Do You Love People?

Introduction

Soon after I graduated from seminary one of my first ministries was as an assistant pastor of First Baptist Church in Medford, Oregon. ...

Patience While You Wait

Introduction

As a planet, a nation, a city, a church, and individuals we’ve been through some testing times since we began this study in James. I ...

Simeon's Song

Introduction

I've been reading a gift somebody got for me. It's a fascinating book called Medieval Views of the Cosmos. When I say it's fascinating, ...

Praying While Running

Editor's Note: Throughout this document Dr. Jeffrey Arthurs has provided a running commentary on his sermon. It's an invaluable guide for how ...

Broken but Chosen

Introduction

It took Michelangelo four years to craft his statue of David. It is 13-feet tall. He used flawed marble. We know the exact quarry the marble ...

Mediation

Introduction

There was once a couple who had been married for 60 years. Throughout their life they had shared everything. They loved each other deeply. ...

Waiting for the Fullness of Time

Introduction

Last Saturday I wrote these words:

I'm at the airport—waiting. I arrived at 7:15 A.M. It's now 9:40. My 8:38 flight was canceled ...

Love in Spite of Differences

Every sailor could agree on one fact. Had it not been for the captain, they never would have survived. The storm came suddenly, and in a matter of moments ...

The Shortest Distance Between Two Points is a Zig Zag

Early in geometry we learned that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. That means if I'm at point A and want to get to point ...

Love Does Not Boast

From the editor:

Over the next few months, PreachingToday.com is going to run an entire transcript series from Haddon Robinson on 1 Corinthians 13. The ...

What Is This Thing Called Love?

From the editor:

Over the next few months, PreachingToday.com is going to run an entire transcript series from Haddon Robinson on 1 Corinthians 13. The ...

Good Riddance

Introduction

"Isn't there somewhere else you're supposed to be?" Has God ever said that to you? God seems to be saying that a lot around here lately. He ...

The Really Good Shepherd

Introduction

According to the United States Social Security Administration, Jacob was the number one male baby name for the year 2007. In the Bible the ...

The Messy Family of God

Introduction

"Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." So reads the first line of Leo Tolstoy's famous novel, Anna ...

A Fine Mess

Introduction

What a great promise from God: "I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go." We talked about this great promise in the last sermon—a ...

The Voice from the Top of the Stairs

Introduction

There's a story oft-told on the Internet—true or not, I don't know—about Susan, a 34-year-old woman who lost her sight due to ...

Odd Man Out

Introduction

Some wedding requests pose a dilemma for pastors. Most of us will not officiate at a wedding between a believer and an unbeliever, believing ...

The Strange Blessing of God

Introduction

Do you live a blessed life? I did a Google search on the phrase, "I live a blessed life." I stumbled upon one guy who wrote, "I live a blessed ...

I'll Stand by You

Introduction

So far in our series we've talked about three big ideas—love, joy, and peace. These Christ-like qualities offer a grand vision for our ...

Winter

Introduction

Confession: I've lived nearly 50 years and, for most of them, have never heeded the truth of Ecclesiastes 3:1-8. For everything there is a ...

God Is Big Enough to Comfort My Suffering

Simeon: A Song of Hope

Introduction

In the 1960s, psychologist Walter Mischel conducted a famous experiment that has come to be known as "The Marshmallow Test." Groups of 4-years ...

The House of Love

Introduction

This message concludes our series on the four best places to live. We've looked at the House of Worship, the House of Prayer, and the House ...

Ready or Not, Here I Come!

From the editor

Simply put: it's easy to mess up a difficult passage like Luke 21. You may find yourself applying something regarding Jerusalem's ...

Finding God in Desperate Places

Introduction

I'd like to write a book someday called Desperate Places: How God Shines Through Our Weakness. These desperate places are places of weakness, ...

Beyond Comfort

Introduction

Where do you turn for comfort when you encounter loss, pain, or disappointment? Some people turn to food. For some reason, certain foods—like ...

Unbreakable?

Introduction

M. Night Shyamalan's film Unbreakable begins with a train wreck. Everyone on board is killed—over a hundred people—except for ...

Peace in the Church

Introduction

When I was a pastor in Arizona, there were two men in the church who were greatly admired. They were both successful businessmen who desired ...

It's All About You, Lord

Introduction

A poet once complained to a friend, "Life's not fair. A banker can write a bad poem, and nobody says anything about it. But if a poet writes ...

The First Extreme: Conformity

Introduction

We have already met Jonah, a scowling, spiteful little man in a chronic state of bellyache. The meaning of his name—"dove"—just ...

Between Memory and Imagination

Introduction

Last week we learned that Deuteronomy is a book about transition. The people of Israel are standing on the banks of the Jordan River with ...

The Hardest Part of the Journey

Introduction

Today marks the beginning of a four-week series on the one book of the Bible that perhaps is read less often than any other. If we took a ...

You Don't Have to Be Good to Come to Christ

Introduction

The description of the early church that is found in the opening chapters of the Book of Acts almost sounds like paradise revisited. Two events ...

The Process of Transformation

Text: 1 John 3:1–10
Topic: How to attain holiness

Introduction

Imagine that you've been asked to write a book on marriage. Your publisher says, "We ...

The Right Way to Handle Church Conflict

Introduction

I am by nature an idealist. I start almost everything in life by thinking about the best-case scenario. As a young man, I had a best-case ...

Praying Through God's Silence

Introduction

Hear these words from the Word in Matthew 15:21–28:

Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. A Canaanite woman ...

Getting In the Last Word

Introduction:

When we began this series, I mentioned that First Peter deals with some topics that Americans don't always immediately relate to. Peter ...

Eliminating Envy

In 1975 country music was going through some major changes. The old Nashville style of slicked back hair, rhinestone suits, and songs about trains, ...

In the Day Of Trouble

Note: This message was first written for the Sunday following 9/11.

Our world changed Tuesday morning. In many ways, things will never be the same. The ...

Practice of Patience

Someone handed me a little clipping this past week. A couple of young men from Chicago decided they were tired of the hustle and bustle of city life. ...

The Patience of Job

"Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy" (James 5:11). The end ...

Practice of Patience

Someone handed me a little clipping this past week. A couple of young men from Chicago decided they were tired of the hustle and bustle of city life. ...

Some Way to Run a Farm

I would wager that the two predominant reasons I've heard people give for not being active in a church are: (1) people in the church seem just as lousy ...

God's Marshmallow Test

Back in the 1970s a research team of psychologists from Stanford University performed on a group of 4 an experiment they called the "marshmallow test." ...