Sermons by Michael Andrus (Page 35)
Various Passages
Money–Godly and Ungodly Ways of Spending It John Wesley advised his followers concerning the use of wealth: “Make all you can, save all you can, give all you can!” I think most Christians would offer a hearty amen! to Wesley’s words, but many live a slightly different version: “Make all you can, spend all you can, and hope that Social Security is solvent when you hit 65.” I am personally convinced that most Christians would like to be more frugal in their saving and…
Various Passages
Money–Godly and Ungodly Ways of Saving It A few weeks ago you all received a bookmark with our church’s new mission on it. It’s really not a new mission–just a restatement of what our mission has always been: “To glorify God through honoring His name, teaching His word, loving His people, and expanding His kingdom.” One of the values under “expanding His kingdom” is this: “We value generous stewardship over all of the resources God has entrusted to us.” We value that because God commands it and because God…
Acts 4:36-5:11
Money–Ungodly Ways of Giving It Please turn with me to the book of Acts 4 and let’s read together the Word of the Lord, beginning in verse 36. Joseph, a Levite from Cyprus, whom the apostles called Barnabas (which means Son of Encouragement), sold a field he owned and brought the money and put it at the apostles’ feet. Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property. With his wife’s full knowledge he…
Luke 16:1-9
Money–Godly Ways of Giving It: A Bad Man’s Good Example Every one of us in this room this morning has a set of priorities, a ranking, if you will, of those things that we consider the most important in the world. I’m sure if asked to put these priorities on paper, most of us would probably list God first, family second, then work, church, friends, and country in some order, followed by eating, golf, TV, sleeping, and other common pursuits. But I am…
1 Thessalonians 2:1-12
How the Gospel Impacts the Pastor It’s no secret to any of you that the media loves bad news. Bad news sells. Bad news titillates the public. Bad news can be used as a tool to further personal agendas, as we saw in the recent tragedy in Tuscon, Arizona. The media particularly likes bad news when it focuses on a politician they don’t like. The conviction of Tom Delay and the fall of John Edwards received a lot of attention because both men had already…
1 Thessalonians 2:17-3:13
How the Church Suffers for the Gospel The Apostle Paul and his two missionary companions, Silas and Timothy, came to Thessalonica and planted a church during Paul’s second missionary journey, but within weeks their success in winning converts stirred up tremendous opposition. In fact, a riot was generated, and they had to flee the city during the night. Paul’s detractors apparently used that fact against him, claiming he had used and abused his new converts and then abandoned them to handle persecution…
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18
How the Gospel Gives Hope to the Church : Josh had a tough passage of Scripture last Sunday, but he did a great job with it. You could hear a pin drop as he talked about the need for sexual purity. If you weren’t able to be here last Lord’s Day I would strongly encourage you to go to the website, and either read it or listen to it. I have a real advantage this morning–my sermon text is a very familiar passage…
1 Thessalonians 5:1-11
How the Gospel Enables the Church to Escape God’s Wrath Last week we studied the amazing truth that Jesus is coming again, and when He returns, the Church will be raptured, caught up together with Him to be with Him forever. We suggested that Paul’s teaching on this topic in 1 Thess 4 was designed to deal with a problem, namely the problem of bereavement. Some of the Thessalonian believers had misinterpreted Paul’s teaching on the possibility of the soon return of Christ as…
2 Thessalonians 2:1-12
The Rebellion of Antichrist Introduction: There is probably no more mysterious and fascinating figure spoken of in the Bible than Antichrist. He has been the focus of a great deal of speculation among students of prophecy and the subject of countless books. Over the centuries I suppose everyone has wondered at one time or another whether some current evil leader in the world might morph into that tragic figure. While we’re going to examine carefully what our Scripture passage says about Antichrist, it is…
2 Thessalonians 3:6-18
The Bread of Idleness Introduction: In a sense it is a relief to be past the most controversial prophetic passages in 1 and 2 Thessalonians. There’s nothing directly in today’s text about the Tribulation or Antichrist or the Rapture or the Second Coming. As you know, my last three sermons have all been on these topics–important but controversial. You’ve been very gracious in listening to views that were, for some, new, and for others, troublesome. For the most part I believe you have followed…
Luke 13:1-5
Why Do Bad Things Happen to Good People (and Good Things to Bad People)? One of my favorite verses in the Bible is Isaiah 1:18: “‘Come now, let us reason together,’ says the LORD. ‘Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.’” This week, and in fact for most of this summer, I want us to reason together, to have a dialogue about some of…
John 14:6, Acts 4:12, Romans 1:18-25
Is Jesus Really the Only Way? (And if so, what about those who have never heard His name?) Dr. Robert Yarbrough, a professor at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, was reviewing a book for an evangelical publisher on women’s roles in the church, a topic we are going to be dealing with later in this series. In the introduction of her book the author noted that historically the nearly universal position of orthodox Christianity has been that women should not be ordained to…