A Famine Not of Bread

Click here to listen to this sermon. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! It is the Second Sunday after the Epiphany, the season of the year in which we focus on Jesus revealing Himself as God Incarnate, the Savior of all mankind. It is also Sanctity of Life Sunday. So, it is fitting that our Old Testament lesson, Isaiah 49, is serving double duty today. Let’s focus especially on verses 5 and 6: And now the Lord says, He who formed Me from the womb to be His Servant, to bring Jacob back to Him; and that Israel might be gathered to Him—for I am honored in the eyes of the Lord, and My God has become My strength—He says: “It is too light a thing that You should be My Servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel; I will make You as a light for the nations, that My salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” Do you see the connection? This Servant will “bring the preserved of Israel” and will be “a light for the n...

"The Transfiguration" by James Tissot Click here to listen to this sermon. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! The mountain traditionally identified as Mount Nebo is located about 12 miles east of where the Jordan River enters the Dead Sea, and it rises more than 2.600 feet above sea level. The Dead Sea is the lowest spot in the world, 1,300 feet below sea level. What a dramatic view of this land that Moses longed to see! By inviting Moses to a bird’s eye view of the Promised Land, the Lord showed one last act of kindness to this special leader of God’s people. But maybe it was more than that. Biblical precepts let a man view land he was about to possess. Perhaps this was the Lord’s way of giving Moses a legal guarantee that Israel would really inherit the land, even though Moses would die before it happened. The Lord had an even better promised land in mind for Moses. The writer to the Hebrews includes Moses on his list of believers wh...

  The Apostle Paul Explains the Tenets of Faith in the Presence of King Agrippa, His Sister Berenice, and the Proconsul Festus ” by Vasily Surikov Click here to listen to this sermon. “ Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer” (Romans 13:1-4). Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! The IRS. CDC. FBI. DHS. City Hall. County Courthouse. The Mayor. The Governor. The Pr...

Click here to listen to this sermon. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! It is the Second Sunday after the Epiphany, the season of the year in which we focus on Jesus revealing Himself as God Incarnate, the Savior of all mankind. It is also Sanctity of Life Sunday. So, it is fitting that our Old Testament lesson, Isaiah 49, is serving double duty today. Let’s focus especially on verses 5 and 6: And now the Lord says, He who formed Me from the womb to be His Servant, to bring Jacob back to Him; and that Israel might be gathered to Him—for I am honored in the eyes of the Lord, and My God has become My strength—He says: “It is too light a thing that You should be My Servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel; I will make You as a light for the nations, that My salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” Do you see the connection? This Servant will “bring the preserved of Israel” and will be “a light for ...

Click here to listen to this sermon. “[Christ] Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By His wounds you have been healed. For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls” (1 Peter 2:24-25). Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! I can understand why those who chose our pericopes (our assigned Bible readings for the week) might have decided to omit verse 18 from our Epistle today. They wished to avoid added controversy. But the verse does give us some needed context as to what kind of suffering Peter was calling these disciples to endure: “Servants [or slaves] be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust. For this is a gracious thing, when mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly. For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if wh...