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Wednesday, July 10, 2019

WHAT’S TRUE & WHAT’S NOT - Sermon

John 21:1-19    WHAT’S TRUE & WHAT’S NOT & DOES JESUS’ RESURRECTION MAKE A DIFFERENCE?

Ray is a corn farmer. He and his wife Annie and small daughter Karin live on farm in Iowa. Ray is a good husband and dad perhaps because he made up his mind to be different from his own father John who was seldom around when Ray was a boy. Their relationship was always troubled and then John died. 
Year later Ray began to hear a voice telling him to build a baseball diamond and an outfield on his farmland. The voice told him, "If you build it he will come." Ray doesn’t understand the persistent message and unable to ignore it he believes it and he persuades Annie let him build a baseball field with spectator seats. One evening some uniformed players begin to emerge from out of the cornfield and they begin to play ball. They appear so happy to play. The game ends as the sun sets and the players withdraw into the corn. Neighbours hear about it and at first think Ray has lost his mind. A game happens night after night as these ghostly players come from the corn and the neighbours show up to watch one night, and return each following night. 
If you haven’t recognized it, Ray is the protagonist in a novel called ‘Shoeless Joe’ written by Canadian author W.P. Kinsella, a novel that was turned into the movie called ‘Field of Dreams.’ In this fantasy drama Ray doesn’t know that the voice belongs to Joe Jackson, nicknamed “Shoeless Joe,” who was an outfielder with the 1919 Chicago White Sox. That team became known as the Black Sox because of a dreadful scandal, when seven players all dead and gone now, were disgraced and banned from baseball because they accepted bribe money for intentionally losing the 1919 World Series to the Cincinnati Reds. 
Near the end of the story as the players return into the corn stalks, only the catcher remains on the field. He removes his mask and a handsome face appears that Ray recognizes as his father John when he was a young aspiring ball player. Ray says to Annie, "It's my father... I-I only saw him years later when he was worn down by life. Look at him. He's got his whole life in front of him, and I'm not even a glint in his eye. What do I say to him?" Ray introduces John to Annie and Karin and choking with emotion Ray asks, "Hey Dad? Do you want to have a catch?" The two enjoy a game of catch between father and son one more time as the sun sets. Then dad waves goodbye and moves into the corn stalks. 
Kinsella story is an inspired piece of literature about the themes of faith and redemption. He writes fiction. He deals in make believeand it’s entertaining and we are okay with that because we understand the genre. 
However, those themes of Faith and redemptionare customary themes in church too. Here in this place we are uninterested in fiction. We want and we expect truth in our conversations and in our teaching. We certainly want the truth about faith and redemption.  

Sunday, July 7, 2019

TEMPTATION READINESS ... Audio file of my sermon Luke 4:1-13


I delivered this message at White Rock Community Church. Pastor Steve Doerksen was preaching through Luke’s gospel, and on Feb 10thneeded someone to step in for him, giving me liberty to choose my own section of scripture and subject or to continue in Luke. I chose to continue his run through Luke. Luke 4 was my text and that is the story of Jesus being tempted by the devil at the outset of Christ’s earthly ministry. In his successful rejection of this enticement, Jesus has taught us how to be ready for temptation so that we also can effectively recognize it and refuse it. Our objective is to say “No.”   

The Temptation of Jesus
1 And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness 2 for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And he ate nothing during those days. And when they were ended, he was hungry. 
3 The devil said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread." 
4 And Jesus answered him, "It is written, 'Man shall not live by bread alone.'" 
5 And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, 6 and said to him, "To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. 
7 If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours." 
8 And Jesus answered him, "It is written, "'You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.'" 
9 And he took him to Jerusalem and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, 10 for it is written,  "'He will command his angels concerning you, to guard you,' 11 and  "'On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.'"
12 And Jesus answered him, "It is said, 'You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.'" 
13 And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time.

If you take time to listen, I thank you. I trust that God’s Word that spoke to me, has also spoken to you.