Sermons from June 2014

Noah: 2 of 2: The end of the world is just the beginning…

Genesis 8:20-9:17 Is God fundamentally for this world or against it? We tend to assume that God is a detached, benign, old grandfather who will let the world just tick on indefinitely. But how can we be so sure? And don’t biblical stories like Noah’s flood indicate that this world is not as safe a place as we like to think? These are the questions we’ll be considering today as we conclude our series on Noah.

Noah: 1 of 2: The end of the world is just the beginning…

Genesis 6:5-8 The recent Noah blockbuster captures something of the horror of this ancient story: a divine judgement wiping out nearly everyone and everything on the planet. One commentator asked the question: “what kind of a god feels he has to destroy everyone just because he’s unhappy with the choices we make?” In fact this kind of portrait of God is why a lot of people cannot bring themselves to believe in the God of the Bible. Come and join us as we consider this question, and as we consider how this ancient text speaks to us today.

How to be a total loser

Supposing there is a God, and supposing there is an after-life, and supposing God is going to divide the world into those who get to be with God forever, and those who will be excluded, how will he make that call? Most of us have a moral-skyscraper in our minds with Nelson Mandela and Mother Theresa on the top floor, and Robert Mugabe and Jimmy Saville in the basement, and most likely God will draw a line (quite a bit below our floor obviously), and that will be the divider. Come and join us as we consider Jesus’ surprising teaching on this crucial subject.