Preaching

          Today, I tried something completely new to me. I preached. I have never given a whole sermon to a congregation before, and I was a little nervious. I wasn't nervious about speaking in front of people, that has never been a problem for me. I was worried that my message might be ignored or misunderstood. I ran into a little trouble when I was trying to find a topic to preach on. There are so many points that I could cover in the bible and I felt a little overwhelmed. Then I realized that maybe this sermon wasn't just for the people in the congregation. I am young and always learning more about Christianity, so why not pick a topic that I struggle with and is important to Christians around the world? I chose to go with leaving sin, and judgement of others. I believe that it is a common misconception that if we are baptised, go to church, and ask for forgiveness of our sins that we can continue to live our lives whatever way we want from Sunday afternoon to Saturday night. This is simply not true. Paul asked the question, "Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase?". The answer is no. As Christians we are called to leave our earthly posession, and that includes sin. Now we are human, so we will sin in some ways, but that doesn't mean that we don't strive to keep ourselves as pure as possible. I am in no way an example of this, though. There are some sins that we would prefer to not have to leave and just have God's grace cover us. In the same way that I'm sure that Jesus probably would have preferred that we would have just obeyed our Lord's will. Instead he left his heavanly home, lived a perfect human life (inspite of Satan's temptation, the same temptation that we face), and died for our shortcomings. So, with such an amazing gift shouldn't we at least give it our best effort to deserve it, even though we could never reach it on our own?
           Now on to my next topic. If Jesus died so that every sinner in this world could have the chance for salvation, and we are called to strive to be like Jesus, how can we say that one person is beyond saving? Ezekiel tells us that if we see someone who is living a life of sin, and we don't try to reach that person, then their blood is on our hands. That's our responsibility as believers. One example that I like to use is homosexuality. It's a very controversial topic, but when you look at it biblically, it's very clear as to our responsibility. Simply, we are called to love everybody. We don't have to like what they do, or even like the person, but WE ARE CALLED TO LOVE THEM. Jesus doesn't say love them, unless they are gay or jewish or mean or anything like that. He just says love them like I love them. In Roman's, Paul talks about how bad the sin is in Rome. The very next chapter he tells us that if we judge people, the Lord will surely judge us. None of us are pure, therefore none of us can judge. On top of that, we are told that sin is sin. If you tell a lie to your friends, then you have sinned. If you commit murder, then you have sinned. If sleep around, then you have sinned. None are greater than the other, with the exception of blastphemy against the Lord. The dictionary definition of blastphemy is to claim the Lord's powers for oneself. Judgement is the Lord's power, and the Lord's power only. So, my personal interpretation is that when you judge someone, and say that their sins are too bad and you don't need to try to minister through love to them, it is blastphemy. Now that might be a very literal, and extreme interpretation of it, but to me it scares me. It scares me because I know that I have judged people. For example, an alcoholic in the street here. There are times that I don't want to talk to that person because I know that they will just ask me to buy them alcohol. Why not take the time to do what I am called to do and at least invite them to sunday service? How about an American example. Everybody has seen that man under the overpass with a sign that say something that you cant read because it's too small. You know that he is asking for money, and usually you make up a reason to ignore that person. "He'll just spend the money on beer", or, "He could be dangerous", or "Why doesn't he just go get a job? I have a job and work hard for my money.". Why don't we just take ten minutes out of our day to give him a ride to subway and buy him a five dollar meal, then before you go, tell him that we are Christiams and invite him to church? I don't think that it means that you succeeded or failed if he shows up on Sunday or not. I think that just by extending the offer, you have done exactly what Jesus calls us to do.