Sermons by Chuck Webster (Page 37)
Why We’re Here: A Worshiping Community
A few weeks back I started a four-part series under the heading, “Why We’re Here,” focusing on Luke’s description of the earliest Christians in Acts 2:42-47. The previous sermons have emphasized the church as a learning community, a sharing community, and an eating together community. For this last sermon in the series, I’m going to emphasize the church as a worshiping community. If you’ve traveled to Europe, you’ve noticed that what used to be the center of Christianity–as indicated by…
Lights in the World
On each month’s first Sunday morning in 2018, we’ve emphasized our theme: Love God. Love People. Change the World. As we near the end of the year I’m using a couple of these Sunday morning sermons to emphasize the last part of that theme: Change the World. God put us here to make a difference, not for us just to meet weekly and talk about how bad the world is, but for us to worship so that we might be…
Why We’re Here: Breaking Bread
This is the third of a four-part series called “Why We’re Here.” I’m aiming to help us as a church think introspectively about some practical reasons why God put us here. To do this, we’re considering Luke’s description of the earliest Christians. The third thing Luke writes that these Christians were devoted to is “the breaking of bread.” Sometimes that expression means the Lord’s Supper, and it may very well have that meaning here. But sometimes it refers to normal…
Why We’re Here: Sharing
We live in a world where many people—especially younger adults—are turning away from organized religion. They still believe in God, but for different reasons they no longer see the need to be a part of a church—a local, visible community of people who are following Jesus. In this world, we in the church need to ask ourselves: Why are we here? Why should Christians be involved in a local church? Why did God put us here? This was the second…
Becoming Disciples
It’s important for churches to ask themselves the question in the sermon title: Why are we here? And it’s important for members of churches to ask themselves a similar question: Why am I a member of this church? What is God doing through this church and through me for us to experience a mutual blessing? Luke’s description of the earliest Christians is exhilarating: these men and women had found what they had been searching for their whole lives–the promised Messiah,…
And change the world
As you know, our theme this year has been “Love God. Love People. Change the World.” This Sunday we turn our attention to the last of those three descriptions of what we are called to do: Change the World. Few would disagree with the fact that the world is messed up in so many ways. Our country is struggling: raging political rivalries, persistent racial tension, widespread addictions, increasing immorality. But of course this is not a new development; the world…
Walking with Abraham: God’s Test
In so many ways Abraham’s life has always been moving here. It’s been 40+ years since God first appeared to him, making him the promise about a land, a nation, and a blessing. It’s been 15+ years since the promised son Isaac was born, and Abraham and Sarah have certainly been thinking about the future. All of their hopes were bound up in this young man. Or so it seemed. And now this. God asks the unthinkable. A human sacrifice?…
Walking with Abraham: Are You Serious?
It had been almost a quarter of a century since God promised Abraham that he would be the father of a great nation. Now he’s 99 years old, and (one would think) he’s pretty much given up hope. What 99-year-old man and 89-year-old woman are able to bring a child into the world? But of course God’s timetable is different from ours, and for reasons only he knows he decides now is the time for the long-awaited promised son to…