Sermon Illustrations for All Saints Day (2013)
Illustration
Object:
Daniel 7:1-3, 15-18
It happened. An atomic bomb fell on America. It was on March 11, 1958, in a small community in South Carolina. An atomic bomb accidentally fell from a B-47 flying at 15,000 feet during a training exercise. The nuclear warhead was not armed, but when the 7,000-pound bomb struck the earth its electronic trigger exploded, leaving a massive crater.
Application: We must always be aware of the unexpected coming of the four great beasts.
Ron L.
* * * * *
Daniel 7:1-3, 15-18
Earthly powers enslave us. The media makes us its puppets in dictating to us what we (think we) want. Society puts us in racial and gender straitjackets. We fight wars because government tells us to, and society largely keeps us in the social class in which we are born. These earthly powers are the four beasts of Daniel's dream. But Daniel's dream makes clear that insofar as the holy ones of the Lord (perhaps the Messiah) will be the one(s) to possess the kingdom, we have the assurance that the ways of the world will not ultimately prevail. Seventeenth-century French intellectual Blaise Pascal describes the enslavement we experience from the ways of the world and of their ultimate demise:
It is absurd to rely on the company of our fellows, as wretched and helpless as we are; they will not help us; we shall die alone. We must act then as if we were alone... We should unhesitatingly look for the truth. And if we refuse, it shows that we have a higher regard for men's esteem for pursuing wealth.
(Pensees, pp. 80-81)
But if we rely first on Christ who ultimately is in control of the earthly powers, then these powers can be made to serve his aims, as Martin Luther King Jr. well described:
Now power properly understood is nothing but the ability to achieve purpose... There is nothing wrong with power if power is used correctly... Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.
(Worldview [April, 1972]: 5ff)
Mark E.
* * * * *
Ephesians 1:11-23
An inheritance can be a wonderful gift that can keep on giving. Dorothy appreciated the attention that her neighbor Mark extended to her in her old age. She seldom got out of the house, and so she appreciated Mark's visits. At the end of each visit when he wrapped his arms around her frail, chilled, bony body, she felt warmed, safe, and loved. When she died, she remembered him in her will and bequeathed to him $5,000. Flabbergasted, Mark knew what he would do with this unexpected gift. He bought a riding lawnmower (which he could never afford himself) plus a few lawn tools and began to care for the yards of the elderly folks in his neighborhood.
Mark M.
* * * * *
Ephesians 1:11-23
Paul starts with himself and his converts who were the first to hope in Christ. He might have meant the Jews, as God gave them the first opportunity to receive Christ.
That word "predestined" has brought some of our fellow Christians to the idea that some have been predestined to salvation before birth. One group (Presbyterians) who were being ordained as pastors had to swear that even if they were predestined to damnation, they would still serve the Lord as long as they lived! I like to think that God has predestined all of us to be saved, but that he "foreknows" that some will reject his salvation. This may be heretical, but I believe God sends no one to hell. We go because we have rejected the one who has saved us. It is our fault if we are damned, and all God's blessing that we are saved.
All those who became believers after Paul became part of the body of the faithful were saved. I can't see that it makes any difference to me if I came in early or late -- just so I made it!
The Holy Spirit is our guarantee that we have made it! He manifests himself in many ways by our actions and words, but also by our thoughts.
I still get letters from my friends in Nepal, excitedly telling me about how many new souls they have brought to Christ every week! On our shores, how many church members can count how many they have brought to Christ every year or in their lifetime? I mention many times about my friend, Pastor Tir, who died in Nepal a few years ago. He was the first Christian in Nepal, but now there are over 2 million! It all started by the mission of that one man! How many on earth can make that claim? Has anyone counted the results of Paul's ministry? The real point is not how many, but are we doing what God gave us to do and sharing the joy of his salvation and seeing others saved because of us -- even if it is only our own children?
Paul certainly goes to extremes to point up the sacrifice of Jesus and what it means to us. It makes us wonder if it is possible to overstate what Christ has done for us! Are we feeling grateful enough? Can we ever feel grateful enough?
Bob O.
* * * * *
Luke 6:20-31
Saints are people who live by the Golden Rule. Sort of. Martin Luther claimed that anyone can obey the Golden Rule; it is just common sense:
For nature teaches -- as does love -- that I should do as I would be done by.
(Luke 6:31)
... that love and natural law may always prevail... Such a free decision is given, however, by love and by natural law with which all reason is filled.
(Luther's Works, Vol. 45, p. 128)
It is not just saints who do good. Anyone (even non-Christians) can be moral. So what makes a saint? Real saints, Luther says, are "good stout sinners... they are not called saints because they are without sins or have become saintly through works... But they become holy through a foreign holiness, namely though that of the Lord Christ..." (What Luther Says, p. 1247).
It really is, then, like 19th-century American journalist Ambrose Bierce once wrote: "Saint: A dead sinner revised and edited."
Robert Louis Stevenson tells us who we saints are: "The saints are sinners who keep on going."
Mark E.
* * * * *
Luke 6:20-31
Katharine Hepburn, the great screen actress and person of great wealth, dressed very simply in her elderly years. She had twenty sets of identical matching beige slacks, white shirts, and black sweaters. She said that when you are young you dress for the opposite sex. She then said, "I'm past that age." Dressing up for her had become a "bore."
Application: Woe to the people who are rich and do not know simplicity.
Ron L.
It happened. An atomic bomb fell on America. It was on March 11, 1958, in a small community in South Carolina. An atomic bomb accidentally fell from a B-47 flying at 15,000 feet during a training exercise. The nuclear warhead was not armed, but when the 7,000-pound bomb struck the earth its electronic trigger exploded, leaving a massive crater.
Application: We must always be aware of the unexpected coming of the four great beasts.
Ron L.
* * * * *
Daniel 7:1-3, 15-18
Earthly powers enslave us. The media makes us its puppets in dictating to us what we (think we) want. Society puts us in racial and gender straitjackets. We fight wars because government tells us to, and society largely keeps us in the social class in which we are born. These earthly powers are the four beasts of Daniel's dream. But Daniel's dream makes clear that insofar as the holy ones of the Lord (perhaps the Messiah) will be the one(s) to possess the kingdom, we have the assurance that the ways of the world will not ultimately prevail. Seventeenth-century French intellectual Blaise Pascal describes the enslavement we experience from the ways of the world and of their ultimate demise:
It is absurd to rely on the company of our fellows, as wretched and helpless as we are; they will not help us; we shall die alone. We must act then as if we were alone... We should unhesitatingly look for the truth. And if we refuse, it shows that we have a higher regard for men's esteem for pursuing wealth.
(Pensees, pp. 80-81)
But if we rely first on Christ who ultimately is in control of the earthly powers, then these powers can be made to serve his aims, as Martin Luther King Jr. well described:
Now power properly understood is nothing but the ability to achieve purpose... There is nothing wrong with power if power is used correctly... Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.
(Worldview [April, 1972]: 5ff)
Mark E.
* * * * *
Ephesians 1:11-23
An inheritance can be a wonderful gift that can keep on giving. Dorothy appreciated the attention that her neighbor Mark extended to her in her old age. She seldom got out of the house, and so she appreciated Mark's visits. At the end of each visit when he wrapped his arms around her frail, chilled, bony body, she felt warmed, safe, and loved. When she died, she remembered him in her will and bequeathed to him $5,000. Flabbergasted, Mark knew what he would do with this unexpected gift. He bought a riding lawnmower (which he could never afford himself) plus a few lawn tools and began to care for the yards of the elderly folks in his neighborhood.
Mark M.
* * * * *
Ephesians 1:11-23
Paul starts with himself and his converts who were the first to hope in Christ. He might have meant the Jews, as God gave them the first opportunity to receive Christ.
That word "predestined" has brought some of our fellow Christians to the idea that some have been predestined to salvation before birth. One group (Presbyterians) who were being ordained as pastors had to swear that even if they were predestined to damnation, they would still serve the Lord as long as they lived! I like to think that God has predestined all of us to be saved, but that he "foreknows" that some will reject his salvation. This may be heretical, but I believe God sends no one to hell. We go because we have rejected the one who has saved us. It is our fault if we are damned, and all God's blessing that we are saved.
All those who became believers after Paul became part of the body of the faithful were saved. I can't see that it makes any difference to me if I came in early or late -- just so I made it!
The Holy Spirit is our guarantee that we have made it! He manifests himself in many ways by our actions and words, but also by our thoughts.
I still get letters from my friends in Nepal, excitedly telling me about how many new souls they have brought to Christ every week! On our shores, how many church members can count how many they have brought to Christ every year or in their lifetime? I mention many times about my friend, Pastor Tir, who died in Nepal a few years ago. He was the first Christian in Nepal, but now there are over 2 million! It all started by the mission of that one man! How many on earth can make that claim? Has anyone counted the results of Paul's ministry? The real point is not how many, but are we doing what God gave us to do and sharing the joy of his salvation and seeing others saved because of us -- even if it is only our own children?
Paul certainly goes to extremes to point up the sacrifice of Jesus and what it means to us. It makes us wonder if it is possible to overstate what Christ has done for us! Are we feeling grateful enough? Can we ever feel grateful enough?
Bob O.
* * * * *
Luke 6:20-31
Saints are people who live by the Golden Rule. Sort of. Martin Luther claimed that anyone can obey the Golden Rule; it is just common sense:
For nature teaches -- as does love -- that I should do as I would be done by.
(Luke 6:31)
... that love and natural law may always prevail... Such a free decision is given, however, by love and by natural law with which all reason is filled.
(Luther's Works, Vol. 45, p. 128)
It is not just saints who do good. Anyone (even non-Christians) can be moral. So what makes a saint? Real saints, Luther says, are "good stout sinners... they are not called saints because they are without sins or have become saintly through works... But they become holy through a foreign holiness, namely though that of the Lord Christ..." (What Luther Says, p. 1247).
It really is, then, like 19th-century American journalist Ambrose Bierce once wrote: "Saint: A dead sinner revised and edited."
Robert Louis Stevenson tells us who we saints are: "The saints are sinners who keep on going."
Mark E.
* * * * *
Luke 6:20-31
Katharine Hepburn, the great screen actress and person of great wealth, dressed very simply in her elderly years. She had twenty sets of identical matching beige slacks, white shirts, and black sweaters. She said that when you are young you dress for the opposite sex. She then said, "I'm past that age." Dressing up for her had become a "bore."
Application: Woe to the people who are rich and do not know simplicity.
Ron L.
