The Joshua Victor Theory

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. There’s a hard lesson about division and judgment in today’s Gospel: Jesus talks about how He did not come to bring peace, but a sword. Divisions in the world, the family, and ultimately divisions from ourselves. Divisions are a tragic symptom of our sinful condition. Selfishness, rivalry, divided loyalties, and much more come from our sinful refusal to put God and His ways first. By contrast, God’s peace comes to those who trust and follow Jesus, even while they are divided from those who won’t follow Jesus. Ultimately Jesus must divide from sin, error and unbelief. There must be a parting of ways between God’s way and the world’s way—between the devil’s lies and God’s truth. Thank Jesus for rescuing us from lies and bringing us into truth. So where does Jesus divide and where does He unite? Jesus must divide us from lies and unify us with the truth. Lies are incompatible with the tru...

·          Palm Sunday entry: meets both praise and rejection. Jesus weeps over the grim consequences of their rejection. Passing up a golden opportunity. As if shooting both the messenger and the doctor who holds the cure. ·          God’s heart—Jesus’ bitter anguish—you don’t know what you’re refusing! He sees a great evil coming upon them, that is now irreversible—the destruction of Jerusalem and this temple. And bitterest of all, was they were bringing this upon themselves by rejecting the things that make for peace. Jesus laments: “ Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace ! But now they are hidden from your eyes. 43  For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side 44  and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone...

Expanded sermon outline: • Shepherd theme in Bible—several uses: 1) describe God in His relation to 2) His people as flock or lambs, 3) but also the leaders, priests, and prophets. Bad shepherds—Ezekiel 34 (wider context) and Jeremiah 23—false teachers, abusive, rule with force and harshness, neglect to feed, protecting personal gain and trampling the poor and needy. Sheep are scattered, none to seek them. God Himself will intervene. • Actions of God as shepherd—Psalm 23, protects, leads, feeds, comforts. Personal knowledge, love, care. Ezek. 34, search and recovery, heal and strengthen, destroy the enemies, justice. Zechariah 11-13, shepherd of the doomed flock, to be betrayed, pierced, mourned over, and struck, so the sheep are scattered. Leads to Jesus’ description: John 10—lays down His life for the sheep • Knowing God as our Good Shepherd—comfort and reassurance, not a hired hand. Not distant, detached, unconcerned with what happens to us. Belonging, invested, has something ...

 Sermon Outline: ·          Paul uses a vivid image to describe the church of Christ—one body, many members ·          Begins with objective reality: In One Spirit, all baptized into one body. Our entrance, identity, incorporation. ·          Illustrates the way we function together, on the one hand, how certain sins particular to the Christian body show themselves; on the other hand, what the body of Christ looks like at its best, as God intended. ·          Starting on the negative side—individualistic tendencies, rejection of our place in the body. Some today would use the language of self-esteem—but Scripture’s advice to us is not to think more of ourselves, but “not to think more highly of yourself than you ought to think.” Humility encourages us not to boast of ourselves. There is a “low thinking” that is ...

Sermon Outline: Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer—longest prayer of Jesus, earlier part is for His immediate disciples, second part expands to all future disciples. Interceding—seeking God’s blessing. Reflect on the great comfort that Jesus prays for us. We need God’s prayer, because apart from Him we all go our own separate ways, and here Jesus is praying for our unity. We may tend to think of prayer as only directed from us to God, but here Jesus prays on our behalf. This affirms what is elsewhere said, that the Holy Spirit also intercedes or prays for us “in groans too deep for words to express” (Rom. 8:26). This section focuses on all future believers “who will believe in me through their word”. These people for whom Jesus’ prays, are not yet part of the church, but He prays for them to believe—showing God’s concern for the lost, and for those who have not yet come to faith in Him. So, like Christ, we too should have ...

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Paul’s letters to the church in Corinth is a surprising study in how much can go wrong in a church. The books of 1 & 2 Corinthians are New Testament letters to the Christian church that Paul founded in Corinth. Corinth was a prosperous city of major importance in Greece, sitting on a narrow strip of land that connected important commercial routes. A center of commerce, culture, religious pluralism, and philosophy, Corinth was a melting pot. It was infamous for its vices and immorality. The Christian church that Paul started there struggled with all kinds of pressures surrounding them. The worship of a pantheon of idols and false gods, the popularity of various religious philosophies, the temptation and wide acceptance of all kinds of sexual sins and the low regard for marriage, along with the usual temptations of wealth or pride. It was an easy place for the church to go astray. Man...