Tag: trinity

Today I've had 200 hits from people googling "trinity sermon".

It's good to know how prepared your pastors are for Trinity Sunday eh??

The talks from Saturday's Conference are now available.  Thanks to Cor Deo for making them available:

Ron Frost: A Description of Christ
Peter Sanlon: The Transformative Power of the Bible
Mike Reeves: The Heart-Winning God
Peter Mead: Deeply Satisfied?

Here are some quotes from Mike's talk.  By the end of it, I was very close to standing on my chair and demanding that he continue, "For pity's sake man, go on!"

"For we may look into his fatherly heart and sense how boundlessly he loves us, that would warm our hearts, setting them aglow."  (From Luther's Large Catechism)

"The triunity of God is the secret of His beauty.  If we deny this we at once have a god without radiance, without joy and without humour... and losing the dignity and power of real triune divinity, He also loses His beauty.  But if we keep to this, that the one God is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, we cannot escape the fact, either in general or in detail that, apart from anything else, God is beautiful."  (Karl Barth)

"One main end of our calling is to lay open and unfold the unsearchable riches of Christ, to dig up the mine thereby to draw the affections of those who belong to God to Christ."  (Richard Sibbes)

And here is Mike's sensational conclusion.

Delighted by God?  Heartfelt Christianity?

The focus isn't on our delight but on the God who is so delightful.  The focus isn't on our hearts but on the Christ who wins them.

And so, my brothers and sisters, look to Jesus who shows us the love of the Father and who shares with us the love of the Father.

Do not focus on any delight you do or do not have in Him.  That's not your focus.  Look to Him who brings delight.  Look to Jesus.  United to Him - He is your status.  Then your heart begins to thrill. 

When you're looking inside grubbing around for how delighted you are... well,  you'll just scrape yourself raw.  Look to Him in whom there is all fullness.  And be delighted.

Look to Jesus, else you'll forget that God is a Father.  Look to Jesus else you'll forget that God is your Loving Father who accepts you in the Son.

For the refreshing of the church today, let us be a people who speak much of Jesus.  Who lay open and unfold the unsearchable riches of Christ to ourselves everyday, to each other, for thereby hearts are drawn to Christ.

For, as Luther said,  it is through Jesus that "we may look into God's fatherly heart and see how boundlessly He loves us, that would warm our hearts, setting them aglow."

I love trinitarian theology.  I love affective theology.  But the centre is Christ.  In Him we see trinity, from Him comes heartfelt joy.  Therefore Look to Jesus!

Sermon on 1 John 4:7-21.
Audio
Powerpoint

Let me give you a thought experiment.  Here are two scenarios.

Scenario 1: Imagine we’re on a ship.  But it springs a leak and starts sinking.  While we’re fleeing to the life-rafts, you manage to grab a bag before it all goes down.  Unbeknownst to the rest of us your bag contains a bottle of water and some canned meat – tuna and spam and things like that.  So there we are huddled together in the life-raft bobbing along the open sea.  Eventually spot an island in the distance.  We start paddling towards it and as we get closer we see that the island is incredibly bare. There doesn’t appear to be a stick of shrubbery, no sign of fresh water, it’s basically a big rock in the middle of the ocean.  But it’s our only hope.  So we row towards the island and as we get closer your brother turns to you and says “Boy I’m thirsty.”  What do you do?

Scenario 2: Same deal.  Our ship sinks.  We flee to the life-rafts.  Unbeknownst to everyone you have a bag containing water and canned meat.  As we bob along in the open sea we spot an island in the distance.  As we paddle towards it, we see that it’s lushous, luxurious, full of life.  You can see the trees heavy with choice fruits.  There’s a gushing waterfall in the distance.  It’s a tropical paradise.  As we row towards shore your brother turns to you and says “Boy I’m thirsty.”

What do you do?  Do you give your brother a drink of water?

Well in scenario 2 you’d be much more likely to give him your water wouldn’t you?  In fact in scenario 2 you might even throw the whole bag open and say, water and spam for everyone, let’s celebrate, wouldn’t you?  In scenario 2 you would treat your little bag of goods a lot differently wouldn’t you?

Why?  Are you a much nicer person in scenario 2?  Are you suddenly more moral?  Have you suddenly got a heightened sense of ethical duty?  Is your conscience stronger now?  What’s changed between scenario 1 and scenario 2?

Here’s what’s changed – your vision has changed.  You have seen an abundance of life and it’s liberated you to be generous.  That’s the only difference between these scenarios.  You’re still the same bundle of sins and selfishness you always were, but now you’ve seen, now you’re celebrating, now you’re assured that things are going to be ok.

You could take anyone in the whole human race and put them into those two scenarios and present them with exactly the same temptations.  And in scenario 1 we’d all be much more tempted to be grasping and greedy.  And in scenario 2 we’d all be much more likely to be selfless and generous.

And that’s got nothing to do with the quality of your moral fibre.  It’s got everything to do with what’s out there.  If your vision is captured by a new reality out there – then you’re freed to be generous.  Sinful, selfish, sulking little ball of contradictions that you are – you see, you celebrate, you’re assured that things are going to be ok, and suddenly you find yourself loving.

And the argument of 1 John, especially in chapters 3 and 4, is this:  Look!  Look!  There is an abundance of life, it’s going to be ok.  We are in tropical paradise territory people.  So bust open your little bag and share out the spam.  That’s the argument. ...continue reading "Beloved, let us love – Sermon on 1 John 4:7-21"