’t it? And the people with whom we disagree on very fundamental things, like God, morality, and good and evil. And people who have hurt us or our families, or who make life difficult for us at work or school. Or people who talk about us behind our backs. The list could go on, I suppose. Jesus says to love even them. Especially them. Part of what makes us different from…
That Other Side of Jesus: He Talks About Fiery Furnaces
Three weeks ago I introduced a short sermon series (click here to view) about the importance of seeing Jesus as he is portrayed in the Bible, and not just in the way that makes us most comfortable. We all like to think about the Jesus who held babies and forgave sinners and ate dinner at tax collectors’ houses. We may not be as comfortable with “that other side of Jesus”: the one who turns over tables, talks about “weeping and…
Let the little children come to me
In the month of May, we’re having a “Train up a Child” campaign—we’re hoping to be able to fill all of our children’s Bible class rotations with teachers through May 2019. In conjunction with this emphasis, we studied the text above. We discussed how children weren’t highly valued in the world of antiquity for different reasons, which may explain why the disciples discouraged people from bringing them to Jesus. The disciples also probably had an inflated sense of their own…