Sermons

Wise Men Still Seek Him Opening Illustration: When I was a sophomore in college, I had a buddy come back to school from summer break with a old Jeep. It was white, it had a great lift on it and it had tires that you just wanted to drive through mud with.  Well one day, that’s exactly what we did. We took his Jeep off road. As he was driving, we found ourself in a wet valley in Shelby County.  It was wet and it was really muddy. Eventually he got the Jeep stuck.  It didn’t seem to matter what we did, the Jeep wouldn’t budge.   So, we made our way to a phone and called someone to pull us out of the mud. Sure enough, a wrecker showed up.  He made his way into the pit and he informed my friend that he did not need to b e pulled out of the mud.  He told us that we were not really stuck at all. He pointed to a gearshift lever that we had not noticed and explained that the jeep had a pulling gear. He showed my friend how to operate the gear; and, the jeep pulled right out of th

Christmas Communion Service 2017 Don't Take Communion, Allow Communion to Take You This is a Time of… Reflection Confession Adoration This is an open communion which means that all believers are welcome to participate.  However, Paul gives a warning not to do so flippantly.   I Corinthians 11:27-29 (NIV) 27  So then, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. 28  Everyone ought to examine themselves before they eat of the bread and drink from the cup. 29  For those who eat and drink without discerning the body of Christ eat and drink judgment on themselves. Prayer of Reflection and Confession I Corinthians 11:23-26 (NIV) 23  For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, 24  and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of

He Came: Mary's Did You Know? Do You Handle Unexpected News With F ear or F aith ? Illustration: Breaking Into Camp In September of 1940, Witold Pilecki, a Polish army captain (Show pilecki 1), did the unthinkable—he snuck into Auschwitz. That's right, into Auschwitz. Pilecki knew that something was terribly wrong with the concentration camp and as a committed (Roman Catholic) Christian and a Polish patriot he couldn't sit by and watch. He wanted to get information on the horrors of Auschwitz, but he knew he could only do that from the inside. So his superiors approved a daring plan. They provided a false identity card with a Jewish name, and then Pilecki allowed the Germans to arrest him during a routine Warsaw street roundup. Pilecki was sent to Auschwitz and assigned inmate number 4859 (show pilecki 2) . Pilecki, a husband and father of two, later said, "I bade farewell to everything I had known on this earth." He became just like any other priso