4/23/17-Following Jesus-John 12: 1-1-8, 23-26 by EP Church Annapolis

If only Jesus had been there, Lazarus would not have died. So said Mary and Martha, and it's hard to argue with them; Jesus certainly had the power to heal the sick. But something else was at play for Jesus which kept him away. On Easter Sunday, Pastor Bruce O'Neil explains how Jesus made the nightmare of death untrue.

Politics played an enormous role in Jewish expectations of the Messiah. He was to be a conquerer in the mold of King David. Jesus knew this, but chose a different, counterintuitive path. The conversation about who Jesus was and is continues...

Who did Jesus claim to be and how do we know that those claims are true? Using a well-known image in his day, Jesus claimed to be a good shepherd, but the answer to how we know that is true may surprise us. Pastor Bruce O'Neil's sermon series on John's gospel continues.

Why was this man born blind? Jesus confronts the assumptions of his disciples and culture with his answer.

As residents of the Land of the Free, we may take our freedom for granted. But Jesus warns us that freedom may not be so simple to come by. Pastor Bruce continues his sermon series on John with a discussion of Jesus's message of grace and freedom.

Despite our best attempts to make it simple, life is complex. Here Jesus avoids the temptation to respond simplistically to two complex situations. EP's sermon series on the Gospel of John continues with the story of the woman caught in adultery.

On the last day of the Festival of Tabernacles, Jesus stood up and declared, "if anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. "Each day during the week celebrating Harvest, the High Priest would carry a golden pitcher and fill it with water from the pool of Siloam while the people recited Isaiah 12:3, "With joy will you draw water from the wells of salvation." What is Jesus saying about himself, and what difference does it make?

Are you satisfied? Jesus posed this precise question to a group he had just miraculously fed. You may have received bread to sate your hunger, he said, but there's a difference between mere survival and a full, satisfied life. Pastor Bruce invites us to consider how this challenge still resonates for us today.

"Do you want to be healed?" may seem like an obvious question to ask someone who has been paralyzed for thirty eight years, but Jesus meant something deeper than meets the eye.