The Joshua Victor Theory

  “To those who are called, beloved in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ: May mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you.” Today our church year begins anew with the season of Advent. We renew our annual cycle of watching and waiting for our Lord. Advent means “to come” and merges our waiting and anticipation for two different comings of the Lord. We remember, reenact, and celebrate Christmas, Christ’s first coming. We anticipate, prepare for, and watch for Christ’s second coming, His return to judge and redeem the world. Advent blends memory and anticipation. Since this is our Christian “New Year’s Day” in a sense, as the church calendar renews, we’re oddly out of step with the world, which doesn’t celebrate New Year’s for another month. The church can never be in complete alignment with the world, which is blind to God’s priorities, and often directly contradicts them. And almost as if to keep us a little off balance, the reading historically used for the 1 st Sunday o...

Sermon Outline: ·          Isaiah’s experience is largely unrelatable to us; feeling of absolute fear for his life, 1) seeing God in His glory, 2) inner sanctuary of the Temple (Holy of Holies). Raw terror of being where no human dares go—don’t have that same sense of fear of authority today to have a close comparison. Not a brush with death (Esther before King Xerxes or Moses and the burning bush are close examples; maybe also ancient Hawaiian kapu about the shadow of an alii falling on a commoner). Different from how people often think of God “ He who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see . ” 1Tim. 6:15-16. Unapproachable—so when Moses, or Isaiah or others are brought into God’s presence, the response is fear, retreat, face-down submission. ·          But the surprise ...

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. This is the fourth and last week where our readings are from the end of Hebrews. Previously we’ve seen how Hebrews makes the case that Jesus is superior over all things, and that our faith is centered in Him. The closing chapters show how to run the race by faith, endure hardships, receive God’s discipline, and be encouraged by the heavenly cloud of witnesses that cheer us on. In this last chapter, the author picks up what might seem like some miscellaneous pieces of advice on how to live. They are called “exhortations”, or encouragements to continue doing what is right. Exhortations are a form of the “Law”, or commands of God—but with the difference that they’re set in the context of the new identity we’ve been given in the Gospel—the reality that Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the Law, and made us a new creation and new community in Him. Let me explain a little more. ...

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The Olympics always feature dramatic stories of the struggle, perseverance, and the hard-fought victories of athletes, and the hardships and intense training that preceded their competition for the gold medal. The attention focused on the athletes is intense; often they are flattered with praise—but just as quickly they can bear the brunt of criticism, suspicion, or doubt, for their failures inside and outside of the game. Every athlete faces the specter of discouragement and the temptation to quit, when the road gets tough. The stakes are high, with the whole world competing, only once every four years, and with only 3 medals to be captured in each event Last week Pastor Roschke drew on the imagery of the “race” that we are running “by faith” as Christians. How “Team Emmanuel” is being cheered on by the cloud of witnesses in heaven, who are encouraging us as we run the race, with...