James Hewitt - Illustrations Unlimited

CHRIST

James Hewitt - Illustrations Unlimited

OUR ONENESS IN CHRIST

I was speaking at the Indiana State Prison. Only weeks earlier, Stephen Judy had been electrocuted there. An execution always creates a special tension in a prison, and I could sense it that day. It was in the air, in the voices of the guards, in the faces of the men. After my talk, the warden walked us through the maze of cell blocks to that most dreaded of places—an isolated wing where five men awaited their final decree and death. Nancy Honeytree, the talented young gospel singer who is part of our team, was with me; several of our volunteers came along as well. Finally, we were ushered through two massive steel gates into the secure area. The inmates were allowed out of their cells, and we joined in a circle in the walkway while Nancy strummed the guitar and sang. It was a beautiful moment for those condemned men—and for us—as we closed by singing together “Amazing Grace.” Two of the men, I knew from their correspondence with me, were believers. One of them, James Brewer, had the most radiant expression during our visit, and he sang at the top of his lungs. As we were shaking hands and saying good-bye, I noticed that Brewer walked back into his cell with one of our volunteers. The others began filing out, but this volunteer remained in Brewer’s cell; the two were standing shoulder to shoulder, together reading the Bible. I was expected in two hours in Indianapolis for a meeting with the governor, so I walked back into the cell. “We’ve got to go,” I called out, beckoning to our volunteer. “Just a minute, please,” he replied. I shook my head and repeated, “Sorry, time’s up, the plane is waiting.” “Please, please, this is very important,” the volunteer replied. “You see, I am Judge Clement. I sentenced this man to die. But now he is born again. He is my brother and we want a minute to pray together. I stood in the entrance to that solitary, dimly lit cell, frozen in place. Here were two men—one black, one white; one powerful, one powerless; one who had sentenced the other to die. Yet there they stood grasping a Bible together, Brewer smiling so genuinely, the judge so filled with love for the prisoner at his side. Impossible in human terms! Brewer should despise this man, I thought. Only in Christ could this happen. The sight of those men standing together as brothers in that dingy cell will remain vivid in my mind forever.

Recognizing our need for Christ

Nov 06 2011 DCFC English [Jesus came to the world to...] John 6:24-37 – be the bread of life

Pastor Brian Bill retells the story of Jon Krakauer in his bestselling book called, “Into Thin Air.” Jon Krakauer relates the hazards that plagued some climbers as they attempted to reach the summit of Mount Everest. Andy Harris, one of the expedition leaders stayed at the peak too long and on his descent, he became in dire need of oxygen. Harris radioed the base camp and told them about his predicament. He mentioned that he had come across a cache of oxygen canisters left by the other climbers but they were all empty. The climbers who already passed the canisters on their own descent knew they were not empty, but full. They pleaded with him on the radio to make use of them but it was to no avail. Harris was starved for oxygen but he continued to argue that the canisters were empty. The problem was that the lack of what he needed had so disoriented his mind that though he was surrounded by something that would give him life, he continued to complain of its absence. The lack of oxygen had ravaged his capacity to recognize what was right in front of him.
CHRIST

The one

Date: 3/2009.101

www.sermonspice.com

"The one" - Jesus

CHRIST

Christ the Only Way – Self

Oct 16 2011 DCFC English [Jesus came to the world to...] John 3 - Give us second birth

It was May 14 2005. I was sitting on the breakfast table with a cup of coffee, reading the news paper. There was this front page article about a trend of having young ministers in the different religions. The journalist interviewed young man age 25-35 who gave up their professional lives to serve in religious ministries. The journalist made a comment, “These young men are seeking purpose in their lives through living for a higher purpose.” I was back in Singapore after my first year in Seminary. I had been going around to share some of my exciting experiences of God during my first year. That morning, I got a phone call from a good friend and he said, “If you read their interviews, they all have had similar spiritual experiences as you. There is this Buddhist monk, an Islamic scholar, a Catholic priest and a Christian pastor. Your experiences of God are not all that unique. What makes you so sure that Christianity is the only way, that only the Christian experience is authentic?”
CHRIST

CHRIST AND BUDDHA—THE GREAT DIFFERENCE

James Hewitt - Illustrations Unlimited

Frederick Buechner, in his book Now and Then, has a section on his comparison of the teachings of Buddha and of Jesus Christ, a topic he wrestled with when he was teaching at Phillips Exeter Academy: “Finally, lest students of comparative religion be tempted to believe that to compare them is to discover that at their hearts all religions are finally one and that it thus makes little difference which one you choose, you have only to place side by side Buddha and Christ themselves. “Buddha sits enthroned beneath the Bo tree in the lotus position. His lips are faintly parted in the smile of one who has passed beyond every power in earth or heaven to touch him. ‘He who loves fifty has fifty woes, he who loves ten has ten woes, he who loves none has no woes,’ he has said. His eyes are closed. “Christ, on the other hand, stands in the garden of Gethsemane, angular, beleaguered. His face is lost in shadows so that you can’t even see his lips, and before all the powers in earth or heaven he is powerless. ‘This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you,’ he has said. His eyes are also closed. “The difference seems to me this. The suffering that Buddha’s eyes close out is the suffering of the world that Christ’s eyes close in and hallow. It is an extraordinary difference, and even in a bare classroom in Exeter, New Hampshire, I think it was as apparent to everyone as it was to me that before you’re done, you have to make a crucial and extraordinary choice.”

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