OUTLINING SERMONS- Narrative–018 The easiest and most effective sermons are narrative sermons or stories. This lecture teaches you how to outline your narrative sermons by outlining blocks of thought instead of facts. The Narrative Sermon With the narrative sermon the preacher uses storytelling to bring out the word of God. The preacher takes a story [...]
Rooftop Crisis
The church (especially in the west) is experiencing a major crisis. This might me the end. Or it could be an occassion for an awakening – an opportunity unlike anything the Christianity has seen in 1000 years. Or it might mean both, really. It really depend on how we respond. How will you respond? Click this [...]
Preaching In The Transition Zone: Bilingual Baptist
Text: 2 Kings 18:17-37 They sure were cute! They were the children’s choir of the Colonial Beach Baptist Church. Each member of the choir was about age six. As they entered the choir loft they began to sing: “Nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen. Nobody knows my sorrow.” I thought: “How much trouble can [...]
Preaching In The Transition Zone: Wheelers and Dealer
SERMON TITLE: Wheelers and Dealers? – Texts: Matthew 25:14-30 A wealthy man goes on a trip. Before leaving he calls together three of his servants. He entrusts into their care the stewardship of his possessions. To the first he gave five talents. To the second he gave two talents, and to the last he gave [...]
Preaching In The Transition Zone: Whose Vineyard
SERMON TITLE: Whose Vineyard? – Texts: Matthew 21:33-46 I recently heard a story about a college student who discover a way to make a little extra money with his personal computer. Now when I say that he found a way to make a little extra money using his computer, I mean that quite literally. He [...]
Preaching In The Transition Zone: Pioneers or Settlers
SERMON TITLE: Pioneers or Settlers! – Texts: Matthew 28:18-20 We’ve all heard stories about the westward expansion of the United States. Leading the way were the pioneers. They were the forerunners who preceded all others exploring the uncharted territories. Their ambition was to investigate every valley, climb every mountain, traverse every desert, cross every river, [...]
Discipleship in “The Transition Zone”
The single most important contribution that Anabaptist ecclesiology can make in a post-modern world is to proclaim that Jesus Christ did not intend for his church to be viewed simply as another human institution. Anabaptists of the sixteenth century were unimpressed by the vast institution the church had become, insisting that this was a corruption [...]
Separation from State In “The Transition Zone”
Anabaptism developed at a time when a synthesis had developed between the state and the church. As we noted in earlier blogs, support for this synthesis was evident not only in Roman Catholic theology, but also in the theology of the Protestant reformers. The Anabaptists, however, rejected this synthesis and sought to separate themselves from [...]
Salvation is Social, Political, and Individual in “The Transition Zone”
The thesis of these blogs has been that the contemporary church can develop a meaningful theology of evangelism in a postmodern world (“the transition zone”) by recovering the Anabaptist vision of the church. Thus far we have defined postmodernism, investigated the roots of the Anabaptist tradition, and examined the major tenets of the Anabaptists’ approach [...]
A Community of Believers In “The Transition Zone”
In previous blogs under “the transition zone” thread, I have shown that the Anabaptists considered the life of discipleship to be the fundamental aspect of the Christian religion. Obviously this life of discipleship, as defined by the Anabaptists, could not be lived in isolation. When the Anabaptists spoke about discipleship, they also spoke to the [...]
