As I begin, I am holding up a copy of the directory of Faith Presbyterian Church. On the front of this directory is a picture. Some might say that this is a picture of Faith Church. But some might say that the real picture of Faith Church is inside the directory in the list of the names of its members and friends and in the information that is listed about them. The picture on the cover is really a picture of the front façade of the building we meet in for Worship and come to for other church meetings and activities.
We are, by the way, planning publish soon a new edition of the Directory which we hope will provide a more complete picture of our church. This will be a pictorial directory. We hope to have your picture in it and pictures of some of us participating in some of the activities of the church.
But as we think of how to capture the essence of faith church in photographs I want us to think of how we picture some of the details of THE CHURCH, the bride of Christ as she waits on earth for her Groom, the returning Jesus Christ.
I think the book of Acts, containing parts of the story of the beginning of the church, provides some snapshots in words of some of the details of the church. Today I have chosen to look at one of those snapshots or photographs in words that occurs in the book of Acts. It involves 4 people, several cities, and covers a territory of thousands of miles.
Our story or snapshot begins at the City of Corinth in Greece. The Apostle Paul had just come there to tell the people there about Jesus. Paul usually traveled with his partner Silas and their associates, which included at various times, Luke, Aristarchus, Titus, and others. But he had left his partner and his associates in Berea and had taken a little working vacation in Athens. Now he had come, alone, to the vital city of Corinth. He would of course go to the Synagogues in Corinth on the Sabbath and, when given a chance, tell the Jews gathered there about Jesus, and that He was the Messiah.
That would only take a few hours a week, and as he had no financial support for this work, he would have to work for a living. Fortunately, all who had been trained to be Rabbi’s or Scribes had also been trained to work at some trade to support themselves. Paul, when he had been Saul, had been trained to be a tentmaker, which was a trade involving making tents, clothing, and other items out of animal skins and animal hair.
When he arrived in Corinth, he found a married couple who were also Jews and practiced the same trade. They were originally from a town on the Southern coast of the Black Sea in what is now Northeastern Turkey. But they had lived and probably worked in Rome for awhile until they had been expelled from Rome along with all other Jews because of an order of the Emperor Claudius.
The Roman Historian Suetonius wrote that the Jews were expelled at this time because of disturbance among the Jews by a certain Chrestus. We do not know if this one called Chrestus is a misspelling or misunderstanding of Christ and if the Jews were expelled because of divisions and perhaps riots caused by some Jews persecuting other Jews who had become Christians. We know that such riots had occurred in some of the towns in Asia Minor.
We also do not know if Aquilla and Priscilla were Christians when they met Paul. If Aquilla and Priscilla were Christians, they had three things in common with Paul, being Christians, Jews, and Tentmakers. If they were not yet Christians, they would have two things in common with him, being Jews and Tentmakers. Paul worked with them and probably lived with them for a while until his partner and associates arrived.
After their arrival, Paul devoted himself more to his evangelistic work but he evidently remained close to Aquilla and Priscilla. They also at some point had become Christians.
After a while, Paul left Corinth. He was about to end what we call his second missionary journey and head back to Palestine and Syria. We do not know if Silas and Timothy traveled with him or stayed in Corinth. But we do know that Aquilla and Priscilla left Corinth with Paul and went with him to Ephesus, a city on the West Coast of Asia Minor, present day Turkey. Paul stayed there just long enough to stir some interest in Jesus, but then sailed east to Palestine. Aquilla and Priscilla stayed in Ephesus. We assume they worked as Tentmakers there, but they also seem to have been lay-leaders in the fledgling church at Ephesus.
I want you to notice that before Paul went to Ephesus, at Cenchrae, Paul had his hair cut for a vow. Cenchrae was the Eastern Port of Corinth. The vow was one of the Jewish vows like a Nazirite vow, that Jews took to show some devotion or gratitude to god. Ones hair was cut short at the beginning and end of the period of the vow and the hair grown during the vow was dedicated to God.
What is important about this is that it demonstrates that although a Christian, Paul was still thoroughly Jewish, participating in distinctively Jewish rituals. He did not give up his culture and ethnicity when he became a Christian.
We Christians are a varied bunch and we always have been. We come from different cultures and ethnic groups and are allowed to continue our connection to them, as long as the individual practices of our culture do not clash with Christian morals. But, back to our picture of the Church.
Paul, having cut his hair and sailed for Israel, went to Jerusalem to visit the First Church. The Church at Jerusalem was still recognized at the first Church, or the Mother Church. Paul had had some disagreements with some who were there and who had come from there, but he still honored their place in the church and visited them and probably reported to them about his work and the new churches he had started.
Then, he went to Syrian Antioch to report to the church that had commissioned him as a missionary and sent him out twice.
Then he started his third missionary journey, visiting some of the churches he had started earlier.
Meanwhile, back in Ephesus, the fledgling church received an interesting visitor. Apollos was a Jewish Christian who was born and raised in Alexandria Egypt. He knew the bible well and was a great preacher and teacher, as well as an evangelist and apologist.
But Apollos had one problem. His theology of the Sacraments was incomplete. He did not know of the Baptism into Christ, he knew only of the Baptism of John the Baptist.
When Aquilla and Priscilla realized this, they did not dispute him in public, but they took him aside and privately taught him about Christian Baptism. Then, eventually they and the other Christians at Ephesus recommended him to the Christians at Corinth when he desired to go there. Apollos proved to be very helpful to the Church at Corinth.
Now, what do we see in this picture of the church? We see laypeople and pastors/missionaries working together and separately to build up the kingdom of God. Aquilla and Priscilla worked side by side with Paul in Corinth and in Ephesus, in the church and in their trade as tentmakers.
We see Apollos, a pastor and missionary receiving instruction from two laypeople and them being willing to help him where he had a weakness.
And we see both Paul and Apollos working separately in two places to build up the churches. As I speak of both Paul and Apollos in this picture of the church I want you to realize that Paul and Apollos may not have ever met. But they knew of each other and respected each other.
So in this picture we see two pastors, and two laypeople working together helping and educating and equipping each other as they together and separately built up the church. We also see, that through Paul, they were all connected to Christians over a thousand miles away from them who were of different cultures and ethnicities. They were all building up Christians, Evangelizing in their cities proclaiming Christ to all, and increasing the church of God in quantity and quality.
That is a good picture for us to study. We too are comprised of Pastors and lay people and we, too are related to Christians in other places and different circumstances.
We too, reach out to others with the good news. Each Tuesday people from this church conduct a Bible Study at the Work Release Center in Lafayette. Each Tuesday and Thursday afternoons people from Faith Church go to Klondike Elementary School and help children with their homework.
And we are all related to each other through Christ and responsible to each other and to other Christians around the world both within our denominational structure and beyond it.
This picture of the church in Acts is sort of a picture of us. May we continue to be accurately described by some of the word-pictures in Acts and in other books in the Bible.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

It seems that many people are enamored with shipwrecks. Most of us have recently seen pictures of a shipwreck near Italy in the Mediteranean Sea. Such pictures always seem to generate a lot of interest.
In connection with that interest, I have a warning for you. April 15, 2012 will be the 100th anniversary of the wreck of the Titanic. For almost 100 years there has been great interest in that wreck, partly because of the questions about its’ construction and partly because of the way the ship was handled by its crew after it struck the iceberg. And then there is the fact that the depth of the water in which it sank is so deep that it is extremely difficult to access and do research to answer some of those questions
This morning we are going to look at a shipwreck that is described in the book of Acts in chapters 27 and 28. Since it was a shipwreck that occurred between 59 and 62 AD, the ship was of a much smaller size than other shipwrecks we have seen or heard about. This shipwreck is important to Christians because it is described in our bible and because it was a part of the Apostle Paul’s trip to Rome as a prisoner.
Paul had been arrested in Jerusalem, transferred to the State capitol of Caeserea, and incarcerated there for two years while awaiting the decision of the governors about how his case would be handled.
At the end of that period, Paul appealed his case to the Emperor in Rome, as was the right of every Citizen of Rome. Paul and other prisoners who were headed for Rome were entrusted to a Roman Centurion and his squad. It was the duty of this Centurion to arrange transportation and security for these men and see that they arrived safely at Rome. Somehow Luke and Aristarchus arranged to accompany Paul on his journey.
The journey began at the man-made seaport at Caesarea on the Mediterranean coast of Palestine or Israel. Herod the Great had called for the creation of this port because Israel’s portion of the Mediterranean Sea had no natural cove or port. It was a magnificent accomplishment and feat of engineering in its time.
The Centurion booked passage for himself, his men, and his prisoners on a Coastal vessel headed North to Sidon. After a stop at Sidon, the ship went North and then West around the island of Cypress, then traveled between Cypress and the Coast of Asia Minor until it arrived at Myra. It seems that the ship they were on was not going to Rome, so they changed ships at Myra. This second ship seems to had the wind against them proceeding from Myra. Luke wrote that they sailed slowly for a number of days, and sailed with difficulty between Rhodes and Cnidus, then turned South and passed the East End of Crete and turned West and entered the Harbor at Fair Havens.
They were at about the halfway point of their journey, but the slowness of their travel thus far presented them with a problem. They were now in the early to mid days of October. The seasonal weather in the Mediterranean Sea made it difficult to travel by sail from September 15th to November 11th and impossible after that until Winter was over. So at Fair Havens, the people who were sailing on the ship had a meeting. They had before them 3 options.
As their first option they could stay where they were and winter in Fair Havens, though it was not the best port in which to spend the winter. It was protected by islands, but the harbor itself did not provide much shelter from the open sea.
Option two involved heading to the West-Northwest to the port of Phoenix and spending the winter there.
Option three was to sail out of Fair Havens and head out to sea to one of the ports of Sicily or Italy.
Those of you who love the democratic systems of government will be pleased to read from our second lesson that at the meeting in Fair havens they discussed their options and took a vote, although the Centurion and the ship-owner seemed to have more votes or their votes carried more weight. As a result, the majority decided to sail for Phoenix.
Those of you who watched the old TV series Gilligan’s Island may want to join me at this point in singing the Chorus of the theme song from that Show “A Three Hour Tour”.
This decision was the prelude to shipwreck that I refer to in the sermon title.
Almost as soon as the ship left Fair Havens the trouble started. They were hit by a strong wind from the Northeast that drove them away from being able to reach Phoenix in the west-northwest. They had a life boat or dingy that was trailing the ship, as they went to the south of the island of Cauda and as it sheltered them from the wind a little, they hauled in the boat, emptied it of water, and secured it on board. During the next 14 days they were driven across the Mediterranean Sea until they struck a sandbar on the coast of Malta. The bow was stuck while first the stern and then the rest of the boat was broken up by the pounding of the waves. The ship and its cargo was a total loss, but all the people on board were saved by swimming to shore or floating to shore on pieces of the boat or its contents.
So, where did they go wrong? They had a democratic process but the majority proved to be wrong. They should have stayed in Fair Havens. Paul had told them that. God revealed the right way to them through Paul. But there was no shining light or trumpets sounding or angels singing as Paul spoke to them recommending that they stay in Fair Havens. He was just a prisoner, it was a wonder they gave him a voice at all. And yet this prisoner had the guidance from God.
You know, it is not easy making the right choices in our lives. Or making the best choices. Most of us seek sources, people or groups to advise us. But how do we choose between the various voices?
I almost always carry a briefcase with me (although a friend of mine who has practiced law says that since I carry no legal briefs in my case, I should call it a sermon-case). Anyway, I nearly always carry it because I keep my calendar in it along with several other lists that I might need at any moment. Once, when I was leaving the house for a Youth Group meeting, Diane asked why I was taking my briefcase. I replied that I might need it if someone asked me a question. She said “Do you have answers in there?” Then proceeded to ask for permission to look into my case whenever she had a question.
I am sure that most of us have wished for such a handy source of answers to the questions we have and guidance for direction.
We need to pray that God will help us see what He wants us to do. He can direct us in the midst of varying voices, opinions, and guidance, but we need to seek his help. Sometimes he guides us through a feeling, sometimes a word from someone, sometimes through closing off to us some of our options, sometimes through what seems to be happenstance. Sometimes a scripture verse seems to speak to us or our situation. But through these means or others, God can guide us to the right decision. Sometimes God’s help comes to us through an unusual or ordinarily disrespected source. In the case of the meeting of the passengers of the ship, God spoke through a prisoner in chains
For further pointers I refer you to the first lesson. Wasn’t that fun? King Ahaziah of Israel sought out the advice of another god regarding his health. God spoke to him through the prophet Elijah and asked him why he, the king of Israel would consult another God about his health. Then he told him that he was about to die.
Then there is that bit about the captains and their 50 men being destroyed by God because they haughtily commanded the prophet to appear before the king. God does not tolerate arrogance. He does not care if you are a king, or a captain, or a father or mother with much experience of raising children, or one of the most brilliant and accomplished scholars in your field. When we come to God asking for help or guidance, it is best if we come cloaked in humility. The third captain learned to approach God’s prophet with humility and kindness and was allowed to live.
God has answers and advice for us. We need to pray for them, we need to look for it to come through regular and unusual channels. We need to listen for his voice through others, and we need to seek God’s will for us in humility, not making any claims on him.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

Samuel had been dedicated to God by his mother before he was born. Her name was Hannah and she had been unable to have children. She asked God for help in this matter and promised that if she had children, the first son would be dedicated to serve God. When Samuel was still a boy, he was taken to Shiloh, where the Tabernacle of God was, to serve God there. He was raised from that point on by the people who lived and worked at the Tabernacle. Those would have been mostly priests and Levites.
The High Priest in those days was Eli. He evidently lived within the temple courtyard or just outside it, as did Samuel.
The tabernacle was that portable place of worship that the Israelites had built according to God’s plans while they were in the wilderness after having come out of Egypt. They carried it with them during their 40 years in the wilderness and after they conquered much of the promised land, they set it up permanently in Shiloh. It would have been over 300 years old at this point, and since it was basically a tent with boards reinforcing the walls, it had obviously been repaired and embellished a bit over time. In this passage we discover that there were people, including Samuel and Eli sleeping in it. I greatly doubt that this passage was intended to convey that people were actually living and spending their nights in the Holy place or Holy of Holies of the tabernacle. I think it is more logical to understand that shelters had been built in the courtyard or against the outside wall of the courtyard for those who worked in the temple. I know that verse 3 says that “Samuel was lying down in the temple of the Lord, where the Ark of God was.” But I think that is just to identify the temple, and remind the readers that at that point the Ark was in the tabernacle. That would be important because in the next chapter the ark was taken out of the tabernacle and it would remain absent from the tabernacle during the rest of the narrative of I Samuel and at least until II Samuel 6, but it is possible that the Ark never got back into the tabernacle.
The place in the Tabernacle where the Ark was kept, was the Holy of Holies, into which only the High Priest was to enter only once each year, on the day of Atonement. To think that a young boy would be allowed to live and sleep in the Holy of Holies is nonsense.
So, Samuel was living as a boy in the tabernacle area and it seems that one of his duties was to tend to the physical needs of the High Priest Eli who had become blind.
The author of I Samuel has already informed his readers that Eli was allowing his sons, who were also priests, to misuse the sacrifices and to abuse the people who came to the Tabernacle to Worship God. The author had also informed his readers that a man of God had told Eli that God was going to judge him and his sons for their abuses.
Then God started to speak to Samuel. We are informed that there weren’t many prophets in those days, that’s what it means when it says, “The word of the Lord was rare in those days; visions were not widespread”.
This is mentioned because that was going to change with Samuel. He was about to receive the first of many prophecies and visions from God. He was to be the first of the great prophets of Israel and the last of the Judges. He would bring in the era of the Kings of Israel. But at this point he was still a boy. Josephus, writing over 1000 years later informs us that Samuel was 12 years old when he received this first prophecy.
The fact of God’s word and visions being rare in those days is also mentioned to explain why Samuel did not recognize the voice of God when he heard it.
The story is not without humor. The boy is sleeping in the hours before dawn, when he is awakened by a voice calling his name. He assumes that Eli needs assistance in the night and goes to Eli who tells him he did not call him and to go back to sleep. He did, but God called again and again he thought it was Eli and was sent back to bed. God called Samuel a third time. This time Eli began to think that God might be speaking to the boy, so he told him to go back to bed and that if he heard the voice calling his name again, to say, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.”
The voice spoke again, Samuel replied as instructed, and God did have a message for Samuel. But I would like to pause here and ask you some questions. Have you ever thought that God was trying to get you to do something or to understand something? Did you ever get some idea to do something based on something that you read in the bible? You may never have heard God speaking to you directly, but maybe you have felt God moving you in a certain direction. Have you ever prayed for directions or guidance from God?
Well, if you answered any of those in the affirmative, I want you to notice that Samuel did not realize what was happening at first. Then, when he did understand what God was saying, He did not want to tell Eli what he was supposed to.
So, God gave Samuel help through Eli. Eli told him to speak back to God and tell him that his servant was listening. Sometimes we need to sit or lie still and listen for God or look for some guidance from God. This is not easy for us who live in the 21st century. We do not like silence. We have portable music players and radios in our cars so we do not have to drive in silence.
And sometimes, when we are searching for guidance, we need to seek out a Christian who is more mature and maybe older than we are, Well, maybe not older. But one whose life God has obviously given guidance. Eli was that person for Samuel.
But I want you to notice that receiving the word of God was not Samuel’s only problem. He also did not want to follow God’s instructions. He was afraid to tell the vision to Eli. Eli was the High priest after all. And Samuel may have loved Eli after all his years of being with him and now helping him.
The message from God announced judgment on Eli and his sons. Samuel did not want to tell Eli that he and his sons were about to be punished by God. Eli had to use covenant language to compel Samuel to tell him. If you look at the 17th verse you will see what I’m referring to. Do you see where Eli says, “May God do so to you and more also, if you hide anything from me of all that he told you.”? Those words were commonly used in covenant making ceremonies. The parties to an agreement would cut up a sacrificial animal and scatter the pieces on the ground walk in the midst of the blood and gore and say “may God do so to me and more also if I break this agreement.”
Samuel complied and told Eli. It turned out that it was worse news for Samuel than it was for Eli. Eli had already been told by another unnamed prophet that God was about to punish him and his sons.
I think Samuel may have had what I like to call the “Only Prophet Syndrome”. We find it most blatantly displayed years later by Elijah, who after calling down fire on his altar, ordering the execution of the prophets of Baal, and ending a drought by praying for rain, ran away and hid from Queen Jezebel. God came to him and asked why he was hiding. He answered “I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts, for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.”
God answered Elijah in several ways, but one of them was by saying “I will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him.” Elijah thought he was the only one who remained on God’s side. He was not.
Samuel thought he was the first and only one to receive the message about God’s upcoming judgment of Eli and his sons. Eli already knew.
Sometimes we feel as if we ought to talk to someone about Jesus or about our faith, or that God wants us to take some stand on a certain issue. But we are afraid that we might be singled out for ridicule. But often, we are not the only ones God is moving to do something or say something. There may be seven thousand others. We most likely will not be alone.
Eli went on to his judgment. Samuel went on to become one of the greatest men of God in the History of Israel. He followed Eli’s advice and proved himself faithful to do and say what God had so instructed him.
That’s Something to think about when you think God wants you to do or say something.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

We just read the last 5 verses of a long story that is 48 verses long and takes up the entire tenth chapter of the Book of Acts. That so much space was given to this one story would lead us to believe that this was an important story in the development of the church. And it is. It is the story of a Roman Soldier, a Centurion or Sergeant Master in the Roman Army and how he and his family became Christians.
The Story begins with a vision given by God to Cornelius the Centurion. In the vision, Cornelius saw an angel who told Cornelius to send people to Joppa and to bring Simon Peter to Cornelius.
As those people from Cornelius approached the town of Joppa, Simon also received a vision from God. You have probably heard about this vision. It is the one where Peter saw a sheet or blanket let down from heaven and on it were all sorts of animals that were defined as unclean in the Jewish laws given by Moses and therefore could not be eaten by Jews. But in the vision a voice told Peter to get up and kill some of the animals and eat them to which Peter responded that he could not because he had never eaten anything that was unclean. The voice then said “What God has made clean, you must not call profane.” This same conversation occurred three times and then the vision ended. The Holy Spirit then told Peter to go with the men who were at that moment arriving from Cornelius.
Peter went to Caesarea to see Cornelius, preached to him and his family and friends about Jesus, and they all believed in Jesus. At that point, the Holy Spirit came upon all of them and they “began speaking in tongues and extolling God”. So Peter asked the Christians who had accompanied him from Joppa if Cornelius and those with him should not be baptized, since they had obviously received the Holy Spirit. And they were baptized. Now the reason this story was so important to Luke, who recorded it in the book of Acts, is because it was the first occasion of Gentiles who had not become Jews believing in Jesus and receiving the HS and being baptized.
But I wanted to look at it for another reason. First, I must confess that I have been involved in the baptism wars. Ever since the reformation there has been a war going on between those Christians who require believers-only immersion baptism, like Baptists and many other denominations and independent congregations, and those who baptize with only a little water and also baptize children, like Presbyterians, Lutherans, Methodists, Episcopalians and others. Since two of the three colleges I attended were run by Baptists of one sort or another, and I am a born-and-raised Presbyterian, I fought the baptism wars or participated in the discussions about baptism.
But I now think that with my involvement in that subject I missed something really important that the Bible says again and again about baptism.
If you will look at this story in its entirety you will see that it begins and ends with the work of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit gave two men visions which started a chain of events which led to another visitation of the Holy Spirit, in which Cornelius and those with him spoke in tongues and extolled God, and upon which, Peter declared that they should be baptized. This, by the way is the only instance in the bible when the gift of the Holy Spirit precedes baptism. All others who are mentioned in the NT as receiving the HS had already been baptized. But here there is still a connection of Baptism to the Holy Spirit.
And if you will look at our first lesson you will see that in it the Holy Spirit is mentioned as connected to Baptism at least two different times: John said that Jesus would baptize with the Holy Spirit and with Fire, and when Jesus was Baptized, the Holy Spirit descended upon Him as a dove. There are many more places in the NT where Baptism is linked to the Holy Spirit.
It seems that in all our concerns about the symbolism of baptism as a cleansing and our discussions and concerns about how much water to use and what parts of the body to cover with water, which are not trivial issues, we have neglected the connection of Baptism with the Holy Spirit.
We view baptism as a connection to the church and an introductory rite into the church. And it is. But we need to recover the connection of the Holy Spirit to Baptism. As baptized persons we need to make room in our lives for God’s Spirit to dwell in us and work in us. If our children and or grandchildren have been baptized we need to raise them in ways that will encourage them to receive the Spirit into their lives and to allow the Spirit to Work in their lives. We need to pray for the Spirit to work in us and pray that we will be open to allow the Spirit to work in us. And we need to pray that the Spirit will move into our children
In Galatians 5: 22&23 the Apostle Paul lists the fruit of the Spirit or the evidences of the presence of the Spirit as: “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control”. As people who have been baptized, we should be trying to assist the Spirit in building these qualities into our lives. Those of you who are officers in this church should be trying to build the members of this church up in these qualities. As parents, grandparents, and friends of baptized children, we should be looking for and encouraging these traits in them.
And we need to tell each other when see these and other traits of the dwelling of the Holy Spirit in their lives.
We are about to celebrate the baptism of Jesus by renewing our baptismal vows. These vows may have been originally been taken for us by our parents, but when we joined a church, we took them upon ourselves. As we remember our vows and our baptisms, lets also remember that our vows and our baptism have bound us to God’s Holy Spirit. From now on, lets seek to know the Spirit, let us seek to make room for the spirit, let us look for and listen for the directions of the Spirit and let us follow the Spirit as He leads us. And let us encourage each other to demonstrate that the Spirit resides in each of us.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

Last Weekend we celebrated the coming of the Son of God into the world. As we did so, on Christmas Eve we looked at a passage in John 1 which stated that in coming into the world, Jesus or the True Light gave the people who believed in Him the right to become children of God. The apostle Paul re-stated and elaborated on this idea in the first seven verses of our second lesson.
He likened the status of those who were to become Christians as heirs in families in the Roman empire. Such heirs, when they were children were treated no differently than the children of the slaves and servants in the household. Although they were to become the owners of the entire estate, they had no rights to spend out of the accounts of the family, and they were bound by all the rules that everyone else on the estate were bound by. But when their parents died, they had the rights to spend from the accounts of the estate and they could exempt themselves from the rules of the household if they chose.
Paul wanted the Christians of the region of Galatia in Asia Minor to understand that as Christians they were like heirs who had been given their freedoms by the death of the Son of God. This was important because the Christians were in danger of giving up their freedoms as Christian offspring of God.
I wanted to look at this passage, its teachings and its implications for us on this new year’s Day for several reasons:
Many of us have spent time with families and friends over the holidays in person or via long phone conversations. In those encounters, there have been many remembrances of the way life used to be for us and the way we used to be. In some ways I suppose we are pleased that our lives and relationships have changed for the better, but in other ways, our present ways of life and behaviors might not seem to be an improvement.
This holiday period also presents us with an opportunity to think about what we have become and make resolutions about what we wish to become. As we do that as Christians we need to remember who we are, we are Children of God Adopted into his family by the death and resurrection of Jesus. Our adoption certificate is our Faith in Him.
So, what does our status as Christians at the beginning of a new year have in common with that of the Christians of the district of Galatia in the first century? Well for one thing, we are and they were the descendants of immigrants. The Gauls after whom the district of Galatia had been named had invaded and settled in that part of what is now Turkey in the 4th century BC. So they, like us, had a sense of belonging where they were but traced their roots elsewhere.
Paul had first preached the gospel about Jesus in Galatia during his first Missionary Journey, when his partner was Barnabas. His work there is described in the 13th and 14th chapters of Acts. If you read those chapters you will find no reference to Galatia. But you will find that Paul and Barnabas did have interesting times in the cities of Antioch of Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra and Derbe. These four cities lay within the district of Galatia.
As we read the accounts of Paul’s ministries in those cities, we learn some interesting things. In each of those cities, in addition to the Gaulian descended Gentiles there were also Jewish populations of considerable size. In those cities, Paul continued his practice of preaching to the Jews first, then to the Gentiles. In Pisidian Antioch, the Jews who refused to become Christians caused trouble and caused Paul and Barnabus to be thrown out of the city.
In Iconium, the non-Christian Jews also caused trouble and there was a plan by non-believing Jews and Gentiles to kill Paul and Barnabus by stoning them.
In Lystra, first the pagan Gentiles tried to worship Paul as Hermes and Barnabas as Zeus. Then later at the instigation of non-Christian Jews from Antioch and Iconium, Paul was stoned and left for dead.
All of that should give you some idea of the racial, ethnic, and religious plurality and tensions present in Galatia. And, as it was in the district, so it was in the churches in the district.
As Christians, they were trying to figure out how they were to live with their new identity in a world that was decidedly not Christian, and in which there were tensions and unrest.
Our situation in this respect is a little different. We are or we need to be aware that our culture is changing. It is moving away from traditional Judeo-Christian values and toward a much more inclusive, accepting environment. In some ways this is good, in other ways, not so much. But we too are trying to figure out how as Christians and as a congregation of Christians we fit in to our culture and society.
One way in which I hope we are not like the Galatian Christians is the central theme of this letter. Paul was concerned that the Galatians were abandoning some of the essentials of their faith.
As part of their heterogeneous society, there were many Jews in their locale and in their churches. And some of them were convinced that since Christianity had its roots in Judaism, Christians should also be Jewish. For Jewish Christians that meant that they were to remain meticulously and actively Jewish, still attending Synagogue services with Non-Christian Jews and still celebrating all the Jewish holidays and festivals.
For the Gentile Christians, it meant that they were to become Jews in order to be Christian. The men would have to be circumcised, and all of them would have to attend Synagogue services and participate in the Jewish festivals and holidays. And in the early days, they were probably ordered to go to Jerusalem and offer sacrifices at the temple until it was destroyed.
To make matters worse, some Jewish Christians had come from Jerusalem and encouraged the Christians to become or remain Jewish.
That is when Paul wrote this letter. He told the Christians in Galatia that as children of God they were free from the religious laws and regulations that they had been subject to before they heard about Jesus. For the Jewish Christians, that meant that there was no merit, no salvation in their Jewishness. They could attend the Jewish festivals and Sabbath services, but their salvation did not depend upon it as they had previously believed. For the Gentile Christians it meant that they did not have to become Jews in any way, but neither were they to engage in the pagan and polytheistic rituals to which they were enslaved before they became Christians.
Paul warns them twice in this passage not to be enslaved by the elemental spirits of this world. This phrase and other translations of the Greek here have led to some confusion. What Paul was referring to was the basic religious principles that they had learned as children. These were connected to basic moral principles of right and wrong. They had been raised to understand that their behaviors either pleased or displeased their deities and that based on that pleasure or displeasure they would be rewarded or punished by those deities. These were the elemental principles (better than “spirits”) they had been enslaved to.
In Christ, they were given salvation because of what Christ did, not because of what they had done or had not done.
So what does all of this have to do with us Christian, American, Hoosiers on the first day of 2012?
In all things, and in all areas of our lives we need to remember who we are. We are children of God. And that takes priority over all other conditions of our existence.
The Galatians had to understand that their being Christians was more important than their being Galatian Gentiles or Jews living in Galatia. They were to live not only as Jews or Gentiles but as Christians first, with the character of Christ firmly embedded in and displayed by all that they did and said. They were not to be bound by fears that their salvation depended upon their adherence to specific laws, rules, and rituals.
We need to understand that our status as Children of God takes precedence over our citizenship of particular nations, our racial or ethnic identities, or our political or ideological identities. We are first and foremost Children of God, made free by the life, death, and resurrection of Christ.
And, as the Christians of Galatia were troubled by Christians from the Jerusalem church teaching them troubling doctrines, so others from other churches are trying to entice us away from believing things that Christians have always accepted as truth from the very beginning of Christianity. And I’m not referring only to the “Big” issue. There are others that are really bigger such as the role and limitations of being inclusive in our church and its theology and whether or not one must actually believe in Jesus to be given entrance into God’s eternal Kingdom.
As Christians living in America we are going to be subjected to 10 more months of politicians trying to get us to see things their way by appealing to our ideals, our race our income levels and how old we are. Each of us needs to remember that before we identify in those ways and become fractured as a Christian Community, we are, each of us Children of God, and everything we do and say should reflect that, the greatest reality in our lives

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

Some of you may have been surprised at our Scripture Reading this morning because you have been told that the Magi or Wise Men most likely did not arrive on the day of Christ’s birth. It is likely that they arrived weeks, months, or perhaps even a year or two later. Nonetheless, this passage is a part of the Christmas or infancy narratives of the gospels. And it is likely that the star appeared to them at the time of Jesus’ birth.
I wanted to talk about this passage this morning because I think it contains some important truth for us as we come to worship Jesus on the occasion of the celebration of his birth.
These fellows we call Wise men are actually referred to in Scripture by their professional title; Magi. Now although this word is similar to our word Magic, which is connected in origin to the same root word, These men were not magicians as we understand that word. They were of a class of learned scholars in Media and Persia who were advisors to the king. The Jewish Prophet Daniel had served as a member of this group some 550 years earlier, as had his three friends.
The areas in which the Magi had expertise included Astronomy which in their case was liked to Astrology. They looked to the stars for guidance. Now although Astrology was forbidden for Jews in the Laws given by Moses, God used the Astrology of the Magi to announce to them the birth of His great king. There had been Jews living in Persia for over 500 years, and, like Daniel, some of them had become Magi. It is likely that they had informed their fellow Magi that the Jews had been promised a great king who would rule the world.
If we agree with the Magi that Jesus is the Great King, we need to obey Him. It is easy and nice for us to honor the birth of God’s son as a baby. Everybody likes babies. But this baby is a king. He demands us to obey him and serve him and follow him.
The Magi are also an example to us in not being disappointed. They had come from the east searching for a king. They were obviously searching for a king descended from a ruling family, that is why they inquired at the capital city of Jerusalem. But God had arranged for this king to come from an old ruling family which was no longer ruling. This particular family was the family of a Carpenter. The Magi were not concerned that no one in Jerusalem was searching for the child, even when some of the folks in Jerusalem knew where the great king would be born, the town of Bethlehem. And, as I said, they were not disappointed when the child turned out to be born in a Carpenter’s family. They recognized him as the great king.
And then the Magi lead the way for us in showing us how to respond to the coming of Jesus. When the star stopped over the place where Jesus was, “they were overwhelmed with Joy”. Christmas is a time for Joy. Being human, we have found ways to manufacture joy by giving gifts to each other as we celebrate the birth of Christ. I spoke to my brother-in-law on the phone recently. Wade is a retired teacher in New York State. I told him I had recently bought a Christmas gift for myself. He said he always buys a gift for himself first, and that puts him the “christmas spirit” and then he has a good time buying presents for others. It works. But the joy it manufactures is not really Christmas Joy.
That artificial joy, even the joy of being with family and friends is short lived. As Christians the joy of Christ, the joy of being in God’s eternal kingdom, the joy of being able the serve the great king should be a part of our every day lives, even when we go through the difficulties of life, the Joy of belonging to God should still be present.
When the Magi went in to the house where Jesus was, they did two things, they “knelt down and paid him homage. Then they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.”
Some English translations say that the Magi Worshipped God instead of saying paid him homage. I kind of like this translation. We all know to worship Jesus, and we do so every Sunday and Wednesday mornings and at other times. But do you pay homage to Jesus? Do you recognize him and honor him as the great king? Do you follow him and make yourself available to him? Before you say yes, let me remind you that later, as an adult, Jesus said, Inasmuch as you do it to one of the least of these my people, you do to me.
And the Magi brought gifts. Valuable gifts that cost them something. What do you bring to Jesus at Christmas? What do you bring to him throughout the year? I have recently been reading the books of Samuel and Kings and in those books are listed the quantities of the daily food the people provided for the kings. It cost them a fortune to provide all those bulls and cows and all that grain. If you honor Jesus as your great king, what do you provide for him out of your strength, wisdom, time, talents, and wealth? If you are tired and broke after Christmas, Jesus will still be your king so you can bring your gifts to him in January, February, and so on.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

If you ever see me in a restaurant lobby waiting for a table, I hope you will talk to me because I hate waiting for a table and would welcome some conversation to help pass the time. I really do not like being told that there is no room in the restaurant for me. Jesus’ family seemed to handle being told there was no room in the inn much better than I would. Jesus, of course was still in his mother’s womb when they were refused admittance to the inn at Bethlehem.
But Jesus would be aware throughout his life that this world had very little room for one such as him. I wonder how old he was when he realized that Joseph would have had no room for him and his mother if God had not sent an angel to intervene. In his early ministry people crowded around him so that there was not enough room indoors to hold him. And there was often no space for him and his disciples to gather together for private conversations.
Later, it was made clear to him that there was no room in the synagogues of Galilee or Judea for one who healed people on the Sabbath or ate in the houses of people who were obviously sinful. Toward the end of his life it was obvious that there was no room in the established Jewish religion of his day or in the Roman Empire for one like Him, so the Jewish leaders manipulated the Roman governor to have him put to death.
I think the Apostle John summed up the life of Jesus very well when he wrote “He was in the world and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him.”
The world made it clear to Jesus again and again that there was no room here for him. He was really not wanted here. He did not fit in here at all.
Ironically, No, way more than Ironically, there was no room for Him in death either. Death could not handle, could not keep the holy, eternal, Son of God. So less than three days after his death Jesus rose from the dead. And when he died and rose again he made room for those who believed in him and wanted to be like him. That room is not in this world. The world really does not like his kind, our kind, very much. We tend to get in the way.
Jesus made room for us in his heavenly, eternal kingdom which is coming someday. John summed it up in these words “But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born not of blood, or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.
We have come here this evening to celebrate the One who came into this world, which had no room for him. He made room for us in His World, His Kingdom. And now we will eat his meal to publicly announce to ourselves and each other that we belong to Him, He has made us Children of God.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

Her name was Mary. Her life began during the last quarter of the first century BC and ended during the first half of the first century AD. She had a lot to do with the change of counting the years from BC to AD. According to Luke, she lived in Nazareth, a village in Galilee.
In the 26th through the 38th verse of the first chapter of his Gospel, Luke described the visit of the Angel Gabriel to Mary. He told her that she was to become the mother of the Son of God in spite of her virginity. That passage gives us the basis for one of the most basic doctrines of Christianity. That Jesus was Divine and Human; God living on earth as a Human being.
Gabriel also told Mary that her much older relative Elizabeth, who had not had children during her normal child bearing years, would finally have a son.
So Mary left Nazareth to take a take a trip to the hills of Judea to visit Elizabeth. This would have been a trip of about 80 miles and would have taken three days of walking. It was quite an undertaking for a young woman in those days.
When Mary arrived at Elizabeth’s house Elizabeth felt her baby move in her womb. She then spoke under the power of the Holy Spirit, addressing Mary as the mother of her Lord.
According to Luke, Mary responded by singing a song that she seems to have composed on the spot. Some scholars have posited that Luke composed the song later and attributed it to Mary because she could not have composed such a song and sung it without preparation. I think that opinion overlooks some things.
First of all, this song is in the form of a Jewish Psalm, and many of the phrases are similar to if not identical to some of the phrases in the biblical Psalms. Mary would have known and probably memorized many of these Psalms because they were used in the Synagogue and Temple Worship services.
This song is also quite similar to the Psalm or Hymn that Hannah, the mother of Samuel sang as she was informed that she was about to have a son after having been without children for years.
Actually, the situations of Mary, Elizabeth, and Hannah have several similarities. Prior to the births of their sons, there had been a period of silence from God. There had been no prophets or prophecies from God for years. Samuel was to be the first of many prophets, and Samuel would anoint the first two kings of Israel, beginning the monarchy.
The sons of Elizabeth and Mary would also be the beginning of a period of great enlightenment from God which would include prophecies. And Jesus was to be the King in the lineage of David who had been promised by God through Samuel.
So, given the prominence of Psalms in Judiasm we can assume that Mary was very familiar with such songs, even the song of Hannah, and would be able to draw from her knowledge of such songs and make one up.
We also do not want to overlook possible inspiration of the Holy Spirit in the process of the composition of this song. Luke informs us that Elizabeth was inspired by the Holy Spirit. Mary may have been also.
So, having provided some background about this song, I want to spend a few moments looking at the words of the song. As I mentioned, this song of Mary is similar to the song of Hannah which is recorded in I Samuel chapter 2. But the tenor is much different. Hannah’s song is a song of victory. She felt that by allowing her to have a son, God had vindicated her and given her victory over those who had taunted her for not having children. Mary’s song reflects a humble woman who has been chosen by God for some great purpose. There is no feeling of personal victory in this song. All of the glory is given to God for keeping his promises to his people and for working his Justice in this world.
This song is known as the Magnificat because of the Latin word with which it begins when it is read in Latin.
Probably because of that, most if not all English translations use the word Magnify to translate the Greek word which in other places is translated Exult, Glorify, extol, and Make Great.
In the first line of the song, Mary gives all honor and glory to God because He has looked with favor on her, his lowly servant. Because of His looking on her with favor, all future generations will call her blessed. In other words, she will be honored because of what God has done for her and through her. She takes none of the credit for the honor which is to be given to her. It is the mighty and holy one who has done great things for her.
In the Christian churches I have encountered in my life, I find two extremes in how Mary is treated. By those within the Roman Catholic tradition she is sometimes too highly revered. Sinlessness is attributed to her. And she is occasionally revered as semi divine or more than semi divine. Mary is not Divine and she was not sinless. She was totally human which means that she inherited the fallen-ness that is common to all humans. A touch of her less-than -spectacular humanity is seen in her inability to understand Jesus in a few of the gospel accounts to the point that Jesus seemed to have implied that she was in his way.
But many protestant communions seem to go too far the other way in their considerations of Mary. Many of us stress her total humanity at the risk of neglecting the honor which God bestowed upon her. This is common for those of us who grew up with neighbors erecting statues of Mary on their front lawns or who offered prayers to Mary. In the midst of such excesses, we may have over reacted.
In this song, Mary acknowledged that there was nothing in her that made her worthy of God’s great blessing, but that that blessing would bring her honor. As well it should.
We honor the Apostles Paul, Peter, and John for their works which they and we acknowledge are only the results of God working in their lives. We also need to honor and respect Mary for what God did through her. She allowed God to use her body and soul in a way no other person was asked to do. She was totally willing to be disrespected for a pregnancy that occurred out of wedlock. She rejoiced in being able to give birth to and raise the Son of God.
And now for the rest of the song. In verses 50 – 53 she speaks or sings of Gods Mercy and Justice. He generally, and will specifically through Jesus, carry out these purposes. God’s mercy of forgiveness and Salvation reached a new level in the ministry and work of Jesus and continues to come to all new generations.
He has exposed the proud and scattered them. He has exposed and deposed the powerful and lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things, spiritually and physically. We who believe in Jesus have been filled with good spiritual blessings. But many have had their stomachs filled with food in the name of Jesus. And we, in small ways have helped that happen through our offerings and involvement in missions.
He has exposed and sent away the rich who counted only on their wealth to bring them honor and esteem and a good life.
And, then finally, there are the 54th and 55th verses in which Mary praises God for his mercy especially extended to Israel, to Abraham, and to his descendants forever.
I find these two verses interesting in the light of what the celebration of Christmas has sometimes become in our culture. It has become a festival that divides the Christians from the Jews. Thankfully, the Jews have a festival at nearly the same time. But there is still an awkwardness between Jews and Christians at this time of year.
Many Christians have taken these verses and other verses in the bible as applying to the church, as the spiritual descendants of Abraham. Indeed there are verses in the NT which instruct us to do so. But I do not think that we are to do so to the exclusion of the Jews. They are still people of God’s chosen nation and they are still to be blessed by God through Jesus.
So this Christmas season My instructions include these two: Give Mary the respect God intended her to have. And give to the Jews the respect they deserve as the literal descendants of our spiritual ancestor Abraham. And pray that they may come to the realization that the promises of God to them are fulfilled in Jesus.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

I guess everyone in this room knows who John the Baptist was. Geneologically, he was a distant relative of Jesus. Theologically he was the one whose duty it was to prepare the people of Palestine for the work of Jesus. He called for people to repent as a way of preparing themselves for the kingdom of God which was coming. He also encouraged others to believe in and follow Jesus.
Jesus said that no one born of women was greater than John the Baptist.
But this morning I want to look at what John said about himself, When he was asked who he was, or what was the significance of his ministry he said “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness “Make straight the way of the Lord,” That response of John was a quotation or paraphrase of Isaiah 40: 3. And, as is usually the case when a verse from the Old Testament is quoted by a person in the New Testament, the entire passage from which that verse is quoted is intended to be understood. So, this morning, in honor of John the Baptist, the one who prepared the way for Jesus, we have before us most of the passage which John saw as his job description.
Isaiah had lived about 700 years before John. The message of Isaiah to the people of his day contained two emphases. The first was judgment by God. He proclaimed that many of the nations of his day would be judged for their evil doing and destroyed by God. The Kingdom of the 10 northern tribes of Israel would be among them. The Kingdom of Judah, consisting of the two Southern tribes of Israel would also be punished but they would not be totally destroyed. A remnant of Judah would be taken as captives to Babylon and after 70 years in Babylon, some of them would return to rebuild their nation. The second theme in Isaiah’s message was restoration. God would rescue the captives and restore them to their homeland and the Temple and its Worship Services would be restored.
As time went on, many people in the restored Judah, which later came to be known as Israel, came to believe that much of what Isaiah said in his “restoration orations” were to be fulfilled again by the coming of the Messiah. John the Baptist, living 730 years after Isaiah and 530 years after the restoration was obviously one of them. He believed that his Ministry in Judea was a fulfillment of what Isaiah wrote in Isaiah 40. Now, some elements of Isa. 40 had already been fulfilled by the return of the captives to Palestine in 500 BC. But John the Baptist felt that he was called to be another Voice in the Wilderness calling people to return to God and to be ruled by God in His Kingdom. John believed that the Messiah, whom he later identified with Jesus, had come to bring God’s new Kingdom to the people He loved.
So, John, Inspired by the Holy Spirit of God conducted his ministry in the wilderness areas near the Jordan River not too far from Jerusalem. John’s message of Repentance and Baptism could be seen as calling people to come to God, but following Isaiah, John saw it as calling people to prepare for the coming of God. People were not moving toward God, God was moving toward his People.
As God had been portrayed as going to the Jews in Babylon and taking them back to the Promised Land, so John understood that the Messiah who was coming from God would bring his people into a new Kingdom. During this season we recall when God came to us in Jesus with the gift of Salvation and Forgiveness, calling us to join his new Kingdom. And we also look forward to the time when God will send Jesus once again to take us into his final kingdom. It is a standard theme in Scripture and an emphases in Reformed Theology that people cannot of their own volition go to God, but God must go to his people and move them to Himself. Any shortening of the space between God and people begins with God moving toward people.
I don’t know if John the Baptist understood it or not, but there is in this passage an intimation of eternity. People are likened to grass and field-flowers which live for a short time and then perish. And then we read “but the word of our God will stand forever.” Jesus has come to us As God’s Word. He brought God’s word to us. And in those words there is the promise of eternal life for all who believe in Jesus.
One more thing. John saw himself as a comforter of Israel, bringing Good News. For Isaiah the good news was that the Judeans would suffer for the sins of themselves and the previous generations of Judeans and that all penalties would be paid during their captivity and they would be released to start all over again.
We have even better news in our time. Our sins have been more than paid for also. But not by our sufferings or captivities. Jesus paid for it all on the cross. The evening before he was killed he poured out some wine and told his apostles that it symbolized his blood being shed as a new covenant for the forgiveness of their sins, our sins. In Jesus God came to us and died to pay the penalty for our sins. Then he sent the Holy Spirit to gather us up and bring us to Him.
Let us now partake of this sacrament with Joy. The Lord has Come, the penalties have been paid. He will come again to take us into his eternal Kingdom.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

Since this is the time of year to express our gratitude for things in our lives, I would like to say that I am thankful that I do not have to drive to Massachussetts after our service tonight. For many years after Diane and I were married, her parents continued to live in Massachussetts and we used to travel from our previous home in Southeastern PA to their home in Western MA after the Thanksgiving Eve Service, leaving at about 9:00 and arrived sometime after 2:30 AM. But since we had family living in Massachussets, it seems proper to celebrate Thanksgiving there, as it is considered to be the state where our Thanksgiving customs had their start
It is customary to think of our American thanksgiving customs as having their origins in Plymouth Massachussetts in 1621. That would make this the 390th anniversary of that marvelous celebration. But when Christians celebrate Thanksgiving, they usually go a lot further back in time to the Old Testament practices of public thanksgiving that are mentioned in the Bible. I think that the Pilgrim Fathers in Plymouth would be horrified to hear that we think of their feast as being the “first Thanksgiving”. They were merely offering their gratitude to God as they read that they Jews in the Old Testament were commanded to do.
As we come together on the Eves of Thanksgiving we often look at one of the Psalms of thanksgiving or a one of the sentences of Thanksgiving in one of the New Testament Epistles, such as our New Testament Reading for this evening.
But as I speak to you for these few minutes this evening I want to go back about 3000 years to the final years of the reign of David, King of Israel. After David had finished most of his battles and wars and after he had completed rebuilding Jerusalem, converting it from one of the last holdouts of the Jebusites into the City of David and the capitol of Israel, he wanted to build a Temple for God. God told him not to. David, with all his military victories had become a man of blood. God wanted a King with less violent associations to build the Temple. David’s son Solomon was to be that King.
David was, however, allowed to gather the money and materials with which the Temple would be built after David’s death. Over the years, David and others had contributed to the treasury of God, which would become the Temple Treasury. Much of this wealth was to be used to build the temple. David had also set apart a considerable portion of his own personal wealth to help with construction. And he authorized a public offering to be taken to gather more wealth to be used for the construction of the temple. The people of Israel responded generously to the temple treasury and an assembly of the people was held, at which David offered the Prayer of Thanksgiving which we find in I Chronicles 29: 10-19.
It is really a wonderful prayer which begins with the acknowledgment that true greatness, power, glory, victory, and majesty exist only in God. Then David proclaimed that all riches, honor, power and might come from God.
This is what we proclaim or ought to proclaim when we participate in our Thanksgiving celebrations. All that we have and are or ever will be has come from God. One of the dangers of our Thanksgiving feasts is that as we gather in our nice homes with family and friends in the midst of some of our possessions, we sometimes begin to think that we have gathered this by our own wisdom and work. And while our wisdom and work were sometimes involved in the process, we have known others who were wiser and worked much harder that we, who have not fared as well as we have. As we celebrate Thanksgiving we need to acknowledge that all that we have and are has come from the God to whom it all belongs.
As I read this prayer last week in preparation for this evening, It occurred to me that there was a verse in it that seemed to resonate with our American experience. Look at verse 15. It reads “For we are aliens and transients before you, as were all our ancestors; our days on the earth are like a shadow, and there is no hope.” At the time David uttered this prayer, His people, the Israelites had only been in possession of the holy land for 450 years. Before that, it had been possessed by the Cannanite nations.
We too, are a nation of aliens and transients. This land is not where our families had their beginnings. Some of the nature of the people of these United States was captured well in a now old movie called “Stripes” in which the character played by a young Bill Murray told other soldiers in training that “Our ancestors were kicked out of or ran away from every respectable country in the world. We are muts.” And as the battle of Tippecanoe just had its 200th anniversary we confess that our ancestors did not always treat the original residents of this land very well.
We are the descendants of immigrants and people who did not always love their neighbors. Nevertheless God has had mercy on us and given us families and residence in a wonderful land.
Because of all this and much more we add our prayers to that of King David that whatever God has been pleased to find in our lives, he will continue to find in the lives of His people, our People, and that we and our families and descendants will continue to direct our hearts, their hearts, to God.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

Did you ever think you were alone and suddenly became aware that another person was there with you? Were you startled or maybe even scared? That happens frequently at my house. Our home is a pretty quiet place, so that when one of us is home, they do not hear the other enter until they come behind us and say something. It is startling, to say the least. That is how the book of Revelation begins, with John being startled.
John, we believe that he was none other than John the Apostle, was now an old man, the only one of the original 12 apostles left on earth. Because his apostolic works had made him unpopular with authorities of the Roman Empire, he had been banished to small Island off the coast of Greece in the Agean Sea. On a Sunday he was worshipping apparently alone, when he heard a trumpet-like voice behind him. He must have been startled, and as he saw who was behind him, he must have been even more startled. The one who was behind him is described in verses 13 –16 as being one like the son of man, which in its basic usage means he was in a human form or shape. He also wore a long robe. His head and hair were white as snow. His eyes were like flames of fire. His feet looked like bronze and his voice sounded like many waters. From his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face shone as brightly as the noon day sun.
Now I am going to be talking in a few minutes about the characteristics of this person and what they mean, but first I wanted to look, as it were, at him in his entirety. Imagine being alone, then startled by an unusual voice and turning to see this guy. Wow! Now, since this is a worship service in a church and I am speaking to you during the sermon time, you can probably guess who this guy is. But you don’t have to. He told John who he was in verses 17-18. He said “I am the first and the last, and the living one. I was dead, and see, I am alive, forever and ever; and I have the keys of death and hades.
Now, who do you think this person is? Jesus! But he sure has changed, hasn’t he? Here we don’t see a Palestinian-Jew-Carpenter-turned-Rabbi. Here we don’t see the humble itinerant preacher, the fellow who seemed so ordinary that it was a real surprise to see him do miracles. The Jesus we see here is the mighty, resurrected, ascended and glorified Jesus who currently lives with the father awaiting his return to earth. Does Jesus look like this today? Maybe. Remember, Jesus is God and God is a spiritual being and he can appear any way he pleases. It pleased him to appear this way to John because the details of his appearance were reminders or symbols of some part of his nature or his calling.
So, let’s spend a few moments to look at the details of this appearance of Jesus to remind ourselves of who He is and what he does.
He is described as one “like the son of man”. In fact, he is a man. Now some of you know that this was Jesus’ favorite term by which to describe himself. But it is also a reminder that since his birth at Bethlehem, Jesus has been a human being. He is one of us. He understands who we are and why we do what we do and what we really need.
He wore a long robe with a golden sash across his chest. The long robe and the gold belt or sash would denote an honored and wealthy person, perhaps a king, but the sash or girdle or belt would on such persons normally be worn about the waist. But the priests in Israel wore a sash up high on the chest. Scholars disagree as to whether Jesus is being depicted as king or priest in this vision. So I think they are both right. Jesus is our king whom we are to allow to rule over us. He is also our priest who intercedes with the Father for us, and who offered himself as the sacrifice for our sins.
And some of the rest of the details point to these two roles of Jesus.
His hair and face were white as white wool or white as snow. Around the world, white hair is a sign of age. In the Middle East, age is believed to bring wisdom. So the white hair is a symbol for Wisdom. Jesus is the all-wise one.
But in the Bible the color white is also associated with purity and holiness. Jesus is pure and holy, even after having lived a life on earth.
His eyes were like a flame of fire. This depicts an all-knowing intellect. Jesus sees and knows all. He can see into the darkest places, even the most secret thoughts of our minds. There are no secrets from Jesus. We live as if there are, that there are things about us that Jesus does not know, but he sees and knows everything about us, even things we do not know.
His feet were like burnished bronze. This might be a little more obscure than the other features but it is not that difficult to understand. One of the most important parts of the uniform of a soldier or an athlete is the shoes. Why, because the strength and skill in the rest of the body doesn’t matter if the feet can’t hold the body up and get it where it needs to be at a particular moment. Most of us know of athletes whose careers were ended because of injured tendons in the feet and ankles. Jesus has no weak spots. His feet will support him and us when he carries us or our sins. His feet are portrayed as being of shining metal.
His voice was like the sound of many waters. John was probably familiar with the sound of the waves of the Agean Sea pounding the shores of Patmos during a storm. But when I think of the sound of many waters I recall a trip I made about 10 years ago to Niagara Falls. As you get close to the falls, you hear the roar of thousands of gallons of water going over the horseshoe shaped falls every second. As you look over it, the roar is so loud that you can hardly hear what others are saying.
When we were there we there we took the trip on the “Maid of the Mist” the boat that takes you to the bottom of the falls and lets you experience water falling down on three sides. The noise and the rocking of the boat and the mist is something to experience. But as we were at the bottom of the falls, our captain was in the wheelhouse with his feet up, reading the newspaper. He had obviously been there many times, but I thought it was disrespectful (and a little dangerous – I was afraid my epitaph would read “Dave died because the captain was reading the newspaper at Niagara Falls”).
Jesus’ voice is like Niagara Falls. His words are supposed to overwhelm us. But sometimes we are distracted by other less important things.
The Glorified Jesus’ sword is not something he needs to carry and handle, it proceeds somehow from his mouth, and it is a double edged sword. It cuts both ways. Jesus’ words cut into and through his enemies. They have also cut through us, convicting us of our sins and of our need to be forgiven and saved by him. As I think of this imagery, I think of the last part of the great hymn written by Martin Luther. He wrote, “The prince of darkness grim, we tremble not for him, his rage we can endure, for lo, his doom is sure, One little word shall fell him.” That word shall come from the mouth of our Lord Jesus Christ, our King.
His face is depicted as being like the sun shining with full force. This like the white hair and face depicts the holiness of God but also the Glory of God. In many of his Old Testament appearances there was a shining glory radiating from God. Jesus is clearly depicted as the Almighty God.
It is no wonder that when John saw him he fell on his face in worship and awe. When you see God your proper position is prone on the ground.
But Jesus put his hand on John and said, “Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last, and the living one. I was dead, and see I am alive forever and ever; and I have the keys of Death and of Hades.”
We, like John, do not need to be afraid of this majestic Jesus because he loves us and died for us. He is now alive forever and ever. That is wonderful for him, but he also has the keys of death and Hades. In those days, death was thought of as the resting place dead bodies. Hades was thought of as the resting place for deceased souls. Jesus can and will release bodies from death and he can and will release souls from hades so that we, body and soul can live forever with him.
There are two more details to this appearance of Jesus that are important to us. Jesus is depicted as standing in the midst of 7 lamp-stands and holding 7 stars in his hand. Now, you might remember that in the temple in Jerusalem and in the temple before it, there was a 7 branched lamp-stand. Jesus is depicted as our king and our priest standing in God’s heavenly temple.
Notice the explanation of lampstands and the stars in verse 20. “As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands: the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.”
Now, the seven churches were 7 real churches in 7 cities in what is now Turkey. But in Revelation they also represent all the churches in that day and in all times. And the glorified Jesus is depicted as walking among them. Jesus is depicted as walking among us, the churches in our day.
The 7 stars are the angels of the churches. Here angels mean either the leaders of the 7 churches or the guardian angels of the 7 churches or the prevailing spirits of the 7 churches. In our time Jesus is among the churches in this world and he has in his hand some element or reminders of us.
For the next 5 weeks we will be thinking about Jesus as he came to Bethlehem so long ago and as he will come back to this earth to establish his final kingdom. But before we do that, I wanted you to look at the Jesus who is currently with us in Spirit, power, and glory. He walks within us and among us.
In our first lesson we read how the prophet Samuel introduced Saul to the people of Israel as their first king. He said “Do you see the one whom the Lord has chosen? There is no one like him among all the people. And all the people shouted ‘Long live the King!’”
My friends, as you read this passage and think about this vision, Do you see the one whom the Lord has chosen? There is no one like him among all the people. Please join me in saying as those folks did: “Long live the king”: “Long live the King.” Amen.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

Sometimes I get a great idea for a sermon title only to realize that I can’t use it or say that. Since our Scripture lesson this morning contains a talking donkey, there were all sorts of funny titles that came to mind for this sermon that I realized that I could not use. So, for the sake of decorum, I chose “How to Become A Fool.”
Although our reading from Numbers is rather long, it is just a small part of the story I want to relate to you this morning. The entire story of Balaam is interwoven with some other stories over 10 chapters of the book of Numbers. It begins in the first verse of the 22nd chapter of Numbers and ends in the 16th verse of the 31st chapter.
In the beginning of chapter 22 we discover that Balaam was a very interesting character. He is written about as being a prophet, but he was not an Israelite. He was a Gentile from Mesopotamia, (one scholar states that he was from the area we know as Iraq.) He was evidently well known among the people living on the East side of the Jordan river and the Dead Sea in Palestine. So in Balaam we have a Gentile prophet to whom God speaks and who Balaam knows he must obey. The only other Gentile to whom God spoke in the OT was Job. In fact, although the Rabbinic literature states that there were 7 gentile prophets in the OT, they include Beor, Balaam’s father and Job’s 4 friends. So the only two who are dealt with in any detail are Balaam and Job.
Balaam enjoyed a reputation of being able to curse the enemies of his clients. He was sort of a prophet or soothsayer or holy man for hire. In this story he was hired by Balak king of Moab and the princes of Midian to curse the Israelites.
The time setting for this story is about 1550 BC. The Israelites had left Egypt 40 years earlier and were ending their period in the wilderness. They had traveled up the east side of the Dead Sea and had come into the edge of the territory of Moab. On the way to Moab, they had been attacked by the Amorites, whom they defeated. Then they were attacked by the people of the territory of Bashan, whom they also defeated.
So when they arrived on the edge of the territory of Moab, their king, Balak felt threatened. This multitude of people who had escaped from Egypt and drowned Pharoah’s army had defeated two of the neighboring territories to his south and had now come to his country.
Balak summoned the elders of the Midianites. The Midianites were a semi nomadic people whose tribes lived within the boundaries of Moab. These elders would have been the chiefs of the tribes. Both the Midianites and the Moabites were related to the Israelites. The Moabites were descendants of Lot, Abraham’s nephew, the fellow who escaped from Sodom. The Midianites were descended from one of the sons whom Abraham had with Keturah, the woman he married after Sarah died.
As a result of the summit between Balak king of Moab and the Midianite chiefs, they sent representatives to the great prophet and oracle Balaam in the East. They took with them money to pay Balaam to come and help them against the Israelites. The request they brought to Balaam from Balak is recorded in verses 5&6 of chapter 22 of Numbers. “A people has come out of Egypt; they have spread over the face of the earth, and they have settled next to me. Come now, curse this people for me, since they are stronger than I; perhaps I shall be able to defeat them and drive them from the land; for I know that whomever you bless is blessed, and whomever you curse in cursed.”
When those representatives reached Balaam and asked him to help the Moabites and Midianites, he asked them to spend the night while he sought the will of God. God came to Balaam that night in some manner and said to him “You shall not go with them. You shall not curse the people for they are blessed.”(22:12) The next morning, Balaam woke and sent them away saying that the Lord would not let him go with them.
When they returned to Balak, he thought that Balaam was bargaining with him for a higher price, so he sent a greater number of representatives who were of higher rank with more money to hire Balaam to return with them. When they arrived, Balaam committed his first error. He should have told them No. God had been clear. But this time they had brought more money and promised more rewards and respect, so Balaam asked them to spend the night while he consulted with God again. This time God consented to let him go, but he must only do and say what God told him to. So he went with them. And that brings us to our the events of our second lesson with the talking donkey. You know, there are only two occurrences outside of visions where animals talk in the bible. They are the serpent in Genesis and Balaam’s donkey.
God sent the angel of death to Balaam and caused his donkey to talk to make him aware that he was heading for trouble and that if he continued his journey, he needed to be very careful to obey the Lord in every way.
I think the folks who wrote the II Helvetic confession got it right when they mentioned Balaam in connection with freedom of the will. We like to talk about our freedom of the will as a good thing. We are free to do what we like. But in exercising his freedom Balaam was walking in peril. God allowed him to exercise his freedom and go, and warned him that he was headed for trouble. Calvin in commenting on this passage wrote “God apparently permits much of which he does not approve.” The fact that God allows you to do certain things does not mean that they are the things he wants you to do or that it is good for you to do them.
So, after the incident with the talking donkey and the angel of death, Balaam told God he would turn back if he wanted him to. Now God had just sent a warning angel and caused a donkey to talk to express His Divine displeasure at Balaam’s trip, but Balaam still asked God if He wanted him to go. And God told him he could go but he should be very careful only to say what God told him to.
That brings us to chapters 23 and 24 which contain my favorite part of the story. Balak took Balaam out so he could see a part of the Israelite horde so Balaam could curse them in person. Balaam built at Balak’s expense 7 altars and sacrificed a ram and a bull on each altar to get God’s attention. Then Balaam was supposed to curse Israel. But God would only allow Balaam to bless Israel, so he did.
Balak was upset, and asked Balaam what he was doing. Balaam answered that he could only say what God told him to. So Balak took him to another location thinking that if Balaam could see Israel from another angle perhaps he could curse them. There might be a warning for us here. If you have to look at something from various angles to see if God might approve of your doing it, You probably already know that you shouldn’t do it.
Balak took him to the second location where 7 more bulls and 7 more rams were offered on 7 more altars and Balaam still blessed Israel. But Balak was not finished with his angles yet, and he took Balaam to a third location. And there 7 more altars were built and 7 more bulls and 7 more rams offered on them. And Balaam still blessed Israel. Then Balak sent Balaam home, but before he went, Balaam gave a 4th oracle, predicting that Israel would defeat Edom, Moab, Amalek, and the Kenites.
Then Balaam went home. And that seems to be the end of the story. But evidently Balaam did not stay home, he returned to give counsel to the Midianites.
In the 25th chapter we read that the men of Israel were seduced by the Midianite women to get involved sexually with them and then to worship their false Gods. Then God sent a plague and ordered a slaughter to punish the Israelites for this and 24,000 of them died.
Chapters 26-30 describe things the people of Israel had to pay attention to before they would be ready to enter the promised land.
Then we come to chapter 31. In this chapter, God commanded the Israelites to attack and destroy the Midianites for seducing the men of Israel to worship their false Gods. They sent 12,000 armed men against Midian and in verse 8 we read, “They killed the kings of Midian: Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba, the five kings of Midian, in addition to others who were slain by them; and they also killed Balaam son of Beor with the sword.”
The reason why they killed Balaam is given in the 16th verse of chapter 31. Moses was upset with the Israelite soldiers because they had allowed many of the Midianite women to live and he said “These women here, on Balaam’s advice, made the Israelites act treacherously against the Lord in the affair of Peor, so that the plague came among the congregation of the Lord.
Balaam had evidently gone home but continued to look for an angle that would allow him to please Balak and the Midianites until he found one. God was protecting Israel, but if Balaam could find a way to cause the Israelites to worship other gods He might curse His own people. So he advised the women to seduce the men of Israel into relationships and into worshipping their Gods. And it worked. Balaam found his angle so he could be respected and paid by the Moabites and Midianites. And it got him killed.
Be very careful when you begin to look for angles so that you can justify certain behaviors and thoughts and can think that God approves of them. God may have already made his desires known to you through his Scriptures. Look no further.
Psalm 53: 1 says “Fools say in their hearts, ‘There is no God’”. The story of Balaam reminds us that there is another kind of fool, the fool who believes in God and looks for angles to do what God does not want him or her to do. Be careful, my friends, lest you become a fool.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

There has been a lot of talk in the past year about debt, taxes, and revenue. Some of this talk has been caused by our alarming and ever rising national debt. Some has been caused by decreasing revenue from local and federal taxes and the resultant cuts in federal, state, and local funding of programs, including our local schools. There has been a lot of talk in Indianapolis and Washington DC about raising taxes.
Evidently in the Roman Empire of the first century AD there were similar discussions. Only the frustration level might have been even higher in that time and place because most of the people affected and having those discussions had no vote and no voice. Hardly any of the Christians (since most were not Roman Citizens) would have had a voice or vote, and some of the moneys extracted from them through taxation would have been used for non or anti-Christian purposes such as the support of the Emperor-Worship Cults.
So we do find in our New Testament some discussions or some answers to the question of how supportive of the government and its revenue system and its officials a Christian ought to be. The matter of paying taxes to Caesar was handled by Jesus and other matters of this issue were handled by the Apostle Paul. In his letter to the Romans, he wrote about the duty of the Christian to obey and respect the authorities of the government.
That section is summarized in the 7th verse of the 13th chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, which is the first verse in our 2nd lesson today. It reads “Pay to all what is due them – taxes to whom taxes are due, revenue to whom revenue is due, respect to whom respect is due, honor to whom honor is due.” Now as we think about that, we need to remember that in Jesus’ answer about paying taxes to Caesar, he added “and give to God what belongs to God”. At this time of year when the finance committee has asked us to think about what we will contribute to the church in the next Calendar year, we need to think about what in our lives belongs to God and how we ought to be thankful to Him by our offerings.
In the 8th verse, Paul moves on from the debts we owe and the obligations we have and need to honor or pay, to an obligation that can never be paid off, an obligation that is a never ending debt for those who belong to God. It is the obligation to love others as we love ourselves. Christians are never to think they have finished fulfilling this obligation. It is a debt that continues to need to be paid. Paul mentions that the payment of this debt is required by the 10 commandments, six of which are fulfilled by loving and caring for others. He does not mention the first 4 commandments, which are fulfilled by loving and serving God.
In the 11th verse he stresses that the fulfilling of the debt to love others might be more important in their time than it had been previously. He wrote “Besides this, you know what time it is, how it is now the moment for you to wake from sleep. For Salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers.” Now that Christ had come and was expected to return and bring this existence to an end, it was of the utmost importance that they demonstrate the love of God to others by loving and caring for them in His Name.
As he continued that thought, he wrote about the day of the return of the lord, Judgment day, the first day of God’s eternal kingdom in a way we might be able to identify with just now. Today is the first day of Standard Time. Most of us, even if we are late risers, have found ourselves recently getting up and preparing ourselves for the day while it was still dark. Many of us have been arriving at work and beginning the day before it was really day.
This is the situation we are in as Christians. We have risen and are living into a day or age that has not yet come. Even though it is still dark, and evil is still very much present in this world, we are living according to the standards of the kingdom that is coming. Or as Paul wrote in vs 12-13; “the night is far gone, the day is near. Let us then lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; let us live honorably as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy.” With the armor of light, the shining armor of the gospel of Jesus we can live in a dark world loving others as we love ourselves.
All of the behaviors he mentions in those verses are behaviors that belong to the night, to this fallen world. We are called away from them and into other behaviors which he Paul summarized in verse 14 when he wrote Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires. Now when you read that part about making no provision for the flesh, you have to remember that when Paul uses the term translated flesh, he is usually referring to the dark side of human nature, to the sinful passions and desires that are related to our bodies. He is not saying that we ought not to take care of ourselves and make no plans or provisions for our futures, that we ought not to buy heavy coats as winter comes.
He likens the behaviors of the day that is coming which we are to live out in the last hours of this night of darkness as “put(ting) on the Lord Jesus Christ”, as you would your clothing. We are to clothe ourselves in Jesus, behaving as he behaved or would behave in our circumstances. Now as we go through the gospel narratives there are some behaviors of Jesus that we might prefer to put on or imitate rather than others.
Jesus was a sharp debater, often able to silence critics with a few sentences. He could walk on water, he could shine with the glory of God. He could overpower demons and raise from the dead. We shall one day have some of those abilities in our Resurrection bodies. But the Jesus Paul wanted Christians to put on, the behaviors of Jesus Paul exhorted Christians to imitate need to be seen in the light of what he had already said about the requirement; to love others.
We see the love Jesus had for others most clearly in this sacrament. He sacrificed his body and blood for us and others he loved. As you take and look at and eat and drink the bread and wine of this sacrament, realize that this is the Jesus, the Jesus of self sacrificing love that we are to put on and wear as our night comes to an end and the eternal day of the new Kingdom begins to dawn.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

Tomorrow will be the 494th anniversary of what is considered to be the beginning of the protestant reformation. On October 31, 1517 Martin Luther, an Augustinian Monk, posted a list of 95 issues about practices and beliefs in that day that troubled him. He posted those 95 Theses (as they are now known) on the door of the chapel of the University of Wittenberg as in invitation for whoever might be interested to debate and discuss these things with him.
Luther, in his studies of the Scriptures and in his study of the writings of early church theologians felt that the issues reflected in the 95 Theses were not based on scripture and that they were leading people away from the true faith. I do not know if he had the book of Jude in mind as he posted those thesis on the door, but he was certainly obeying verse 3 of that short epistle. In that verse we read “…I find it necessary to write and appeal to you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints.”
In the Epistle of Jude, the author reminds his readers that it had been predicted by the apostles that people would be sneaking in among the Christians and attempting to get them to deny elements of the true faith or to convince them to accept ideas and practices that were contrary to the true faith.
Luther believed that in his time those folks who had stolen into the church and were attempting to corrupt the believers were some of the priests, bishops and even some of the popes of the church.
The headlines of our newspapers and the reports from the mainline denominations should make it clear to us that there are still people in the church attempting to mislead others into accepting things that have never been accepted in the church. And some leaders are denying doctrines that have always been a part of the Christian Faith. There is a Presbyterian Minister in the state of Tennessee who has written on his “blog” that the statement that “Jesus died for our sins” is absurd. He is one of many who are leading people away or attempting to lead people away from what Jude refers to as “the Faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints.”
That faith is described in our bibles, particularly in the New Testament. That is why we give bibles to our children, so they can become familiar with the faith that we as Christians believe. I am going to say more about that later. What I am trying to say now is that the faith that has been entrusted to the saints is under attack, as it always is, and that we need to be willing to contend for it.
I am humbled and pleased to be the pastor of some people who are doing that. Some of our members are professors of Philosophy and have written and debated that belief in God and in Jesus is logical and consistent with other decisions that we have made and that the Christian Worldview is logical and rational and should be accepted. Another person in our church has also done his share of contending for the Christian faith in the academy and in China.
But we all need to be willing to contend for the faith when we hear it challenged or corrupted by others.
Now, there might be something misleading about the term “entrusted to the saints.” Those designated as “saints” are not limited to those who have officially been called saints, as Augustine, Paul, Peter, and others, but all who are being sanctified, all who are becoming more like Christ. The saints (with a small s) to whom the Faith has been entrusted include us, who have said that we believe in Jesus.
A summary of that faith is given in our first lesson, Acts 4: 10-12. In this passage Peter was speaking about the power by which he had healed a man. He said that power came from “Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead. This Jesus is ‘the stone that was rejected by you, the builders: it has become the cornerstone.’ There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved.”
Now, no brief statement can give all of the truths that are a part of what we believe about Jesus, but these two and a half verses are a start. We believe in Jesus who was the Christ, the one chosen and anointed by God to be the Savior He sent into the world. He was killed by people and God raised him from the dead.
The part about him being the stone is a reference to an OT legend about an important stone in the temple. What it means in this context is that Jesus was the one about whom the prophets spoke hundreds and even thousands of years before his birth.
This is the basic content of our faith which we have already stated using the word of the Apostle’s Creed as a response to the sacrament of Baptism.
And now I would like to direct your attention to verse 20 of the book of Jude. “But you, beloved, build yourselves up on your most holy faith; pray in the Holy Spirit; keep yourselves in the love of God; look forward to the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life.”
We are to build ourselves up in the faith of Jesus, build our lives upon our profession of faith in Jesus. Every part of our lives should be affected by what we believe about Jesus.
And we are to assist others, especially the young ones to build their lives on their faith in Jesus. You just promised to do that for Noah this morning. In baptism he was set apart as belonging to God and His Church and we all promised to help him come to faith in Jesus and to help him build his life on his faith.
We also gave bibles to our young people so they could read God’s word and believe it and build their lives on their faith. We need to pray for them and do all we can to help them understand their bibles.
It has been almost 494 years since Luther unintentionally started the Protestant Reformation. But there is still a need for us to contend for the Faith of Jesus Christ. There is still a need for us to build ourselves up in our holy faith. And there is still a need to help children and others to build their lives up on their faith in Jesus.

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906

I have never met Morgan Meyers. He and his wife Dorothy moved from West Lafayette before I arrived. Shortly after I came, I was having a conversation with a person who was lamenting their departure and they said that Morgan was the only one among this congregation who had the heart for or gift of Evangelism.
That gave me something to think about. Had I become the Pastor of a congregation in which no one had the gift of Evangelism? If so, that was not a shocking thought, because I am a Presbyterian Pastor and if there has ever been a group of Christians who have for the past 50 years seemed uncomfortable about and incapable of Evangelism it would be the members of the PC(USA) and we have the statistics to prove it.
Evangelism has become something that we are uncomfortable about and over the years it has become obvious to some of us that part of the problem is that we don’t even know what evangelism is. And that is a factor in our declining membership numbers and the decline in the number of people who know we are in their community and/0r care.
So, I thought that as we looked at this passage from the Apostle Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians we might think about what is revealed here about the man who was one of the first evangelists and perhaps one of the most effective.
But before I do that I feel that I need to define the word evangelism. It has its derivation from a foreign language. Euangelion is a Greek word and it simply means Good News. It is used in the Bible to mean the Good news about Jesus, his birth, life, death, and resurrection. It also especially refers to the salvation he procured for those who believe in him. So, in its simplest definition, Evangelism means Good News-ing; Telling the good news or sharing the good news about Jesus.
Our first reading tells us about Paul’s stay in Thessalonica during which he started the Christian Church there. From reading that account, we might have been surprised that Paul was there long enough to start a church in Thessalonica. Nevertheless, A church was formed in Thessalonica of the people Paul convinced to become Christians there. We know this because he wrote to them in the two epistles to the Thessalonians.
Things had not been going well for Paul and his companions Silas and Timothy as they came to Thessalonica. They had just come from Philippi where they had been in some trouble. It all started when Paul had driven a demon out of a servant girl. The demon had evidently given her the ability to foretell the future and perhaps given her contacts with the dead. When the demon was gone, the girl’s owners felt that she was not worth as much as she had been. They could no longer make profits from her fortune telling and consulting the dead. So they tried to bring a legal case against Paul, but it turned into a riot. At the conclusion of the riot the magistrates ordered that Paul and Silas be beaten with rods and put in the dungeon.
Now, God did a miracle that night, and Paul and Silas were freed in the morning, but it is likely that they were still bearing the pains and bruises of their beatings when they arrived in Thessalonica. This is what he refers to in the first two verses of the second chapter of his first letter to the Christians at Thessalonica. In verses 1 &2 we read: “You yourselves know, brothers and sisters, that our coming to you was not in vain, but though we had already suffered and been shamefully mistreated at Philippi, as you know, we had courage in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in spite of great opposition.”
Others, bearing Paul’s bruises and pains may have taken some time off before doing what had just gotten them into trouble, or perhaps given up all together as my grandmother did with her sandwich.
About 30 years ago my family and I visited Pennsbury Manor, the rebuilt estate house of William Penn located along the Delaware River North of Philadelphia. We ate our meals outside on picnic tables. My grandmother began to eat her sandwich unaware that it and she were under the gaze of a large wild turkey which was part of a flock that lived on the estate. When my grandmother paused to look to her left, the turkey rushed in from the right and snatched the sandwich from her plate. My aging 4’10” grandmother (who’s girth was equal to her height) got up from that picnic table and ran from it faster than anyone of us could have imagined saying “Well, if you want the sandwich that badly, you can just have it!”
Many have given up on Evangelism, on telling others about Jesus, because they have had one or two negative reactions or sometimes because they were afraid that they would receive negative reactions.
Paul and Silas were not deterred by the opposition they received. They were run out of Philippi and their friends later asked them to leave Thessalonica when troubles came there. But in each place, they left a group of Christians who had become Christians because Paul and Silas told them about Jesus. And city by city and town by town, in spite of riots and imprisonments, people came to know Jesus and churches were planted throughout what is now Turkey and Greece and what was Macedonia.
They labored on because they knew who they were working for. Paul explained that in verses 3-5 “For our appeal does not spring from deceit or impure motives or trickery, but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the message of the gospel, even so we speak, not to please mortals, but to please God who tests our hearts. As you know and as God is our witness, we never came with words of flattery or with a pretext for greed; nor did we seek praise from mortals, whether from you or others,”
Paul did not allow the negative reactions, even when they involved physical attacks, to deter him from telling others about Jesus because he was not working to please others or be spoken well of by others. He was telling others about Jesus in order to please God.
As one reads those verses one might wonder if Paul had been watching television during the last 4 decades of our time. We have seen false evangelists exposed by the news media. We have seen them to be deceivers and flatterers, motivated by greed and other impure motives. They have been exposed on 60 minutes and other news shows. But their false evangelism or evangelism gone terribly wrong should not deter us from telling others about Jesus. We need to please God in this matter just as Paul did, not as full time missionaries or evangelists as he did, but as those who have been saved by the good news and want others to know what we know and be saved as we have been.
As you think about that, I would like you to look at the MO (modus operandi) of Paul as he tried to tell others about Jesus. look at verse 7-8. “we were gentle among you, like a nurse tenderly caring for her own children. So deeply do we care for you that we are determined to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you have become very dear to us.”
We need to develop relationships with people who need Jesus. We need to live before them an example of a life lived trying to please God. We need to care tenderly for them as does a mother who is nursing or caring for her own child. We need to allow the people who need Jesus to become very dear to us. We need to let God direct us to certain people who need Jesus and we need to pray for them and care for them and talk to them about Jesus and bring them to Faith Church where they will be loved by some of the finest people you have ever met.
Was Morgan Meyers the only one of our members who had the gift of Evangelism or the heart for evangelism? I don’t think so, what do you think?

Pastor David L. Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906