Faith Speaks — Reverend Neil Taylor — Sermon Podcast

Week Four — I Quit! Comparing.

Fed up with the status quo? The way things are isn’t the way things have to be. Are you willing to see what happens when you’re ready to say, "I Quit!".

Read Acts 26:9-21

St. Paul’s entire life can be explained in terms of one experience—his meeting with Jesus on the road to Damascus. He instantly saw that all the zeal of his dynamic personality was being wasted, like the strength of a boxer swinging wildly. Perhaps he had never seen Jesus, who was only a few years older. But he had acquired a zealot’s hatred of all Jesus stood for, as he began to harass the Church: “…entering house after house and dragging out men and women, he handed them over for imprisonment” (Acts 8:3b). Now he was “entered,” possessed, all his energy harnessed to one goal—being a slave of Christ in the ministry of reconciliation, an instrument to help others experience the one Savior.

Week Three — I Quit! Living in Fear.

Fed up with the status quo? The way things are isn’t the way things have to be. Are you willing to see what happens when you’re ready to say, "I Quit!".

Week Two — I Quit! Complaining.

Fed up with the status quo? The way things are isn’t the way things have to be. Are you willing to see what happens when you’re ready to say, "I Quit!".

Week One — I Quit! Making Excuses.

Fed up with the status quo? The way things are isn’t the way things have to be. Are you willing to see what happens when you’re ready to say, "I Quit!".

The audio of the first 4.30min is a bit rough — Mea culpa!

Read Acts 6:8-7:2a,51-60 and Matthew 23:29-39

Read Luke 1:67-69

Zechariah praised God when his son was born. He praised God for the promises that God made, the promises that God kept the promises that were in his son. Because he knew that his son was created for a purpose. He knew that his son John would be called a prophet and would “go before the Lord to prepare a way.” He knew that his son would “tell the people how to be saved through the forgiveness of their sins.” Zechariah was filled with joy at the birth of his son… so he praised God.

However, I want you all to know that God rejoices no less for you than did Zechariah for his son. Zechariah so loved his son that he got a glimpse of him through God’s eternal eyes. Therefore, God so loves you that he has laid out a path for you to follow.

Read John 1:19-34

John the Baptist appears at the beginning of John’s Gospel (and the other Gospels) and then falls into the background because he is a link or a bridge between the Old Testament and the New Testament. He is prominent at the beginning of the Gospel because he is part of its roots. The roots of Jesus go back to eternity (John 1:1), and his roots go back to the Old Testament. John is like one of those great tree roots that protrude above the ground a few feet out from the tree trunk.

Over and over, we will see in this Gospel that John the writer explains Jesus in terms of the Old Testament. Jesus doesn’t appear on the scene of history without historical preparation. God had been at work in Israel for two thousand years, and even before that, putting in place a historical backdrop that would make Jesus’ life and ministry more intelligible.

John the Baptist is a root partly underground in the Old Testament and partially exposed in the New Testament. He has a foot in both worlds—a prophet something like Elijah (but not Elijah reincarnate 1:21) and a voice crying that the long-expected Messiah has come.

Read Isaiah 40:1-11; Mark 1:1-8; 2 Peter 3:8-18

To understand our New Testament reading from 2 Peter 3:10–14 and to understand the season of Advent and all things apocalyptic, we need to realize that there are false teachers that saturate their false teaching through the media, academia, and once-trusted institutions, and they all in lockstep say:

“Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation” (2 Peter 3:4)

Therefore, the false teachers of this age reject the reality of the second coming. They deny that with the coming of the Lord, there will be a world-transforming upheaval. They reject it as unbelievable and unimaginable. Because for thousands and thousands of years, the world has gone on just the way it did from the beginning. They tell us that nature is steady and constant. And this thought of an inbreaking of the Son of God and a transformation of this created order is out of the question.