Sermon Illustrations for Trinity Sunday (2015)
Illustration
Object:
Isaiah 6:1-8
Most of us are aware of how unsettling political transition can be. God calls Isaiah at the death of a great king, in the face of an external threat from the powerful Assyrians and political challenges from neighboring states.
In the beginning of the chapter, we learn of the death of King Uzziah, who had governed Judah with great success for over 40 years. However, our attention is not directed to the next Davidic heir on the throne. With Isaiah, we see a cosmic throne and a ruler whose reign extends over the universe. An earthly temple cannot contain his majesty; the mere hem of his garment fills the Jerusalem sanctuary. God’s domain is not limited by the Davidic King, Jerusalem, or Judah; God’s domain and action extend to the world. What Assyria, Samaria, or for that matter any other nation does is at the Lord’s direction. Isaiah, at a moment of crisis, discovers a universal God who has no other challengers.
(from Robert W. Neff and Frank Ramirez,Country Seer, City Prophet: The Unpopular Messages of Micah and Isaiah [Brethren Press, 2007], pp. 14-15)
Frank R.
Isaiah 6:1-8
Martin Luther claims that the Triune God is talkative -- involved in an internal conversation with the Father as speaker, the Son as the Word, and the Spirit as the listener (Luther’s Works, Vol. 24, pp. 364-365). Consequently it is not surprising that in this lesson the Triune God is concerned to cleanse the mouths of his people in order that they may speak of him without impediment. When that happens, Luther says, we have a mission, the only purpose that there is in life: “We have no other reason for living on earth than to be of help to others. If this were not the case, it would be best for God to kill us and let us die as soon as we are baptized and have begun to believe. But he permits us to live here in order that we may bring others to faith, just as he brought us (Luther’s Works, Vol. 30, p. 11).
Mark E.
Romans 8:12-17
Christian Reger is a child of God. His story is told by Philip Yancey in the devotional book Stories of Hope for a Healthy Soul (Zondervan Publishing, 1999).
Yancey read the books of Elie Wiesel and Corrie ten Boom, and decided to visit the site of one of the Nazi concentration camps. It was on the grounds of the Dachau camp near Munich, Germany that he met Holocaust survivor Christian Reger. Christian spent four long miserable years that seemed like an eternity as a prisoner in Dachau. His internment came because he was a member of the branch of the German state church known as the Confessing Church. The Confessing Church was under the leadership of Martin Niemoller and Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who opposed Hitler and tried to assassinate the demented leader. Reger was turned in by his church organist to the authorities, who arrested him and shipped him to the Dachau labor camp.
Since liberation day, Reger and other members of the International Dachau Committee have worked hard to restore the concentration camp as a lasting monument and lesson to all humanity. Their slogan? “Never Again!”
Yancey writes that while visiting Dachau he found Reger wandering the grounds searching out tourists to converse with in German, English, or French. He answers their questions and reminisces about his days as an inmate. He shares that during the final winter, when coal supplies ran low, the crematories were shut down. Prisoners no longer had to put up with the constant stench of burning comrades. Reger says, however, that death did not stop, because many of the inmates died of exposure. The guards would make the prisoners stack the naked bodies in the snow like “cordwood, a number stenciled on each with a blue marker.”
Writer Yancey states that Reger will share those horror stories if you ask. But he never stops there, because he continues to share his faith, how even at Dachau he was visited by the God of love. He was reassured that he was a child of God.
Reger is quoted: “Nietzsche said a man can undergo torture if he knows the Why of his life, but here at Dachau, I learned something far greater. I learned to know the Who of my life. He was enough to sustain me then, and is enough to sustain me still.”
The author of Romans reminds us that we are God’s children in any human circumstance we find ourselves.
Derl K.
Romans 8:12-17
If we do nothing but please ourselves -- eat, drink, and be merry -- we will die. Not that we can’t do things to enjoy life, but don’t let that be the center of our universe. We can’t do it by ourselves. We need the Holy Spirit to put to death the temptations that are making us slaves to sin, and may we be led by the Spirit of God to be his sons. Only through the Spirit are we able to know that we are God’s children. We are children by adoption.
My son was raised in the church, but after he was away at school and his job he wandered away; but then I shouldn’t complain, since I also wandered away from my God and my church for almost ten years. He got into drugs and sex, and no words seemed to bring him back. It was only when he saw the uselessness and emptiness of it all that he went to rehab. He became a changed person, and even he admits that it was not him but the Holy Spirit that turned him around.
Sometimes it can take a traumatic experience in life to turn us around, like the death of a loved one or the loss of a job.
The thing that turned me around when I had a motion picture business was an offer to make a great deal of money making porno films. They were disgusting, but the money made it a great temptation. It made me decide that I had to set aside a time to pray each day to see if anyone was up there. I had not given it much thought before. I figured that if I were baptized and confirmed, that should get me into my final reward (if anything). My folks taught me that God could forgive anything. The only problem was that I had to confess it first. To make a long story short, God answered those prayers through his word when I finally realized that is where he was talking to me!
It is so easy to be a slave to sin. The temptations are everywhere! The evil one can keep us so busy pleasing ourselves that we have no time left to listen to God. God is waiting for us to cry out “Abba, Father!” Yes, even coming to church every Sunday is not enough. God is waiting for us to realize that he is our Heavenly Father and that he wants us to come to his love. He wants us to want him so much that we are willing to suffer for him.
Bob O.
Romans 8:12-17
After showing how great the reward of a spiritual life is, and that it makes Christ to dwell in us, and that it quickens our mortal bodies, and wings them to heaven, and renders the way of virtue easier, he next fitly introduces an exhortation to this purpose. “Therefore: we ought “not to live after the flesh.” But this is not what he says, for he words it in a much more striking and powerful way, thus “we are debtors to the Spirit.” For saying “we are debtors not to the flesh” indicates this. And this is a point he is everywhere giving proof of, that what God hath done for us is not matter of debt, but of mere grace. But after this, what we do is no longer a matter of free-will offering, but of debt. (italics mine)
(St. Chrysostom, “Homily XIV, The Epistle to the Romans,” in The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Vol. XI, pp. 439-440)
Frank R.
John 3:1-17
John Wesley offers a helpful observation about what it means to be born again. In his view it is really the beginning of life. Just like a child born in the world has eyes in the womb but did not really see, has ears but did not hear; but at birth the child begins to see and hear. Likewise, only when you are born again can you really see God and hear him (Works, Vol. 6/1, pp. 69-70). Likewise Martin Luther makes clear, contrary to what a lot of Americans think, that being born again is not about behaving differently: “Christ says: ‘It is my purpose to inform man that I will make him thoroughly pious, not externally by spreading his sour face or his respectable conduct before the world. No, not that. I want to instruct him in the new birth, I want to build from the bottom and purify the heart’ ” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 22, p. 281).
This new birth is not in its strictest sense an experience that we should have or have already experienced. In fact, as famed modern theologian Karl Barth made clear, our being born again happened long ago -- on the cross: “The point at issue is not that we have still to achieve, or even repeat, our reconciliation with God.... The truth is -- and this is the love of God the Father and the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ -- that these have taken place, so that there is no further need of Golgotha. In him we have both our justification and sanctification, both our regeneration and conversion” (Church Dogmatics, Vol. IV/2, p. 369).
Mark E.
Most of us are aware of how unsettling political transition can be. God calls Isaiah at the death of a great king, in the face of an external threat from the powerful Assyrians and political challenges from neighboring states.
In the beginning of the chapter, we learn of the death of King Uzziah, who had governed Judah with great success for over 40 years. However, our attention is not directed to the next Davidic heir on the throne. With Isaiah, we see a cosmic throne and a ruler whose reign extends over the universe. An earthly temple cannot contain his majesty; the mere hem of his garment fills the Jerusalem sanctuary. God’s domain is not limited by the Davidic King, Jerusalem, or Judah; God’s domain and action extend to the world. What Assyria, Samaria, or for that matter any other nation does is at the Lord’s direction. Isaiah, at a moment of crisis, discovers a universal God who has no other challengers.
(from Robert W. Neff and Frank Ramirez,Country Seer, City Prophet: The Unpopular Messages of Micah and Isaiah [Brethren Press, 2007], pp. 14-15)
Frank R.
Isaiah 6:1-8
Martin Luther claims that the Triune God is talkative -- involved in an internal conversation with the Father as speaker, the Son as the Word, and the Spirit as the listener (Luther’s Works, Vol. 24, pp. 364-365). Consequently it is not surprising that in this lesson the Triune God is concerned to cleanse the mouths of his people in order that they may speak of him without impediment. When that happens, Luther says, we have a mission, the only purpose that there is in life: “We have no other reason for living on earth than to be of help to others. If this were not the case, it would be best for God to kill us and let us die as soon as we are baptized and have begun to believe. But he permits us to live here in order that we may bring others to faith, just as he brought us (Luther’s Works, Vol. 30, p. 11).
Mark E.
Romans 8:12-17
Christian Reger is a child of God. His story is told by Philip Yancey in the devotional book Stories of Hope for a Healthy Soul (Zondervan Publishing, 1999).
Yancey read the books of Elie Wiesel and Corrie ten Boom, and decided to visit the site of one of the Nazi concentration camps. It was on the grounds of the Dachau camp near Munich, Germany that he met Holocaust survivor Christian Reger. Christian spent four long miserable years that seemed like an eternity as a prisoner in Dachau. His internment came because he was a member of the branch of the German state church known as the Confessing Church. The Confessing Church was under the leadership of Martin Niemoller and Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who opposed Hitler and tried to assassinate the demented leader. Reger was turned in by his church organist to the authorities, who arrested him and shipped him to the Dachau labor camp.
Since liberation day, Reger and other members of the International Dachau Committee have worked hard to restore the concentration camp as a lasting monument and lesson to all humanity. Their slogan? “Never Again!”
Yancey writes that while visiting Dachau he found Reger wandering the grounds searching out tourists to converse with in German, English, or French. He answers their questions and reminisces about his days as an inmate. He shares that during the final winter, when coal supplies ran low, the crematories were shut down. Prisoners no longer had to put up with the constant stench of burning comrades. Reger says, however, that death did not stop, because many of the inmates died of exposure. The guards would make the prisoners stack the naked bodies in the snow like “cordwood, a number stenciled on each with a blue marker.”
Writer Yancey states that Reger will share those horror stories if you ask. But he never stops there, because he continues to share his faith, how even at Dachau he was visited by the God of love. He was reassured that he was a child of God.
Reger is quoted: “Nietzsche said a man can undergo torture if he knows the Why of his life, but here at Dachau, I learned something far greater. I learned to know the Who of my life. He was enough to sustain me then, and is enough to sustain me still.”
The author of Romans reminds us that we are God’s children in any human circumstance we find ourselves.
Derl K.
Romans 8:12-17
If we do nothing but please ourselves -- eat, drink, and be merry -- we will die. Not that we can’t do things to enjoy life, but don’t let that be the center of our universe. We can’t do it by ourselves. We need the Holy Spirit to put to death the temptations that are making us slaves to sin, and may we be led by the Spirit of God to be his sons. Only through the Spirit are we able to know that we are God’s children. We are children by adoption.
My son was raised in the church, but after he was away at school and his job he wandered away; but then I shouldn’t complain, since I also wandered away from my God and my church for almost ten years. He got into drugs and sex, and no words seemed to bring him back. It was only when he saw the uselessness and emptiness of it all that he went to rehab. He became a changed person, and even he admits that it was not him but the Holy Spirit that turned him around.
Sometimes it can take a traumatic experience in life to turn us around, like the death of a loved one or the loss of a job.
The thing that turned me around when I had a motion picture business was an offer to make a great deal of money making porno films. They were disgusting, but the money made it a great temptation. It made me decide that I had to set aside a time to pray each day to see if anyone was up there. I had not given it much thought before. I figured that if I were baptized and confirmed, that should get me into my final reward (if anything). My folks taught me that God could forgive anything. The only problem was that I had to confess it first. To make a long story short, God answered those prayers through his word when I finally realized that is where he was talking to me!
It is so easy to be a slave to sin. The temptations are everywhere! The evil one can keep us so busy pleasing ourselves that we have no time left to listen to God. God is waiting for us to cry out “Abba, Father!” Yes, even coming to church every Sunday is not enough. God is waiting for us to realize that he is our Heavenly Father and that he wants us to come to his love. He wants us to want him so much that we are willing to suffer for him.
Bob O.
Romans 8:12-17
After showing how great the reward of a spiritual life is, and that it makes Christ to dwell in us, and that it quickens our mortal bodies, and wings them to heaven, and renders the way of virtue easier, he next fitly introduces an exhortation to this purpose. “Therefore: we ought “not to live after the flesh.” But this is not what he says, for he words it in a much more striking and powerful way, thus “we are debtors to the Spirit.” For saying “we are debtors not to the flesh” indicates this. And this is a point he is everywhere giving proof of, that what God hath done for us is not matter of debt, but of mere grace. But after this, what we do is no longer a matter of free-will offering, but of debt. (italics mine)
(St. Chrysostom, “Homily XIV, The Epistle to the Romans,” in The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Vol. XI, pp. 439-440)
Frank R.
John 3:1-17
John Wesley offers a helpful observation about what it means to be born again. In his view it is really the beginning of life. Just like a child born in the world has eyes in the womb but did not really see, has ears but did not hear; but at birth the child begins to see and hear. Likewise, only when you are born again can you really see God and hear him (Works, Vol. 6/1, pp. 69-70). Likewise Martin Luther makes clear, contrary to what a lot of Americans think, that being born again is not about behaving differently: “Christ says: ‘It is my purpose to inform man that I will make him thoroughly pious, not externally by spreading his sour face or his respectable conduct before the world. No, not that. I want to instruct him in the new birth, I want to build from the bottom and purify the heart’ ” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 22, p. 281).
This new birth is not in its strictest sense an experience that we should have or have already experienced. In fact, as famed modern theologian Karl Barth made clear, our being born again happened long ago -- on the cross: “The point at issue is not that we have still to achieve, or even repeat, our reconciliation with God.... The truth is -- and this is the love of God the Father and the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ -- that these have taken place, so that there is no further need of Golgotha. In him we have both our justification and sanctification, both our regeneration and conversion” (Church Dogmatics, Vol. IV/2, p. 369).
Mark E.
