Sermon Of The Week

Though we are brought low during Lent, it is not a time for despair. The fasting and trials that Jesus encounters in the wilderness recapitulate the temptation of Adam in the Garden and Israel in the wilderness. Jesus overcomes the devil in the wilderness, telling of the victory to come.

In the Transfiguration we see the beautiful and glorious wisdom of God. Christ sees the Father’s will as glorious. Yet Peter's eyes see naturally. The Transfiguration shows us that our perspective is flawed.

Christ teaches the value of His presence and the value of the New Covenant that He brings with him through a parable of old garments and wineskins. We can not approach Christ if He does not make us anew.

The Gospels (the four of them, equally) bring us before Christ showing our true condition: sinful man is both unable to do anything about his condition, and is dead to the sensation of the effect of sin.

Christ is the ladder which Jacob saw; He is the one who is "Bethel", the house (tabernacle) of God in the midst of His people. He is the one who confirms the covenant and fulfills His promises.

Jesus Christ, walking in the power of the Holy Spirit, shows us how we sustain our hearts in the love of God.

Though Christ was not guilty of any sin, as our High Priest and Kin, Jesus Christ receives water baptism, so that he would be the Head of a New People. Not only is He the Federal Head of this people by water, He also is baptized with the Holy Spirit to bestow the Spirit upon them.

For John, the Incarnation is an act of immense proportions, illuminating how we understand the entire universe, physically, spiritually, and philosophically.

Simeon and Anna show us the righteousness of Christ in their worship and praise the Lord at the sight of the Child.

Jesus Christ comes to fulfill the promises of God to David. He comes to establish an everlasting Kingdom in which we can truly live as redeemed mankind.

God's aim in the sending of His Son is that through His people He would work in the earth to cause righteousness in all places.

God desires to bring us back from our sins and by coming near, He has made sure it will happen.

God has every right to renounce Israel and leave her in bondage, yet because of His great mercy, He will not give her up.

There is no situation which merits hopelessness. To live without hope is to live an active denial of eternity with God.

God desires that we would consciously engage our will in a sustained effort against sin.

Through our union with Christ, mediated by the Holy Spirit, we are invited to live with the Lord always before us.

Worship, and therefore all of life, is not neutral. Man becomes like what he beholds in worship.

Like Naaman, we are like dead men, in need of cleansing and restoration. In Naaman's washing and later in John the Baptist's ministry we see our need of washing and the preeminent worth and beauty of the Lamb of God.

Though we could never be justified to God by doing His law, His moral law still informs how we should live.

The Kingdom of God Series, Chapter 3B Reviewed. God's Kingdom plan in Creation is and must be His ongoing, current and eternal plan. His attributes, purpose, law and ways never change. He, His plans and His administration are progressively revealed.