Sermon Illustrations For Lent 2 (2020)
Illustration
Psalm 121
When we moved my husband to live with our children in North Carolina, while I stayed in Pennsylvania to serve in my call, many people questioned our decision. How could we live apart? Were there problems in our marriage? It’s hard for people to understand the choices we make sometimes. Yet, my husband and I both sought the presence of God in our decisions. We knew the choice was best for us. We knew my call was not completed. We knew he would be safer with our children and less isolated with the grandchildren around him. We looked to the hills but found instead God as the keeper of our souls and our relationship. We talk daily; we see each other almost monthly for days. We are as connected as we ever have been. He is thriving in the presence of the children and grandchildren. He is safer and I am less worried. God knew the path to take and comforts us each day of the journey. God hold us, each of us, on our journeys.
Bonnie B.
* * *
Genesis 12:1-4a
It is tempting to praise Abraham’s faith, to use it as an example for us. That is a distortion of this text. It is about God’ s Work, about His grace, not our faith. John Calvin nicely made this point, as he once wrote:
It is certain that faith cannot stand, unless it be founded on the promises of God. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.I/1, p.346)
This insight does not come easily to human beings, Martin Luther says:
There is nothing about which this nature of ours is less able to hear than its own honors and God’s favors... God abhors the confidence which we have with regard to ourselves. But it is a natural shortcoming which troubles all the saints, especially the greatest. (Luther’s Works, Vol.3, p.4)
In this spirit Calvin adds that “there is no other method of living piously and justly, than that of depending on God.” (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.I/1, p.444) But we can’t stop God by our pride and stubborness. He notes:
Whence the gratuitous kindness of God shines the more clearly, because, although men impeded the cause of it by obstacles of their own, it nevertheless comes to them. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.I/1, p.459)
Mark E.
* * *
Roman 4:1-5; 13-17
There are a lot of metals that on the surface look like gold. Centuries ago, people discovered that unscrupulous operators would take advantage of this to trick people into paying for worthless metal. In order to determine whether gold was genuine or not, scientists devised an acid test. The metal that is supposed to be gold is rubbed on a black stone, leaving a mark behind. Gold is a noble metal, meaning that it is resistant to the corrosive effects of acid. If the mark is washed away by the acid, then the metal is not really gold. If it remains unchanged, the genuine nature of the gold is proven.
“Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.” Abraham possessed a genuine faith that left a mark. As verse 17 notes, Abraham trusted “in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.” What kind of faith do you have? Is it the real kind that leaves a lasting mark?
Bill T.
* * *
Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
Money is a wonderful concept. In our digital world, cash, whether in the form of coins, paper money, or the digital ones and zeros in which most currency is encoded and exists in the world, has value only because we believe in it. When people cease to believe in their money it loses value. Faith is essential.
It’s no different with something supposedly tangible. I’m thinking of precious metals like gold. You can’t eat gold. It has a few industrial uses. True, once crafted into something beautiful it does not tarnish, but beauty and value are in the eye of the beholder. Gold also has value only because we believe it does. When faith in gold wavers its value on the open market slips downward as well.
Far be it from me that I should give you investment advice, so don’t make changes in your retirement plan because of my words — unless you’re looking to your eternal investment in things of eternal value. Abraham’s faith in the promise of God may have seemed to some to have had no value, but the Apostle Paul is at pains to point out that Abraham’s faith is reckoned to him as righteousness because even though he did not see an immediate return in his investment in God’s promise, he believed that promise had the value of solid gold. We who inherit the promise through our faith also perceive great value.
Frank R.
* * *
Romans 4:1-17
Devon Still had encountered many difficulties in life, some of which were of his own doing. Playing football became his salvation. The 6’5”, 310 lb. defensive end was drafted by the Cincinnati Bengals in 2012. His life-long ambition had arrived, but injuries kept him off the field for many games. This resulted in playing for the Houston Texans in 2016, and the next year on the practice squad for the New York Jets. After that season Still was dismissed from professional football.
Still grew up in Wilmington, Delaware. His parents were not churchgoers, and when he was in the fifth grade his parents divorced. He went to live with his grandmother. It was also the beginning of his acting out and stealing. Grandma began taking Devon to church every Sunday. She had taken him to church before, but this time he knew it was for punishment.
Still said of his spiritual journey, “I’m a person of faith, though there have been times I’ve felt disconnected from God. Like when injuries threatened to derail my NFL career. I’d remember what my grandma told me when she was dragging me to church as a kid back in Wilmington, ‘The Lord speaks to all of us, Devon, but you’re never going to hear him if you don’t open your ears and listen.’”
Yet, even as an adult, Still could not hear the voice of God. When he prayed, he came to the understanding to never expect an answer, at least not one like his grandma used to hear. To hear his grandma tell it, the Almighty talked to her in a booming Old Testament voice, one where there was no mistaking that it was the voice of God. Still feared that he was never going to have that kind of relationship with God. He knew that he owed everything to God; yet, he pondered, was it too much to ask for some actual spoken words from God?
In his junior year at Penn State, Still got a coed pregnant. Into that relationship daughter Leah was born. The couple tried to work out their relationship, but it did not happen. In the separation Still promised to always be with Leah.
After college he was drafted by the Cincinnati Bengals. In his second year with the Bengals, Still encountered what was thought to be his football ending injury. In December 2013, playing against the Pittsburgh Steelers, Still strained his back. By that night, he couldn’t walk. Again, he needed surgery. The pain was unrelenting. An ultrasound revealed three blood clots in his lungs. The doctor informed him, “You’ll never play football again.”
It was also during this period in his life that he met Asha. It was a relationship of mutual love and support
Devon asked Asha, “Why does everything keep going wrong?” The huge defensive end was practically in tears. With spiritual insight, Asha replied, “Maybe you need to have a real relationship with God. Not just a help-me-out-of-a-jam one.”
Asha and Devon joined a Pentecostal church. Devon was amazed at how hard that congregation prayed. The church welcomed Asha and Devon with open arms. For the first time, Devon understood the importance of a church community. A church team that always has your back. A month after the couple started attending, Still went back to the doctor. The blood clots were gone. Devon said, “All those prayers, said by people who barely knew me. I knew I’d been led there.” That April, Asha and Devon were baptized. Finally, Devon felt as if his life had turned a corner.
Then in June 2014, Leah was diagnosed with a mass growing in her abdomen. It was stage four neuroblastoma. As Still related his feelings, “Right there in the hospital waiting room, I fell to my knees. I’d never taken a hit that hard playing football. My head was spinning. And I felt a flash of anger. What did God want from me? Then I thought of the people at church, their incredible support. I was going to need them more than ever. But more than ever, I craved that one-on-one connection to God. His voice booming in my ears. As it had for my grandmother.”
Still felt closer to God, but he also wondered why God seemed so distant and quiet. Devon said “it still seemed as if I was doing all the talking. I tried not to take it personally – until Leah, my sweet four-year-old daughter, got sick with cancer. I really needed to hear directly from him then.”
Since the June 2nd diagnosis, Still spent the next three weeks sleeping beside his daughter at the hospital. In support of his daughter, Still shaved his head bald and said that he will grow his hair back only when Leah does.
Spending so much time at the hospital, Still saw many other parents suffering emotionally for their children. Also, he could not avoid the trauma that the children were experiencing. Still began a campaign to raise awareness and support on his Instagram account. Soon he had a half million followers.
Eventually Still had to retire from football, but he continued his campaign for cancer awareness in young children. Devon Still said, “My entire life God has been talking to me, in ways I just hadn’t been hearing.”
Still recounts his spiritual life journey in his book, Still in the Game: Finding the Faith to Tackle Life’s Biggest Challenges, which was published in January 2019.
Ron L.
* * *
John 3:1-17
I have always been a curious person, a life-long learner. As a result, I have a bachelor’s degree, two master’s degrees and a doctoral degree. Yet, I wonder if I would have had the courage and curiosity to act as Nicodemus did. Nicodemus steps out on faith to ask questions of Jesus, questions of faith and spiritual understanding. As I think about his actions I am reminded of the times in my life that I have questioned God. When my 4-year-old brother was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer, I questioned where God was and why I was spared such a fate at twelve. When my first marriage crumbled around me, I asked God why I had made such a poor choice? When trouble entered my second marriage, I yelled at God about the feelings of having wasted the investment of 24 years with a man who seemed to want to escape me. But I never doubted the presence of God, even when I didn’t understand. Maybe that is the point. Nicodemus comes seeking the presence of the living God, the wisdom of the one who is present with us to prove God’s love for us. That is why Jesus came, and perhaps, it is in the time of questioning we are closest to our living God.
Bonnie B.
* * *
John 3:1-17
Martin Luther called this text (esp. v.16) “the gospel in miniature.” He goes on to elaborate on what this can mean in everyday life:
It pleases me very much that this doctrine of ours gives glory and everything else solely to God and nothing at all to men; for it is as clear as day that it is impossible to ascribe too much glory, goodness, etc. to God.... And it is true that the doctrine of the Gospel takes away all glory, wisdom, righteousness, etc. from men and gives it solely to the Creator, Who makes all things out of nothing. Furthermore, it is far safer to ascribe too much to God than to man. (Luther’s Works, Vol.26, p.66)
John Wesley nicely described how what it feels like to have faith in this Gospel:
Another fruit of this living faith is peace... And it is a peace which all the powers of earth and hell are unable to take from him... Whether they are in ease or in pain, in sickness or health, in abundance or want, they are happy in God. (Works, Vol.5. p.216)
Mark E.
* * *
Matthew 17:1-9
We get a glimpse of eternity in time with this story, a foreshadowing of the Resurrection. Modern theologian Paul Tillich offers a deep insight about life which illuminates this text. He claims that the nature of the cosmos is the mediation of temporality by eternity. All temporal events contain a dimension of eternity (Biblical Religion and the Search for Ultimate Reality, pp.77-78). In the very instant I write and when these words are read eternity surrounds us. That makes good scientific sense since we are surrounded by light and at the speed of light there is no time, all time is made into an eternal instant. Nineteenth-century essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson made this point regarding God, and it seems to be happening in the Transfiguration story: “He takes men out of time and makes them feel eternity.”
What does this entail for us in daily life? It means that every temporal moment of our week bears eternity in it, is sacred. Jesus’ Transfiguration reminds us that the eternity we glimpse in everyday life is really Him, that the whole universe is contained in His divinity in the Godhead. We are only alive because we live in the One Who is the source of life. Convinced of that way of thinking we can pray and sing along with the great Catholic theologian/scientist of the 20th century, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin:
Lord Jesus Christ, You truly contain within Your gentleness, within Your humanity, all the unyielding immensity and grandeur of the world.. I love You as the source and life-giving ambience, the term and consummation of the world... Lord, Jesus, You are the centre towards which all things are moving... (Hymn of the Universe, pp.75-76)
Reminded of Christ’s eternity we go into the world knowing that we go along with Him.
Mark E.
When we moved my husband to live with our children in North Carolina, while I stayed in Pennsylvania to serve in my call, many people questioned our decision. How could we live apart? Were there problems in our marriage? It’s hard for people to understand the choices we make sometimes. Yet, my husband and I both sought the presence of God in our decisions. We knew the choice was best for us. We knew my call was not completed. We knew he would be safer with our children and less isolated with the grandchildren around him. We looked to the hills but found instead God as the keeper of our souls and our relationship. We talk daily; we see each other almost monthly for days. We are as connected as we ever have been. He is thriving in the presence of the children and grandchildren. He is safer and I am less worried. God knew the path to take and comforts us each day of the journey. God hold us, each of us, on our journeys.
Bonnie B.
* * *
Genesis 12:1-4a
It is tempting to praise Abraham’s faith, to use it as an example for us. That is a distortion of this text. It is about God’ s Work, about His grace, not our faith. John Calvin nicely made this point, as he once wrote:
It is certain that faith cannot stand, unless it be founded on the promises of God. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.I/1, p.346)
This insight does not come easily to human beings, Martin Luther says:
There is nothing about which this nature of ours is less able to hear than its own honors and God’s favors... God abhors the confidence which we have with regard to ourselves. But it is a natural shortcoming which troubles all the saints, especially the greatest. (Luther’s Works, Vol.3, p.4)
In this spirit Calvin adds that “there is no other method of living piously and justly, than that of depending on God.” (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.I/1, p.444) But we can’t stop God by our pride and stubborness. He notes:
Whence the gratuitous kindness of God shines the more clearly, because, although men impeded the cause of it by obstacles of their own, it nevertheless comes to them. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.I/1, p.459)
Mark E.
* * *
Roman 4:1-5; 13-17
There are a lot of metals that on the surface look like gold. Centuries ago, people discovered that unscrupulous operators would take advantage of this to trick people into paying for worthless metal. In order to determine whether gold was genuine or not, scientists devised an acid test. The metal that is supposed to be gold is rubbed on a black stone, leaving a mark behind. Gold is a noble metal, meaning that it is resistant to the corrosive effects of acid. If the mark is washed away by the acid, then the metal is not really gold. If it remains unchanged, the genuine nature of the gold is proven.
“Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.” Abraham possessed a genuine faith that left a mark. As verse 17 notes, Abraham trusted “in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.” What kind of faith do you have? Is it the real kind that leaves a lasting mark?
Bill T.
* * *
Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
Money is a wonderful concept. In our digital world, cash, whether in the form of coins, paper money, or the digital ones and zeros in which most currency is encoded and exists in the world, has value only because we believe in it. When people cease to believe in their money it loses value. Faith is essential.
It’s no different with something supposedly tangible. I’m thinking of precious metals like gold. You can’t eat gold. It has a few industrial uses. True, once crafted into something beautiful it does not tarnish, but beauty and value are in the eye of the beholder. Gold also has value only because we believe it does. When faith in gold wavers its value on the open market slips downward as well.
Far be it from me that I should give you investment advice, so don’t make changes in your retirement plan because of my words — unless you’re looking to your eternal investment in things of eternal value. Abraham’s faith in the promise of God may have seemed to some to have had no value, but the Apostle Paul is at pains to point out that Abraham’s faith is reckoned to him as righteousness because even though he did not see an immediate return in his investment in God’s promise, he believed that promise had the value of solid gold. We who inherit the promise through our faith also perceive great value.
Frank R.
* * *
Romans 4:1-17
Devon Still had encountered many difficulties in life, some of which were of his own doing. Playing football became his salvation. The 6’5”, 310 lb. defensive end was drafted by the Cincinnati Bengals in 2012. His life-long ambition had arrived, but injuries kept him off the field for many games. This resulted in playing for the Houston Texans in 2016, and the next year on the practice squad for the New York Jets. After that season Still was dismissed from professional football.
Still grew up in Wilmington, Delaware. His parents were not churchgoers, and when he was in the fifth grade his parents divorced. He went to live with his grandmother. It was also the beginning of his acting out and stealing. Grandma began taking Devon to church every Sunday. She had taken him to church before, but this time he knew it was for punishment.
Still said of his spiritual journey, “I’m a person of faith, though there have been times I’ve felt disconnected from God. Like when injuries threatened to derail my NFL career. I’d remember what my grandma told me when she was dragging me to church as a kid back in Wilmington, ‘The Lord speaks to all of us, Devon, but you’re never going to hear him if you don’t open your ears and listen.’”
Yet, even as an adult, Still could not hear the voice of God. When he prayed, he came to the understanding to never expect an answer, at least not one like his grandma used to hear. To hear his grandma tell it, the Almighty talked to her in a booming Old Testament voice, one where there was no mistaking that it was the voice of God. Still feared that he was never going to have that kind of relationship with God. He knew that he owed everything to God; yet, he pondered, was it too much to ask for some actual spoken words from God?
In his junior year at Penn State, Still got a coed pregnant. Into that relationship daughter Leah was born. The couple tried to work out their relationship, but it did not happen. In the separation Still promised to always be with Leah.
After college he was drafted by the Cincinnati Bengals. In his second year with the Bengals, Still encountered what was thought to be his football ending injury. In December 2013, playing against the Pittsburgh Steelers, Still strained his back. By that night, he couldn’t walk. Again, he needed surgery. The pain was unrelenting. An ultrasound revealed three blood clots in his lungs. The doctor informed him, “You’ll never play football again.”
It was also during this period in his life that he met Asha. It was a relationship of mutual love and support
Devon asked Asha, “Why does everything keep going wrong?” The huge defensive end was practically in tears. With spiritual insight, Asha replied, “Maybe you need to have a real relationship with God. Not just a help-me-out-of-a-jam one.”
Asha and Devon joined a Pentecostal church. Devon was amazed at how hard that congregation prayed. The church welcomed Asha and Devon with open arms. For the first time, Devon understood the importance of a church community. A church team that always has your back. A month after the couple started attending, Still went back to the doctor. The blood clots were gone. Devon said, “All those prayers, said by people who barely knew me. I knew I’d been led there.” That April, Asha and Devon were baptized. Finally, Devon felt as if his life had turned a corner.
Then in June 2014, Leah was diagnosed with a mass growing in her abdomen. It was stage four neuroblastoma. As Still related his feelings, “Right there in the hospital waiting room, I fell to my knees. I’d never taken a hit that hard playing football. My head was spinning. And I felt a flash of anger. What did God want from me? Then I thought of the people at church, their incredible support. I was going to need them more than ever. But more than ever, I craved that one-on-one connection to God. His voice booming in my ears. As it had for my grandmother.”
Still felt closer to God, but he also wondered why God seemed so distant and quiet. Devon said “it still seemed as if I was doing all the talking. I tried not to take it personally – until Leah, my sweet four-year-old daughter, got sick with cancer. I really needed to hear directly from him then.”
Since the June 2nd diagnosis, Still spent the next three weeks sleeping beside his daughter at the hospital. In support of his daughter, Still shaved his head bald and said that he will grow his hair back only when Leah does.
Spending so much time at the hospital, Still saw many other parents suffering emotionally for their children. Also, he could not avoid the trauma that the children were experiencing. Still began a campaign to raise awareness and support on his Instagram account. Soon he had a half million followers.
Eventually Still had to retire from football, but he continued his campaign for cancer awareness in young children. Devon Still said, “My entire life God has been talking to me, in ways I just hadn’t been hearing.”
Still recounts his spiritual life journey in his book, Still in the Game: Finding the Faith to Tackle Life’s Biggest Challenges, which was published in January 2019.
Ron L.
* * *
John 3:1-17
I have always been a curious person, a life-long learner. As a result, I have a bachelor’s degree, two master’s degrees and a doctoral degree. Yet, I wonder if I would have had the courage and curiosity to act as Nicodemus did. Nicodemus steps out on faith to ask questions of Jesus, questions of faith and spiritual understanding. As I think about his actions I am reminded of the times in my life that I have questioned God. When my 4-year-old brother was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer, I questioned where God was and why I was spared such a fate at twelve. When my first marriage crumbled around me, I asked God why I had made such a poor choice? When trouble entered my second marriage, I yelled at God about the feelings of having wasted the investment of 24 years with a man who seemed to want to escape me. But I never doubted the presence of God, even when I didn’t understand. Maybe that is the point. Nicodemus comes seeking the presence of the living God, the wisdom of the one who is present with us to prove God’s love for us. That is why Jesus came, and perhaps, it is in the time of questioning we are closest to our living God.
Bonnie B.
* * *
John 3:1-17
Martin Luther called this text (esp. v.16) “the gospel in miniature.” He goes on to elaborate on what this can mean in everyday life:
It pleases me very much that this doctrine of ours gives glory and everything else solely to God and nothing at all to men; for it is as clear as day that it is impossible to ascribe too much glory, goodness, etc. to God.... And it is true that the doctrine of the Gospel takes away all glory, wisdom, righteousness, etc. from men and gives it solely to the Creator, Who makes all things out of nothing. Furthermore, it is far safer to ascribe too much to God than to man. (Luther’s Works, Vol.26, p.66)
John Wesley nicely described how what it feels like to have faith in this Gospel:
Another fruit of this living faith is peace... And it is a peace which all the powers of earth and hell are unable to take from him... Whether they are in ease or in pain, in sickness or health, in abundance or want, they are happy in God. (Works, Vol.5. p.216)
Mark E.
* * *
Matthew 17:1-9
We get a glimpse of eternity in time with this story, a foreshadowing of the Resurrection. Modern theologian Paul Tillich offers a deep insight about life which illuminates this text. He claims that the nature of the cosmos is the mediation of temporality by eternity. All temporal events contain a dimension of eternity (Biblical Religion and the Search for Ultimate Reality, pp.77-78). In the very instant I write and when these words are read eternity surrounds us. That makes good scientific sense since we are surrounded by light and at the speed of light there is no time, all time is made into an eternal instant. Nineteenth-century essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson made this point regarding God, and it seems to be happening in the Transfiguration story: “He takes men out of time and makes them feel eternity.”
What does this entail for us in daily life? It means that every temporal moment of our week bears eternity in it, is sacred. Jesus’ Transfiguration reminds us that the eternity we glimpse in everyday life is really Him, that the whole universe is contained in His divinity in the Godhead. We are only alive because we live in the One Who is the source of life. Convinced of that way of thinking we can pray and sing along with the great Catholic theologian/scientist of the 20th century, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin:
Lord Jesus Christ, You truly contain within Your gentleness, within Your humanity, all the unyielding immensity and grandeur of the world.. I love You as the source and life-giving ambience, the term and consummation of the world... Lord, Jesus, You are the centre towards which all things are moving... (Hymn of the Universe, pp.75-76)
Reminded of Christ’s eternity we go into the world knowing that we go along with Him.
Mark E.
