Sermon Illustrations For Easter 6 (2017)
Illustration
Acts 17:22-31
Have you ever tried to be heard in a loud crowd? It may have been at a concert or at a football game, but if you’ve ever tried to talk at one of those events you know how tough it can be. Paul may have faced a similar situation, not so much with loud voices but with an onslaught of ideas.
Paul found himself at the Areopagus, or Mars Hill. Mars Hill is the Roman name for a hill in Athens, Greece, called the Hill of Ares or the Areopagus. Ares was the Greek god of war, and according to Greek mythology this hill was the place where Ares stood trial before the other gods for the murder of Poseidon’s son Alirrothios. Rising some 377 feet above the land below and not far from the Acropolis and Agora (marketplace), Mars Hill served as the meeting place for the Areopagus Court, the highest court in Greece for civil, criminal, and religious matters.
Earlier at the marketplace, Paul encountered some Epicurean and Stoic philosophers who, having heard Paul proclaim the resurrected Jesus Christ, wanted to learn about “this new doctrine” he was teaching -- so they “brought him to the Areopagus” to hear more from him.
We know from history that the Epicurean philosophers generally believed that God existed but that he was not interested or involved with humanity and that the main purpose of life was pleasure. On the other hand, the Stoic philosophers had the worldview that “God was the world’s soul” and that the goal of life was “to rise above all things” so that one showed no emotional response to either pain or pleasure. This was the background for Paul’s message -- a cacophony of voices, ideas, and thoughts. Into that mix of teachings, Paul proclaims truth. He speaks of the “Unknown God” who is the God of gods.
There is still today an avalanche of teaching and thinking about spiritual things. Will you stand up against that massive force and proclaim the truth?
Bill T.
Acts 17:22-31
The fastest-growing religious group in America is the religiously non-affiliated. Paul spoke to an audience like this in Athens. Like in his context, the religiously non-affiliated have their own altars before which they bow. As modern theologian Paul Tillich once said, we all have an ultimate concern, and what concerns you ultimately is your god. For some that ultimate concern (what concerns you the most or orients your life) is money, success, or family. That is your god. And then the question is whether these gods stand a chance against the God who loves and cares for us.
In elaborating on the existence of God, Paul claims that “in him we live and move and have our being” (v. 28). Martin Luther elaborates on this point in a way most suggestive of the Higgs Boson theory (the belief that there is a field which binds together the various subatomic particles into atoms to form matter): “Now if he [God] has found the way whereby his own divine nature can be wholly and entirely in all creatures and in every single individual being, more deeply, more inwardly, more present than the creature is to itself, and yet on the other hand may and can be circumscribed nowhere and in no being, so that he actually embraces all this and is in all, but no one being circumscribes him -- should not this same God also know some way whereby his body could be wholly and completely present in many places at the same time, and yet none of these places could be where he is?” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 37, p. 60).
Mark E.
Acts 17:22-31
In the newspaper comic The Born Loser, Brutus P. Thornapple is standing in front of his boss, Rancid W. Veeblefester. Veeblefester is a rich tycoon who is a very cranky, unpleasant man. He works in an office surrounded by moneybags, which is reflective of his stinginess. He always scolds Brutus for being incompetent and seems to enjoy tormenting him. Veeblefester tells Brutus that he has both good and bad news. Disenchanted, Brutus replies: “Why is it that whenever you have good news and bad news for me, the bad news always ends up having a greater impact on me than the good news?”
Application: Our reading teaches us the importance of not worshiping idols and to be respectful of other people.
Ron L.
1 Peter 3:13-22
“Now who will harm you if you are eager to do what is good?” This is what the 13th verse of this passage reads in the New Revised Standard translation. Those of us who can be cynical remember the colloquialism “No good deed goes unpunished.” Sometimes it seems that the more you try to live aligned with the will of God, focused on righteousness and compassion, hope and life, the more the world socks it to you. What’s a faithful person to do?
From Peter’s perspective, the best thing one can do is to continue to live aligned with Jesus, following his example. There is no need to fear earthly suffering or earthly challenges. Rather, we live in the hope of the resurrection, in the knowledge that nothing can separate us from God and God’s love. Sometimes the hardest thing to do is to remain steadfast in faith and in the living out of faith. Yet we are not alone in these struggles. Jesus, Emmanuel God with us, is here traveling the journey of human life and challenge with us. We are truly blessed.
Bonnie B.
1 Peter 3:13-22
Christians have wrestled with just what the author meant when he wrote that Jesus “went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison” (v. 19). The theories are many. Some think that Jesus, while his body was in the grave after his death and before the resurrection, went to preach to all the righteous from the Hebrew scriptures who lived before his time in order to give them the opportunity to be saved. Some think that Jesus preached to the fallen angels or the fallen souls that he had triumphed over in his death. Some time this verse in with the previous verses about Noah and the flood. Just as Noah was preserved over the chaos of the waters, so Jesus was preserved beyond death. Some think that Jesus gave people in hell a second chance to repent and be saved.
I have no idea what to make of this. This passage seems to lie beyond some sort of legalistic interpretation. It suggests to me instead that God is willing to go to extraordinary lengths, through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, to save the world.
Frank R.
1 Peter 3:13-22
First we need to do good (according to God’s word), and then be ready to tell others about our faith if they question us. If you don’t know why you believe in our Lord, how can you be a witness for him? Can we point to a time when our faith began? Not like the answer I gave to someone who asked me “When were you saved?” and I replied “2,000 years ago, but I didn’t realize it until recently.”
Can you point to a time when you “felt” saved? We became God’s child at our baptism, but when did we realize and accept that? It was supposed to happen at our confirmation where we “confirmed” our faith. That is one thing we can share with others who ask. If we can’t, then we need to search our hearts and the scripture until we find him.
No, we do not earn our salvation by obeying God’s laws. We obey God’s laws because of our love for him and because we believe that he has already made us his children through Christ’s sacrifice.
This passage seems to say that Jesus preached to the souls in hell. He seems to be meeting with those who never met him on earth. That could include all those living before he came to earth, like those who were drowned in the great flood and those on the mission field today who never had a chance to hear about him yet.
Our faith can and will be tested by those with malicious complaints against us. We can only win them by our patient endurance. This is what can put them to shame! That has won many disbelievers on the mission field, and can win non-believers in our country.
Our responsibility is to keep on doing good if we want to win others for our Lord.
Our only option after baptism is to reject it. If we don’t, it is ours. Hell is a choice! It comes by rejecting God’s gift to us when he made us his children.
Bob O.
John 14:15-21
“I am coming back for you.” Are there any more important words for one who must wait? In the movie Hacksaw Ridge, Desmond Doss is a medic for the army in Okinawa. His unit has tried to take Hacksaw Ridge from the Japanese. They hold it for a while, but the Japanese launch a surprise attack and force the Americans to retreat. Many soldiers are killed or wounded. Doss does all he can to rescue as many as he can. While others have escaped over the ridge, he stays, trying to save “one more.” I recall a scene from the movie in which Doss is carrying a wounded man to safety and comes upon another hurt soldier. Doss reaches out to him, touches him, and tells him “I’m coming back.” The wounded man breaths deeply, knowing that Doss will keep his word.
Jesus also makes a promise to come back. He tells his disciples who may be troubled by his leaving: “I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you.” These are words of encouragement and comfort. Jesus will not leave us alone, hurting and struggling in this world. He is coming back. You and I can be comforted in that promise.
Bill T.
John 14:15-21
When you are in love, you love. The love between you and your loved one makes you love. You don’t even need reminders. You just do what your loved one needs or wants. This is Jesus’ point in the lesson regarding how love leads to keeping his commandments.
Martin Luther made the point in another way. He spoke of Christians as being made so rich that they have a surplus of goods, so many that they just spontaneously give away what God keeps pouring into them. The first reformer makes several other illuminating comments: “If you see in the crucified Christ that God is so kindly disposed toward you that he even gives his own Son for you, then your heart in turn must grow sweet and disposed toward God” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 44, p. 38). “God is satisfied with my faith... therefore he wants me to do my works to benefit my neighbor.... He doesn’t need my works at all... God is rich enough himself without me and my works. He lets me live on earth, however, so that I may show the same kind of friendship to my neighbor that God has graciously shown to me” (Weimar Ausgabe, Vol. 20, p. 513 [translation mine]). “As Christ has become the common possession of us all... we should also become common possessions of one another” (Complete Sermons, Vol. 3/2, p. 59).
Mark E.
John 14:15-21
Leland Stanford Jr. was a freshman at Harvard University when he contracted typhoid fever and died. His parents inquired if they could build a monument in memory of their son. Appearing before Harvard’s president wearing ragged clothes, the couple were dismissed as vagabonds -- even after the couple said that the monument would not be a statue but an entire building. The president told Stanford’s parents that the university had $7.5 million invested in buildings and no additional money was needed. The couple decided that if it only took $7.5 million to build a campus, then they would build one of their own in memory of their son. On October 1, 1891, Leland Stanford, the co-founder of the Central Pacific Railroad, built Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, in memory of his son.
Application: If are obedient to the commandments of Jesus, we can do great things.
Ron L.
Have you ever tried to be heard in a loud crowd? It may have been at a concert or at a football game, but if you’ve ever tried to talk at one of those events you know how tough it can be. Paul may have faced a similar situation, not so much with loud voices but with an onslaught of ideas.
Paul found himself at the Areopagus, or Mars Hill. Mars Hill is the Roman name for a hill in Athens, Greece, called the Hill of Ares or the Areopagus. Ares was the Greek god of war, and according to Greek mythology this hill was the place where Ares stood trial before the other gods for the murder of Poseidon’s son Alirrothios. Rising some 377 feet above the land below and not far from the Acropolis and Agora (marketplace), Mars Hill served as the meeting place for the Areopagus Court, the highest court in Greece for civil, criminal, and religious matters.
Earlier at the marketplace, Paul encountered some Epicurean and Stoic philosophers who, having heard Paul proclaim the resurrected Jesus Christ, wanted to learn about “this new doctrine” he was teaching -- so they “brought him to the Areopagus” to hear more from him.
We know from history that the Epicurean philosophers generally believed that God existed but that he was not interested or involved with humanity and that the main purpose of life was pleasure. On the other hand, the Stoic philosophers had the worldview that “God was the world’s soul” and that the goal of life was “to rise above all things” so that one showed no emotional response to either pain or pleasure. This was the background for Paul’s message -- a cacophony of voices, ideas, and thoughts. Into that mix of teachings, Paul proclaims truth. He speaks of the “Unknown God” who is the God of gods.
There is still today an avalanche of teaching and thinking about spiritual things. Will you stand up against that massive force and proclaim the truth?
Bill T.
Acts 17:22-31
The fastest-growing religious group in America is the religiously non-affiliated. Paul spoke to an audience like this in Athens. Like in his context, the religiously non-affiliated have their own altars before which they bow. As modern theologian Paul Tillich once said, we all have an ultimate concern, and what concerns you ultimately is your god. For some that ultimate concern (what concerns you the most or orients your life) is money, success, or family. That is your god. And then the question is whether these gods stand a chance against the God who loves and cares for us.
In elaborating on the existence of God, Paul claims that “in him we live and move and have our being” (v. 28). Martin Luther elaborates on this point in a way most suggestive of the Higgs Boson theory (the belief that there is a field which binds together the various subatomic particles into atoms to form matter): “Now if he [God] has found the way whereby his own divine nature can be wholly and entirely in all creatures and in every single individual being, more deeply, more inwardly, more present than the creature is to itself, and yet on the other hand may and can be circumscribed nowhere and in no being, so that he actually embraces all this and is in all, but no one being circumscribes him -- should not this same God also know some way whereby his body could be wholly and completely present in many places at the same time, and yet none of these places could be where he is?” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 37, p. 60).
Mark E.
Acts 17:22-31
In the newspaper comic The Born Loser, Brutus P. Thornapple is standing in front of his boss, Rancid W. Veeblefester. Veeblefester is a rich tycoon who is a very cranky, unpleasant man. He works in an office surrounded by moneybags, which is reflective of his stinginess. He always scolds Brutus for being incompetent and seems to enjoy tormenting him. Veeblefester tells Brutus that he has both good and bad news. Disenchanted, Brutus replies: “Why is it that whenever you have good news and bad news for me, the bad news always ends up having a greater impact on me than the good news?”
Application: Our reading teaches us the importance of not worshiping idols and to be respectful of other people.
Ron L.
1 Peter 3:13-22
“Now who will harm you if you are eager to do what is good?” This is what the 13th verse of this passage reads in the New Revised Standard translation. Those of us who can be cynical remember the colloquialism “No good deed goes unpunished.” Sometimes it seems that the more you try to live aligned with the will of God, focused on righteousness and compassion, hope and life, the more the world socks it to you. What’s a faithful person to do?
From Peter’s perspective, the best thing one can do is to continue to live aligned with Jesus, following his example. There is no need to fear earthly suffering or earthly challenges. Rather, we live in the hope of the resurrection, in the knowledge that nothing can separate us from God and God’s love. Sometimes the hardest thing to do is to remain steadfast in faith and in the living out of faith. Yet we are not alone in these struggles. Jesus, Emmanuel God with us, is here traveling the journey of human life and challenge with us. We are truly blessed.
Bonnie B.
1 Peter 3:13-22
Christians have wrestled with just what the author meant when he wrote that Jesus “went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison” (v. 19). The theories are many. Some think that Jesus, while his body was in the grave after his death and before the resurrection, went to preach to all the righteous from the Hebrew scriptures who lived before his time in order to give them the opportunity to be saved. Some think that Jesus preached to the fallen angels or the fallen souls that he had triumphed over in his death. Some time this verse in with the previous verses about Noah and the flood. Just as Noah was preserved over the chaos of the waters, so Jesus was preserved beyond death. Some think that Jesus gave people in hell a second chance to repent and be saved.
I have no idea what to make of this. This passage seems to lie beyond some sort of legalistic interpretation. It suggests to me instead that God is willing to go to extraordinary lengths, through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, to save the world.
Frank R.
1 Peter 3:13-22
First we need to do good (according to God’s word), and then be ready to tell others about our faith if they question us. If you don’t know why you believe in our Lord, how can you be a witness for him? Can we point to a time when our faith began? Not like the answer I gave to someone who asked me “When were you saved?” and I replied “2,000 years ago, but I didn’t realize it until recently.”
Can you point to a time when you “felt” saved? We became God’s child at our baptism, but when did we realize and accept that? It was supposed to happen at our confirmation where we “confirmed” our faith. That is one thing we can share with others who ask. If we can’t, then we need to search our hearts and the scripture until we find him.
No, we do not earn our salvation by obeying God’s laws. We obey God’s laws because of our love for him and because we believe that he has already made us his children through Christ’s sacrifice.
This passage seems to say that Jesus preached to the souls in hell. He seems to be meeting with those who never met him on earth. That could include all those living before he came to earth, like those who were drowned in the great flood and those on the mission field today who never had a chance to hear about him yet.
Our faith can and will be tested by those with malicious complaints against us. We can only win them by our patient endurance. This is what can put them to shame! That has won many disbelievers on the mission field, and can win non-believers in our country.
Our responsibility is to keep on doing good if we want to win others for our Lord.
Our only option after baptism is to reject it. If we don’t, it is ours. Hell is a choice! It comes by rejecting God’s gift to us when he made us his children.
Bob O.
John 14:15-21
“I am coming back for you.” Are there any more important words for one who must wait? In the movie Hacksaw Ridge, Desmond Doss is a medic for the army in Okinawa. His unit has tried to take Hacksaw Ridge from the Japanese. They hold it for a while, but the Japanese launch a surprise attack and force the Americans to retreat. Many soldiers are killed or wounded. Doss does all he can to rescue as many as he can. While others have escaped over the ridge, he stays, trying to save “one more.” I recall a scene from the movie in which Doss is carrying a wounded man to safety and comes upon another hurt soldier. Doss reaches out to him, touches him, and tells him “I’m coming back.” The wounded man breaths deeply, knowing that Doss will keep his word.
Jesus also makes a promise to come back. He tells his disciples who may be troubled by his leaving: “I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you.” These are words of encouragement and comfort. Jesus will not leave us alone, hurting and struggling in this world. He is coming back. You and I can be comforted in that promise.
Bill T.
John 14:15-21
When you are in love, you love. The love between you and your loved one makes you love. You don’t even need reminders. You just do what your loved one needs or wants. This is Jesus’ point in the lesson regarding how love leads to keeping his commandments.
Martin Luther made the point in another way. He spoke of Christians as being made so rich that they have a surplus of goods, so many that they just spontaneously give away what God keeps pouring into them. The first reformer makes several other illuminating comments: “If you see in the crucified Christ that God is so kindly disposed toward you that he even gives his own Son for you, then your heart in turn must grow sweet and disposed toward God” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 44, p. 38). “God is satisfied with my faith... therefore he wants me to do my works to benefit my neighbor.... He doesn’t need my works at all... God is rich enough himself without me and my works. He lets me live on earth, however, so that I may show the same kind of friendship to my neighbor that God has graciously shown to me” (Weimar Ausgabe, Vol. 20, p. 513 [translation mine]). “As Christ has become the common possession of us all... we should also become common possessions of one another” (Complete Sermons, Vol. 3/2, p. 59).
Mark E.
John 14:15-21
Leland Stanford Jr. was a freshman at Harvard University when he contracted typhoid fever and died. His parents inquired if they could build a monument in memory of their son. Appearing before Harvard’s president wearing ragged clothes, the couple were dismissed as vagabonds -- even after the couple said that the monument would not be a statue but an entire building. The president told Stanford’s parents that the university had $7.5 million invested in buildings and no additional money was needed. The couple decided that if it only took $7.5 million to build a campus, then they would build one of their own in memory of their son. On October 1, 1891, Leland Stanford, the co-founder of the Central Pacific Railroad, built Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, in memory of his son.
Application: If are obedient to the commandments of Jesus, we can do great things.
Ron L.
