Apr 24 2011 dcfc english Worship [The Master & The Disciple] Luke 24: 28-36

CHRISTMAS, SECULARIZTION

Seculariztion of Christmas

Date: 12/2007.101

In Illinois, state government workers were forbidden from saying the words Merry Christmas while at work

In Rhode Island, local officials banned Christians from participating in a public project to decorate the lawn of City Hall

A New Jersey school banned even instrumental versions of traditional Christmas carols

Arizona school officials ruled it unconstitutional for a student to make any reference to the religious history of Christmas in a class project

Millions of Americans are starting to fight back against the secularist forces and against local officials who would rather surrender than be seen as politically incorrect. Gibson shows readers how they can help save Christmas from being twisted beyond recognition, with even the slightest reference to Jesus completely disappearing.

Now, honestly, I don't care if someone says Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays. I don't look to retailers or the general culture to validate the meaning of the season for me. What does concern me is the attempt to rewrite history to rob Jesus of the enormously positive influence He has had on the world over the past two thousand years.

CHURCH

Barna Research

Date: 3/2009.101

Be the Church

Date: 3/2009.101

power of one, being able to make a difference as a church

Church

Date: 11/2008.101

Mrs. Smith: Yes, it is such a relief after a long hard week of work. I just love to come to church, sit down on the soft cushions and not think about anything for an hour.

Church

Date: 11/2008.101

Church & Culture

Date: 6/2008.101

Church & Democracy

Dear Colson Center Friend,

As we approach a critical election year in 2012, some in the press continue to fixate on the faith of Christian political candidates. They throw out words like "theocrats" and "dominionists" with dark hints that Christian politicians desire to "impose" their religion on an unwilling populace.

But friends, we teach here at The Colson Center that Christians aren't seeking to "impose" anything on anyone. As a supporter of our movement, I'm sure you agree. What we do is "PROPOSE"—propose a way of life that benefits the common good and promotes human dignity.

Remember, Western liberal democracy (which gives the media the freedom to bite the hand that feeds it) arose from Christian roots.

It was in the monasteries of Christian Europe during the Middle Ages where we begin to find democracy for all—noble and peasant alike. Capitalism, guided by Augustine's writings, took root in the northern Italian states. In fact, the moral standards that Christianity engendered in Western culture were crucial for the development of democracy: People must be able to govern themselves and practice self-restraint before they can rule themselves via elected government. I talk about this at length in my book, The Faith, which I'd like to send you as a thank you for becoming a Charter Member of The Colson Center.

Even beyond modern liberal democracy, think for just a moment about how Christianity made Western culture the most humane culture in history: schools for all, charities, hospitals, the great universities . . . these are all fruits of Christian culture in the West. The belief in the sanctity of life made Christians defenders of each individual's dignity.

We believe men and women are sovereign creatures made in God's image.

Because we bear His image and were granted free will by God Himself, we enjoy freedom as a right—it's in our nature. (That's also, by the way, why the Church has always defended the right of private property—another hallmark of the West.)

So, the next time a friend or acquaintance blithely comments that Christians seek to "impose" their religion on others, gently remind him or her that we seek no such thing. We will continue as our forbearers did, PROPOSING that which benefits the common good and promotes human dignity. Western civilization has been shaped by this proposal and every American who enjoys the blessings of freedom—believer and non-believer alike—benefits from it.
CHURCH

America Return to God – Francis Schaeffer

July 10 2011 DCFC English Worship – [Carpe Diem: Live, Laugh & Love] Eccl 8:1-15

Today the separation of church and state in America is sued to silence the church. When Christians speak out on issues, the hue and cry from the humanist state and media is that Christians and all religions are prohibited from speaking since there is a separation of church and state. The concept used today is totally reversed from the original intent. This would have amazed the Founding Fathers. The French Revolution that took place shortly after the founding of the USA, with its excesses and final failure leading to Napoleon and an authoritative rule, only emphasized the difference between the base upon which the US was founded and that of the French Revolution. As a matter of historical fact, the Founding Fathers believed that the public interest was served by the promotion of religion. The Northwest Ordinance of 1787, which set aside federal property in the territory says, “Religion, morality and knowledge being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind.

In 1811, the NY State court upheld an indictment for blasphemous utterances against Christ and its ruling given by Chief Justice Kent, the court said, “We are Christian people and the morality of the country is deeply engrafted upon Christianity.”

The establishment of Protestant Christianity was one not only of law but far more importantly of culture. It supplied the nation with its system of values until around 1920. As Terry Eastland said concerning John Adams, “Most people agreed that our law was rooted, as John Adams had said, in a common moral and religious tradition that stretched back to the time Moses went up to Mt Sinai. Similarly almost everyone agreed that our liberties were God-given and should be exercised responsibly. There is a distinction between liberty and license.

Vernon McLellan

Former Congressman & Arizona State Senator John Colan, “Separation of church and state is a false issue. It is a slogan created by the secular humanist which sounds legal but in fact is a sham. It does not appear anywhere in the constitution and it is not a concept of that our Founding Fathers believed. The Constitution was written with godly influence of the government was a given.” Humanists love to tell us, “You cannot legislate morality.” It is illogical because every law – air pollution, murder, taxes, every single one of them legislate morality. The question is not whether we legislate morality, but whose we legislate.

No title

One of the most striking Internet success stories in recent years is Zappos, the $1+ billion e-commerce business which was bought last year by Amazon.

But, as is often the case, the Zappos empire was not created overnight.  Ten years ago, the online retailer known for selling shoes was actually desperate for sales.  It wasn’t until a young Tony Hsieh came aboard in 1999 -- as a business consultant and investor -- did that all begin to change.

Hsieh’s unorthodox approach to company culture turned Zappos not only into a very lucrative business, but one beloved by customers and employees alike.  He was named CEO in 2000 and attributes Zappos’ success to sticking by the company’s core values, which were designed to make employees happy.

“Our number one priority at Zappos is company culture. Our belief is that if we get the culture right most of the other stuff like delivering great customer service or building a long-term enduring brand for the company will happen naturally on its own,” says Hsieh who is also the author of a new book “Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion and Purpose.”

Hsieh, 36, has stayed CEO of Zappos, despite making a salary that one would normally associate with an entry-level customer-service rep--$36,000 a year. Hsieh has been so successful as an entrepreneur that money no longer motivates him. What does, he says, is continuing to develop the company and culture that the Zappos team built over the past decade. And, so far, Amazon has allowed him to do that. 

He must be on to something:  Fortune magazine named Zappos #15 on its annual ranking of “Best Companies to Work For” at the beginning of the year.

Born for business

Hsieh, a first-generation Taiwanese-American, was only in his mid-20s when he joined the Zappos team.  He may have been fresh out of college, but he certainly was no stranger to creating and cultivating multi-million dollar businesses.

From a very young age, he had the entrepreneurial instinct. At just nine years old, he had started his very first business – a worm farm.  A few years later came his mail-order make-your-own button company.  Then while studying computer science at Harvard he started making his peers what every college student demanded more than anything: pizza.

His first “real” company

Shortly after college in 1996 at the age of 24, Hsieh co-founded LinkExchange a website development business from the comfort of his own basement. Two years later Microsoft paid him $265 million – yes, nine figures – for his creation.

Of course Hsieh needed another challenge and to feed his insatiable entrepreneurial appetite.  That challenge would be Zappos.  His goal was to make the company – at the time fighting for financial stability - the largest online shoe retailer.

Zappos named him CEO and he did what he set out to do. Hsieh grew the company that had nearly non-existent sales when he started, to over $1 billion in sales today. 

His guiding principle:  Happiness.  When you enjoy what you do and where you work, great things will happen.

“We have 10 core values at Zappos. We try to do is hire people whose personal values match their corporate values,” says Hsieh while also stressing the importance not hiding or holding back who you are outside of the office. “It is about being yourself in the office because we found that when true friendships are formed, that is when creativity really blossoms (in our employees) and great ideas come out, which is what has driven our growth.”

The company will not hire anyone who does fit within their corporate culture.

“One our values is to be humble, and that is the one that trips us up most during the hiring process. There are a lot of smart people out there that are also egotistical and for us it is not a question, we just won’t hire them,” says Hsieh.

In the same vein, the company will fire employees who do not live up to those standards.

Often, when growing companies are acquired by much-larger ones, such cultures are destroyed, as the acquirer seeks to wring out the "synergies" used by financial folks to justify the acquisition.

But that's not so in this case, Hsieh says.

Before Amazon and Zappos agreed to their deal, Amazon signed a document saying it would let Zappos continue to do its own thing. And Hsieh says Amazon has honored that commitment.

Basically, the only thing that has changed, Hsieh says, is that Zappos has swapped its old board of directors for a new one--at Amazon. Zappos still runs its own show, and that has enabled it to maintain the culture that it so carefully cultivated in its years as an independent company.
CHURCH

America, Return to God – Jim Nelson Black

July 10 2011 DCFC English Worship – [Carpe Diem: Live, Laugh & Love] Eccl 8:1-15

One of the gurus who provoked the mischief of the sixties was a German born philosopher and Berkeley professor named Herbert Marcuse. He wrote voluminously and laid out an agenda for undermining the capitalist system of the West. Marcuse proposed a radical environmentalism. He encouraged and an all out assault on Judeo-Christian morality. He saw the value of homosexuality and lesbianism in shocking and shaking the culture and he was critical of the nuclear family. An avowed Marxist, his purpose was the utter defeat of capitalism. “If the New Left emphasizes the struggle for the restoration of nature, if it demands a new sexual morality, the liberation of women, then it fights against material conditions imposed by the capitalist system.” He added that Art and fashion are ideal tools of the evolution.” He called for an assault on the English language and the use of profanity and obscenity to desecrate the everyday speech. The use of sexualized curse words are especially important, he said: “It turns easily against sexuality itself” and is a debasement of human intimacy. Slang, violent, loud vulgar rock music were useful tools in undermining the culture. Sadly, by the time he died in 1979, all these invasions were well under way.

There is no more ominous threat to our future as a nation than the campaign for homosexuality being waged today in the popular media. The same perversions that brought ancient societies to ruin and that have been an anathema to every civilization known to man for more than 5000 years, are now paraded in the public eye and almost universally defended as inalienable rights. 45% of adults in the country believer homosexuality is an acceptable lifestyle and thanks to relentless programming in schools, 85% of high school seniors say homosexuality is acceptable. Likewise, 86% say that homosexuality is determined at birth. Throughout Scripture, God’s judgment on sexual perversion is made strikingly clear. Yet the secular world has chosen sodomy over sanity.

Dr Alfred Kinsey whose studies on sexual behaviors shocked the nation, and changed attitudes and behaviors of Americans dramatically, claimed to reveal what was really going on in America’s bedroom. In Sexual Behavior and the Human Male (1948) and Sexual Behavior and the Human Female (1953) he claimed that 95% of American males engaged in some of form of not just promiscuous but criminal sexual behavior. He claimed that women were much more sexually active than anyone realized and that was a good thing. His book sold more than 200,000 copies within the first two months. However, in a brilliant expose, Dr Judith Reisman uncovered a fraud that Kinsey’s report was based on surveys conducted in prisons, including some 1,400 sex offenders. It was shockingly dishonest and statistically invalid. Yet the media soaked it up. This corruption continues to permeate today through internet pornography today. In 1973, Americans spent about $10 million on pornography, by 1987 it was $8 billion and by 2001 it exceeded $14 billion a year. Teenage pregnancy and violence against women rose 525% since 1960. This country has the highest number of reported rapes in the world. It is no accident that the states which recorded the highest volume of sales of adult and sexually explicit materials also have the greatest number of rape cases. In the culture, 1 in 3 girls and 1 in 7 boys will be sexually molested before their 18th birthdays. In 1973 some 167,000 cases of child abuse were reported in America, by 1990 it exceeded 2 million. In addition 50% of all American households are run by single parent. In 1960, just 5% of all births in the country were to unmarried women, by 2000, 33% of all births and 70% of African American births were to unmarried women. Out of wedlock childbirth is not just the leading cause of single parenthood, it is the number one cause of poverty among women.

The greatest on-going tragedy of this generation is the crisis of abortion in America. Since 1972 there have been over 41 million abortions. That is more than 1,350,000 abortions a year in America. That horror that has been unleashed on America n the name of “a woman’s right to choose” is nothing less than the American Holocaust. IN Germany, the Nazis killed more than six million Jews, Poles, Christians and other undesirables. In America 41 million innocent children have been slaughtered. The famous Roe vs. Wade decision that on the woman’s right to abort was handed down in 1973. It helps to understand the context of it. Having just passed through the sixties and the moral values, traditions, and laws that had governed Western civilization for 2000 years, had been jettisoned in barely one decade. It was in this moral vacuum that the Court decided to act to provide a solution to the problem created by this new immorality. D. James Kennedy said, “The sin which was engendered in the sexual revolution was to be covered up by the abortion revolution. Today those aborted babies would be graduating from high school choosing colleges. If you watch a graduation ceremony, you should know that every fourth place should have been occupied by a cap and a gown that was empty, for the child was not there.”
 
CHURCH

America, Return to God – Vernon McLellan

July 10 2011 DCFC English Worship – [Carpe Diem: Live, Laugh & Love] Eccl 8:1-15 What is the connection between faith & politics?

Feb 26 2012 DCFC English [Dan 7 – Triumph of the Messiah]

Feb 26 2012 DCFC Chinese [Dan 7 – Triumph of the Messiah]

I remember hearing one university history professor who reported, “The average age of the world’s great civilizations has been around 200 years. These nations progressed through this sequence:

From spiritual faith to courage;

From great courage to liberty;

From liberty to abundance;

From abundance to selfishness;

From selfishness to complacency;

From complacency to apathy;
CHURCH

CS Lewis & Church

Date: 4/2009.101

America Return to God - Vernon McLellan

Feb 26 2012 DCFC English [Dan 7 – Triumph of the Messiah]

Feb 26 2012 DCFC Chinese [Dan 7 – Triumph of the Messiah]
Oswald Spencer who wrote The Decline of the West said, “You are dying. I see in you all the characteristic stigmas of decay. I can prove that your great wealth, and your great poverty, your capitalism and your socialism, your wars and your revolutions, your atheism and your pessimism and your cynicism, your immorality, your broken down marriages, your birth control, that is bleeding you from the bottom and killing you from the top in your brains, can prove to you that these a characteristic marks of dying ages of ancient States – Alexandria and Greece and neurotic Rome.
CHURCH

Life is Mostly Edges - Calvin Miller

Needless to say, we children didn't want to go to those churches that brought us baskets. The last place you want to go worship  is the place where people need you to be poor so they themselves can feel rich in the dispensation of their charity. There is something grandiose about giving a beggar a dime, but there is nothing grandiose in receiving it. Beggar don't ask for money so they can think well of themselves, but because feeling bad about themselves is usually less painful than starvation.

I think it was in this spirit that Mama received gifts from the church. She knew church members usually gave two ways. To their own well heeled members, they bake casseroles and dropped them off at elegant addresses with a sprig of parsley and a Hall mark card. But to the poor, they dropped off a basket and a can opener. Of course, Mama never refused their baskets, for the shame of it was less than the joy she derived out of being sure her little ones were fed.

There was one other difference in how church members gave food to their own peers. They never asked if they'd been born again when they dropped off a casserole. But it was mandatory that they win as many of us poor people as they could. They could have said they were giving a cup of cold water in Jesus' name. But it was demeaning to have to confess Christ every time they dropped off a basket.

CHURCH

Jumping without Parachutes

Date: 11/2007.101

Illustrations for Preaching & Teaching From Leadership Journal: Ed. Craig Brian Larson #30
Tim Bowden, in his book One Crowded Hour about cameraman Neil Davis, tells about an incident that happened in Borneo during the confrontation between Malaysia and Indonesia in 1964.

A group of Gurkhas from Nepal were asked if they would be willing to jump from transport planes into combat against the Indonesians if the need arose. The Gurkhas had the right to turn down the request because they had never been trained as paratroopers. Bowden quotes Davis's account of the story:

Now the Gurkhas usually agreed to anything but on this occasion they provisionally rejected the plan. But the next day one of their NCOs sought out the British officer who made the request and said they had discussed the matter further and would be prepared to jump under certain conditions.

"What are they?" asked the British Officer.

The Gurkas told him they would jump if the land was marshy and reasonably soft with no rocky outcrops because they were inexperienced in falling. The British officer considered this and said that the dropping area would almost certainly be over jungle and there would not be rocky outcrops so that seemed all right. Was there anything else?

"Yes," said the Gurkhas. They wanted the plane to fly as slowly as possible and no more than 100 hundred feet high. The British Officer pointed out the planes always did fly as slowly as possible when dropping troops but to jump from 100 feet was impossible because the parachutes would not open in time from that height.

"Oh," said the Gurkhas, "that's all right then. We'll jump with parachutes anywhere. You didn't mention parachutes before!"

Any church could use such Gurkhas-like commitment and courage.

CHURCH

Church - Loneliness in Church

Passport Through Darkness – Kimberly L Smith

We found no comfort in church. Most churches we visited focused on salvation, forgiveness, Bible studies and doing good works – almost exclusively programmatic things taking place within their four walls. We could find none that taught about the reality of extreme poverty, how vulnerable those conditions made women and children to trafficking, or about a biblical response required from the church. I tried to tell myself not to be angry or sad. After all, until I was faced with Carlos a few years ago, I didn’t know about trafficking either. My self talk didn’t help much; I still couldn’t understand how – once they knew, so many could turn away. At one time, going to church provided a deep sense of joy and comfort. Now, I felt more alone in the center of a beautiful worship service with glorious music rocking the rafters than I did as the only white woman in the middle of the Sahara Desert surrounded by a mob of hungry, thirsty, smelly, sick and dying people.

CHURCH

Me Religion

More Americans tailoring religion to fit their needs

By Cathy Lynn Grossman, USA TODAY 9/13/2011

If World War II-era warbler Kate Smith sang today, her anthem could be Gods Bless America.

By Eric Gay, AP

People take part in a National Day of Prayer gathering in San Antonio in May. Polls show that in 1991, 24% of U.S. adults hadn't been to church in the past six months; today, it's 37%.

Enlarge

By Eric Gay, AP

People take part in a National Day of Prayer gathering in San Antonio in May. Polls show that in 1991, 24% of U.S. adults hadn't been to church in the past six months; today, it's 37%.

That's one of the key findings in newly released research that reveals America's drift from clearly defined religious denominations to faiths cut to fit personal preferences.

The folks who make up God as they go are side-by-side with self-proclaimed believers who claim the Christian label but shed their ties to traditional beliefs and practices. Religion statistics expert George Barna says, with a wry hint of exaggeration, America is headed for "310 million people with 310 million religions."

"We are a designer society. We want everything customized to our personal needs — our clothing, our food, our education," he says. Now it's our religion.

Barna's new book on U.S. Christians, Futurecast, tracks changes from 1991 to 2011, in annual national surveys of 1,000 to 1,600 U.S. adults. All the major trend lines of religious belief and behavior he measured ran downward — except two.

Religious beliefs, practices shift

In a typical week, U.S. adults who say they:

Source: Barna Group OmnPolls

More people claim they have accepted Jesus as their savior and expect to go to heaven.

And more say they haven't been to church in the past six months except for special occasions such as weddings or funerals. In 1991, 24% were "unchurched." Today, it's 37% .

Barna blames pastors for those oddly contradictory findings. Everyone hears, "Jesus is the answer. Embrace him. Say this little Sinners Prayer and keep coming back. It doesn't work. People end up bored, burned out and empty," he says. "They look at church and wonder, 'Jesus died for this?'"

The consequence, Barna says, is that, for every subgroup of religion, race, gender, age and region of the country, the important markers of religious connection are fracturing.

When he measures people by their belief in seven essential doctrines, defined by the National Association of Evangelicals' Statement of Faith, only 7% of those surveyed qualified.

Barna laments, "People say, 'I believe in God. I believe the Bible is a good book. And then I believe whatever I want.'"

LifeWay Research reinforces those findings: A new survey of 900 U.S. Protestant pastors finds 62% predict the importance of being identified with a denomination will diminish over the next 10 years.

Exactly, says Carol Christoffel of Zion, Ill. She drifted through a few mainline Protestant denominations in her youth, found a home in the peace and unity message of the Baha'i tradition for several years, and then was drawn deeply into Native American traditional healing practices.

Yet, she also still calls herself Christian.

"I'm a kind of bridge person between cultures. I agree with the teachings of Jesus and … I know many Christians like me who keep the Bible's social teachings and who care for the earth and for each other," Christoffel says. "I support people who do good wherever they are."

And it's not only Christians sampling hopscotch spirituality. The Jewish magazine Moment has an "Ask the Rabbis" feature that consults 14 variations of Judaism, "and there are many," says editor and publisher Nadine Epstein.

"The September edition of Moment asks 'Can there be Judaism without God?' And most say yes. It's incredibly exciting. We live in an era where you pick and choose the part of the religion that makes sense to you. And you can connect through culture and history in a meaningful way without necessarily religiously practicing," Epstein says.

Sociologist Robert Bellah first saw this phenomenon emerging in the 1980s. In a book he co-authored, Habits of the Heart, he introduces Sheila, a woman who represents this.

Sheila says: "I can't remember the last time I went to church. My faith has carried me a long way. It's Sheilaism. Just my own little voice. … It's just try to love yourself and be gentle with yourself. You know, I guess, take care of each other. I think God would want us to take care of each other."

Bellah, now professor emeritus at University of California-Berkeley, says, "Sheila was a jolt to some at the time. But to a lot of people, it wasn't a jolt at all, they had been living that way for a while. Don't romanticize the past. Fervent religiosity was always in the minority. Just because people showed up in church didn't always mean a deep personal conviction or commitment."

Bellah sees two sides to the one-person-one-religion trend. On the positive: It's harder to hold on to prejudices against groups — by religion or race or gender or sexuality — if everyone wants to be seen individually.

"The bad news is you lose the capacity to make connections. Everyone is pretty much on their own," he says. And all this rampant individualism also fosters "hostility toward organized groups — government, industry, even organized religion."

Today, even the godless disagree on how not to believe, says Rusty Steil of Denver.

He grew up Lutheran and retained his parents' "strong moral code," but, he says, he couldn't stick with "ancient myths of people trying to make sense of the world."

"I don't find much comfort in imagining there's an all-powerful God who would allow people starving and all the natural and man-made disasters," Steil says.

Steil calls himself a "live-and-let-live atheist," as apart from the virulently anti-religious variety such as Christopher Hitchens or Richard Dawkins, or "those who actively promote disbelief."

Paul Morris, an Army medic at Fort Bragg in North Carolina and veteran of six tours in the Middle East, says he has seen Christianity, Judaism and Islam in action, for better and for worse, and, frankly, he'll pass.

Morris grew up "old-style Italian Catholic," but says he never felt like his spiritual questions were answered. So, he says, "I just wiped the slate clean. I studied every major religion on the face of the planet. Everyone had parts that made sense, but there was no one specific dogma or tenet I could really follow," Morris says.

"So now, I call myself an agnostic — one who just doesn't know. What I believe is that if you can just do the right thing, it works everywhere."

CHURCH

Missing the obvious

Date: 12/2008.101

Feb 20 2011 DCFC English Worship – [The Master & The Disciple] Luke 4:1-13 The Purpose of the Disciple
Sermon Central - don't miss the point. let the main point be the main point

Speaking of missing the point, Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are camping. They pitch their tent under the stars and go to sleep. Sometime in the middle of the night, Holmes wakes Watson. "Watson, look up at the stars and tell me what you deduce."

Watson says, "I see millions of stars, and if even a few of those have planets, it's quite likely there are some planets like Earth, and if there are a few planets like Earth out there, there might also be life."

Holmes replies, "Watson, you idiot, somebody stole our tent!"

Application:

Gospel Message

Church

Purpose of Life

CHURCH

Life is Mostly Edges - Calvin Miller

11 Apr 2010 DCFC English Worship - [Building a Community in Christ] Eph 6:10-17 What about the devil?

Dr Calvin Miller, bestselling author, poet, pastor and seminary professor, wrote of his life story from his humble beginnings in Enid OK, to his midnight inspiration that led him to write the best selling singer trilogy, tells a story about church. His grade school teacher Mrs. Deurksen noticed that he was too poor to own a pair of galosh. SO his feet were always wet when it rained. One day after school, she asked him to remain behind while all the other students left. Then she presented to him a pair of galoshes, black with four shiny metal hooks. They were beautiful. Calvin Miller said, “I started to take off my shoes so I could try them on and she said, “No child! You can keep your shoes on. These are made to slip right over your shoes.” I was amazed that you could actually wear two pair of footwear at the same time. I put them on and asked, “How much do they cost?” “They’re free for everyone in our school whose initials are CM.” I was flabbergasted! Those were my initials!” “You wear them home. They are yours” Said Mrs. Duesksen. I hung around and asked, "Well, don't you want me to be born again or something? I never got anything free without being born again." "Well, now you have. I'm sure if you need to get born again, the Baptists can help you with that. But the galoshes are yours. You run along now."

Years later, at his mother’s funeral, an old man approached him, “Dr Miller, did you ever wonder where the two hundred and fifty dollars came from on your second year at OBU?” “I’ve wondered all my life about that anonymous gift that allowed me to continue my studies,” Miller replied. “I gave it and by the way, you were worth every penny of it and then some!” Miller comments on these two stories, “In such moments, I forgive the church for sometimes being so unlike her Founder. It wasn’t just Jesus that appealed to me. It was what Jesus did through people who could for brief shining moments stop thinking about themselves and turn their minds to someone else. To give up selfish concerns and think of others is a small miracle in a selfish world. This is the grand narcotic – self denial. How addictive it is in the life of anyone with the courage to put it into practice. This is Church.

CHURCH

This is our place

Date: 3/2009.101

www.sermonspice.com
"This is our place" - Introduction for church
CHURCH

Welcome to our church

Date: 3/2009.101

www.sermonspice.com
"Welcome to our church" - What is our church about?
CHURCH

What about the Church?

Date: 4/2009.101

21 June 2009 DCFC English Worship - [Heavenly Songs for Earthly Woes] Ps 103 The Scandal of Grace
What so Amazing about Grace - Philip Yancey P15
Quoted from Charles Leung, from Gordon MacDonald, "The world can do almost anything as well as or better than the church. You need not be a Christian to build houses, feed the hungry or heal the sick. There is only one thing the world cannot do. It cannot offer grace.

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