A Famine Not of Bread

Click here to listen to this sermon. “Is such the fast that I choose, a day for a person to humble himself? Is it to bow down his head like a reed, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Will you call this a fast, and a day acceptable to the Lord (Isaiah 58:4-5)? Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! Imagine a world that is cold and silent toward pain and human suffering. Try to envision a place where everything is driven by self-indulgence and life is all about financial gain, business transactions, and the bottom line. A society where politics and government are more about attaining and maintaining power than serving and protecting the nation and its citizens. Countless people are being dehumanized. The sanctity of human life is determined by usefulness, cost-benefit analysis, convenience, and the god of choice. In this world, there are no prayers, liturgies, hymns, sermons, or Sacraments. And so, love and compassion are rare commodities. Thi...

The Baptism of Boden Diggs Bucher Click here to listen to this sermon. “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?” (Isaiah 43:18-19a). Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! The children of Israel had been in this situation before. About seven hundred years earlier, they’d been captives in Egypt, slaves to a Pharaoh who ruled them with an iron fist. But God had not forgotten His people. He met Moses on Mt. Horeb, spoke to him from a burning bush, and introduced Himself as I AM. The Lord told Moses He was sending him to Pharaoh with the command to let God’s people go. When Pharaoh refused, the Lord sent a series of plagues to convince him of the futility of resistance. The tenth plague was the worst of them all, where the Lord took the lives of all the firstborn sons of Egypt—all, of course, except for those who killed the Passover lamb and painte...