Sunday, February 22, 2009

Sun. Feb. 22, 2009 (Russ Klassen)

Russ Klassen, youth pastor at Sherbrooke Mennonite Church, provided a beautiful contrast between a mythopoetic text about Aten-Ra, the monotheistic representation of God as the sun, from Egypt in the Middle Dynasty (2000 BC - 1600 BC), and Psalm 104. In a Job-like message, the mystery and beauty of the world the One Living God has created is made apparent to both peoples, yet Russ drew contrasts between the distant, inpersonal God Aten, and the immanent God of the Jewish people. This was a talk to stretch the mind and to find symbols and meaning in other works of the world that presaged the coming of the One Living God. With discernment, one can take useful meaning from such texts. [AP] Listen to the sermon audio MP3 recording from Sunday Feb. 22nd, 2009 using your browser's preferred media player.

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Sunday, February 15, 2009

Sun. Feb. 15, 2009 (Andre Pekovich)

The service from the lectionary focussed on healing and miracles, first with the healing of Naaman, an unbeliever from another Syrian province under direction of the prophet Elisha (2Ki 5:1-14); second with Jesus’ healing of the leper (Mk 1:40-45); and last, a psalm of grateful praise from one who, though undeserving, was healed (Ps.30). Andre Pekovich read three articles that noted miracles are provided to believer and unbeliever alike, not solely as answer to our heartfelt prayers, but as evidence of His superiority of will, His dispensation of authority to prophets, and to underscore the importance of the common people in His kingdom. God performs miracles not to document individual “special-ness”, but to build up the power of belief in His existence and to enable our role as ‘the healed’ to bring the possibility of belief and relationship with God to others who also require healing. How miraculous that our brothers in sisters in the ‘two-thirds world’ are so much more able to accept miracles in the spirit which they were intended than we in the Western world. [AP] [No audio posted]

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Sunday, February 8, 2009

Sun. Feb. 8, 2009 (Henry Neufeld)

On February 8, 2009, Henry Neufeld cited numerous scriptures referring to God's glory. When Moses insisted that he see God's glory, God relented, hid Moses in a crevice in a rock and let him observe a bit of the glory after passing by. Later, Jews were reportedly unable to look at Moses' face after he had been with God because it still reflected God's glory. The story of the Mount of Transfiguration shows that New Testament writers were also interested in this concept. Fittingly, Revelations has many references to the glory of God. Our hymns, like Handel's "Messiah", often have glory as a major theme. C.S. Lewis even wrote of "the weight of glory". Glory is not something for which we merely wait (heaven), but we can quite possibly see glimpses of God's glory in people, for they are made in God's image. Some time ago, Jake Loewen suggested to our fellowship that the closest we will get to God is through the person sitting next to us. Do we see glimpses of God's glory in each other? How? What would we anticipate seeing? [JEK] Listen to the sermon audio MP3 recording from Sunday Feb. 8th, 2009 using your browser's preferred media player.

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Sunday, February 1, 2009

Sun. Feb. 1, 2009 (John Funk)

John Funk spoke about his experiences with the Christian Peacemaker Team in Hebron where he recently spent 23 weeks. John said the recent ground war in Gaza made it hard to prepare for Sunday, even though there are many Israelis and Palestinians working for peace. After living in the Holy land John said he now reads the Bible with fresh eyes; there are many layers to the Scriptural accounts of which we see only a few. The Israeli occupation of the West bank reminds one of the Roman occupation in Jesus’ time. John mentioned his respect for the Torah and Old Testament, noting that some passages promote violence if taken out of context. The prophets and gospels stress hopefulness, justice and peace. John said the faith of the Palestinians stands between hope and despair, and determined action keeps hope alive and this means living in the confidence of God’s intention for humanity. He defined hope as “expectation with confidence.” Jesus told his followers to watch the signs carefully, to be aware of events around us. Even though the Romans used guerrilla tactics, Jesus told his followers not to be drawn into the conflict. Jesus says “watch,” get ready for the birth of a child. We need a confident hope in the unfolding of the kingdom of God. Hope is what nurtures and sustains us as we reach out with confidence in the justice of God. Scripture calls us to hope even when the outlook is bleak. [HN] Listen to the sermon audio MP3 recording from Sunday Feb. 1st, 2009 using your browser's preferred media player.

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