Sermon Poetry, 14 February 2010
Sermon Title – “The Great Commission and the Church”
Sermon Text – Matthew 28:16-20
Preacher – Pastor Steve Garrick

Jesus Christ, Exalted King, has sent His Chosen Bride
He sends as One who rules and reigns, as One Who’s earned the right
Both God and Man, the Lamb Who died, our risen Potentate
Our slaughtered Lord, our sovereign King, our God who loves and saves

Our loving Lamb has bound the one who hates the Holy God
This devil’s bound by Jesus Christ and men are being saved
The Spirit moves and men are saved from every tribe and tongue
The Church is sent and used by Christ to call His chosen loves

Our Savior sends His holy Bride into a darkened world
So men are saved and sanctified, submitting to the Lord
Our goal is to disciples make, baptizing growing souls
So they can be more like our Lord, this work’s our worthy goal

The Great Commission’s still our goal, until our King’s Return
The Word proclaimed is till our task, the Church is going forth
Though single souls, we’re saved in One, the Bride of Jesus Christ
You love the Groom, you’ll love the Bride and work so she is saved

The Church is called to preach the Word to lost and deadened men
The Great Commission is our task, to missionaries send
We meet to pray, we hear the Word, we send to preach the Truth
The Gospel of our Lord and King to send into the World

Sermon Poetry, 7 February 2010
Sermon Title – “The Great Commission and the Purpose of God”
Sermon Text – Romans 8:18-25
Preacher – Pastor Steve Garrick

For all of time our God above has been eternal blest
Sufficient in Himself
With happiness and joy supreme, full fellowship of Three

He made a world that fell in sin, rebellion from our race
We fell in sin and death
But in our sin, He’s glorified and we are given Grace

The world we’re in is frail and pale, it breaks and falls apart
Our hearts are weak and poor
But in our Christ, we’re made alive, the fruits of Heaven’s earth

We’re slaves to sin, corruption’s lord, this world will rot away
We can’t escape its work
Subjected firm, with Hope the goal, the futile thence to Grace

Before the world was ever made, ‘twas God ordaining sin
And all of its effects
This sin and death was worth the hope of Christ’s eternal win

Sermon Title – “Christian Unity and the Pastoral Ministry, #4”
Sermon Text – Ephesians 4:12-16
Preacher – Pastor Larry Vincent

Pastors preach the Word of God to saved and fellow slaves
With Word and Prayer to minister so Christ in us is praised
The Truth of God proclaimed and heard, the knowledge of our Lord
We hear and live, obey and serve, submitting to the Word

There’s danger in the world about, and even in our hearts
Temptations to derail our faith, from devils foul and smart
We’re kept through what our God has said, the mercy of the Word
The Spirit keeps our souls secure, in Jesus Christ our Lord

In Christ we’re loved for all of time, our hearts are washed and cleansed
We’re called to love our fellow saints, though sinners all we be
The words we hear are given feet and hands to love our King
We love our Lord by loving men, the praise of God we sing

In Jesus Christ the lost are saved, we’re ragamuffins weak
We’re knit and joined into His frame, our Head is Jesus sweet
Though feet or hands, we’ve all a part in glorifying God
We love the World and love the Church, as one in Christ we trod

Sermon Poetry, 17 January 2010
Sermon Text – John 10:40-42
Preacher – Pastor Tom Lyon

By Grace God uses preaching of
His Word proclaimed and heard
The Power of the Word of God
Is Grace of God our Lord

The preaching of the Word of God
Is power strong and sweet
‘Tis greater than amazing works
The place where Jesus meets

The Spirit of our Holy Lord
Gives preaching power great
Without His work, the Lost won’t live
He loves the ones who hate

Amazing words and stunning dress
Are empty without Truth
Just useless words and wasted breath
Is preaching lacking Truth

True preaching sanctioned by the Lord
Tells Truth of Jesus Christ
Christ crucified must be our theme
The Lamb of greatest price

The Word proclaimed will till the ground
Of hardened sinners hearts
The Words of God are mighty seeds
That flourish, Grace imparts

The Word believed will action take
The Spirit quickens souls
It’s by His Grace that men believe
Increasing Heaven’s rolls

Religiosity devoid of Christ-enlivened spirituality always and without fail leads to damnation.  This is a sobering lesson of the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector.  Jesus made no secret of His detestation of the teachings and theology of the Pharisees.  When He was not teaching doctrines that ran contrary to the Pharisees (enraging them) or dining with sinners (deeply offending them) or teaching parables against them (confounding them), He was pronouncing woes upon them and calling them vipers and whitened sepulchers.  He even saw fit to use them as an object lesson in this parable in Luke 18:9-14.

The parable in question involves two characters: a Pharisee and a Tax Collector.  Pharisees were the religious leaders of their day.  They were renowned for their apparent righteousness and law-keeping.  They loved the honor of men and loved the sweet smell of money (Luke 16:14).  They were self-righteous and devious.  Jesus did not think very highly of the Pharisees.  In return, they hated Him.  The Gospels are filled with battles that Jesus had with these leading rulers and many of his teachings were teachings in direct opposition to the Pharisees.  In Matthew 21:33-40 Jesus likened them to tenants who beat and murdered the servants of the owner of a vineyard, even going so far to murder the owner’s son.  When asked what should be done to men such as those, the Pharisees ironic answer was “He will put to those wretches to a miserable death and let out the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruits in their seasons” (Matthew 21:41).  Jesus’ telling response was that they (the Pharisees) had rejected God’s chief cornerstone and that “…the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits.” (Matthew 21:43).  Furthermore, Jesus pronounced seven woes against them in Matthew 23:13-36, using perhaps his harshest language recorded in the Gospels.  In this chilling passage Jesus referred to the Pharisees as hypocrites, children of hell, blind guides, blind fools, blind men, whitewashed tombs, serpents, and a brood of vipers.  He pronounces woes on them for trying to keep people out of God’s kingdom, attempting to make proselytes into children of hell, making foolish oaths, neglecting the “…weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness” (Matthew 23:23), being men concerned only with their outer appearance, concerning themselves with external righteousness while being internally dead men of lawlessness and hypocrisy, and hypocritically distancing themselves from the murder of God’s prophets.  Again, Jesus did not think highly of the Pharisees.  Their doctrines were hateful to Him.  Their supposed worship was a stink to His nostrils.  He hated their wickedness and their hypocrisy.  Yet, the Pharisees were the “big leaguers” of the Jewish religious climate.  They were the professionals.  If they said to jump, everybody asked how high.  They were the Righteous.  They were the ones close to God.  They were the ones who were in and doing God’s will.

The tax collectors, on the other hand, were a despised lot.  After Levi the Tax Collector was called by Jesus to be a disciple he invited Jesus and his fellow Tax Collectors (and other sinners) over to his house.  The scribes of the Pharisees took offense to this and asked why Jesus would do such a thing, to eat with such a dirty group of people.  Jesus’ beautiful answer is telling: “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.  I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Mark 2:17)  Tax Collectors were a sinful lot and they knew it.  They were in the employ of the Roman Empire but were Jews.  They were cheats, snitches and were despised by everybody.  They and everybody else knew that righteousness was impossible for them.  They were not well.  That Jesus would eat with them was a scandal of the highest order.  Such men were worse than the Romans.  Yet Jesus, because of His gracious love, came to save such men.  The Pharisees knew that they were righteous.  The Tax Collectors knew that they were not.    

The parables of Jesus were more than quaint stories.  They always had a purpose and always had a particular message and audience in mind.  Quite handily, Luke very kindly interpreted this parable by mentioning the audience and purpose of this passage.  In Luke 18:9 he states: “[Jesus] also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt”.  This parable was (and is) intended for men like the Pharisees, who thought themselves righteous and better than everybody around them.

In particular, the Pharisee of Jesus’ parable was a stellar example of perceived righteousness.  By his own loud, self-seeking, prayerful admission, he proclaimed his righteousness by thanking God for giving it to him.  “God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.  I fast twice a week, I give tithes of all I get.”  (Luke 18:11).  This was a man convinced of his standing before God and of his own inherent righteousness.  He was fair with his money (even though he loved it too much), he was just (even if it was by his own depraved standard of righteousness), he was faithful to his wife (even if he was able to find a myriad of reasons to justly divorce her) and he was nowhere near as wicked as the nearby Tax Collector.  Furthermore, this man did not just fast once a year or once a month or even once a week, he fasted two times during a week and he was sure to let everybody see how much his devotion cost him.  Even more impressively, he gave tithes of all he that he got, even if it meant that he did not have enough to respectively give to his parents in their need.  This Pharisee in Jesus’ parable was the standard of holiness and God-likeness.

The Tax Collector, on the other hand, agreed with the Pharisees assessment of him.  He knew that he did not have the righteousness of the Pharisee.  He knew that he was an extortioner, that he was unjust and that he was adulterous.  He was a tax collector after all.  This man knew that he was sick and in dire need of a physician.  It was all he could do to fall on his face and cry to God for the simple grace of underserved, unearned, unjust and completely necessary mercy.  This man was at his end.  He knew that there was nothing that he could do and nothing that he could offer to God to make God love him.  He quite simply had nothing to give and was ready to take anything and everything that God might give to him.  This man, Jesus says, went home justified, rather than the Pharisee.  This man repented of the sins that the Pharisee would never admit he had committed.  This man, completely unacceptable to God was accepted and went home justified and the Pharisee who by God’s grace kept all the law was found wanting and went home condemned.  In exalting himself the Pharisee was humbled to the point of condemnation.  In humbling himself and simply asking for mercy, the sinful Tax Collector was exalted and justified before God.

Sermon Poetry, 13 December 2009
Sermon Title – “Keeping the Unity of the Holy Spirit”
Sermon Text – Ephesians 4:1-7

In Christ we’ve life that comes from God
As men once blind we see
We’re called to love our Sovereign King
The One by whom we’re free
The sin within is raging fierce
The Spirit holding strong
Lord, give us strength to keep Your Word
Your worship be our song

In Christ we’re one, we’re unified
Once sinners all, we’re free
How do we love the ones of God?
How do we love our King?
We hate and lie, we cheat and steal
Despising Jesus’ own
Once enemies, now brothers all
We praise our Lord enthroned

We’re children of our Lord and King
Of every race and tongue
But now, in Christ, we all are His
In Christ the Church is one
We all were sinners foul and rank
Depravity was ours
But now in Christ we’re saved and cleansed
His mercy on us poured

We’re called to join with Jesus’ own
Submitting one to all
Forgiving fellows’ heinous sins
And asking love for ours
We’re bound to do the dirty work
Of loving fellow men
We’re called to build relationships
With those redeemed from sin

Lord please forgive us when we lose
The point of Jesus’ love
When pride and arrogance is strong
O’er others placed above
Lord humble us, Your mercy heal
In spirit make us poor
Relying on Your loving grace
To others place before

Your grace convict me to repent
And turn from all my sin
In self-control to love Your own
My family and my kin
You saved my soul, You made me live
You’ve loved me as Your son
In Christ my heart is born again
Redemption You have won

Sermon Title – “Thankfulness for the Great Power of God”
Sermon Text – Revelation 11:15-19
Preacher – Jarrett Downs

I’m saved by grace, through faith in Christ
A sinner, now a saint
A rebel once, in Christ a son
All thanks to God, I’m saved

Although I’m saved, this life gets dark
God’s Hand is heavy still
When I despair of life and love
I thank His gracious will

God’s promises are sure and good
He loves His rebel own
When we are beat by lords and kings
Our God is on His Throne

The Church is beat and raped and killed
But still she marshals on
She’s kept by God, sustained by Grace
And loved by Christ the Son

The rule of God is over all
In times of love and strife
The Spirit keeps the Saints of God
In Christ the dead have life

The Church is made of sinners all
Of every kind and tribe
All sinners we in Christ are free
And loved by Him on high

All thanks to God who saves by grace
Through faith in Christ the Son
The Spirit moves and keeps the Church
Whose freedom has been won


Sermon Poetry, 1 November 2009
Sermon Text – 2 Cor. 2:14-16

A fragrance of Jesus, a sweet smelling life
Lord, give me the mercy to be
A vessel to witness of Jesus’ great love
This mercy be showered on me

I’m planting the Gospel, I’m watering dirt
But haven’t the power to grow
The growing is given through Jesus’ shed blood
The Spirit enlivening stones

Although we aren’t many, Your mercy is large
You save how You will when You want
Lord, help us to trust You, though fearful we be
To suffer as Jesus above

Please keep us encouraged, to keep running on
To run further up, further in
Lord give perseverance, dear Father we pray
To stay in the race you have giv’n

Dear Father, this sinner is weak and is frail
With nary the strength to obey
Enable this sinner to love as I’m loved
The love of my Savior e’er sweet

Ecclesiastes 7:1-13

This is a passage written by a man who is tired.  This is a man who is tired of life.  This is a man who is tired of sin.  This is a man who is tired of the wickedness and the injustice of the world.  This is a man who has tried to be wise and tried to be good and tried to be just, but who has found out that it cannot be done.

Who can really blame this man for his despair?  Who hasn’t felt the pull of despair or the tickle of such dark cynicism?  Who hasn’t at times found it more comfortable to live in the house of sorrowful mourning rather than joyful feasting?  Who hasn’t at times wallowed in black thoughts and feelings?  Who hasn’t tried to keep God’s Law and failed?  Who hasn’t tried to be wise for wisdom’s sake alone?  Who hasn’t felt more comforted in sorrow than laughter?  Who doesn’t feel passionate frustration at the cruelty of the oppression of the weak?  Who hasn’t felt utter frustration at the laughter and tomfoolery of fools?

Still, even more depressing, we are more often than not the fools!  We laugh at our stupidity when we should mourn over our sin.  We oppress and we bribe.  We would rather hear the songs of fellow fools rather than feel the stinging rebukes of the wise and just.  We’re proud people with proud spirits and we don’t want to think about our own mortality nor consider or immorality.  We are impatient and selfish.  We are discontent with our own lives, always looking back into the past or selfishly looking into the future, hoping for what we alone want.  We dwell in the house of mirth, unaware of our foolishness and not caring.

Surely such a reality should drive us to madness!  What depression we should naturally feel when forced to see the blackness of our own hearts!  We try and try to be wise and be good and holy but we can’t, won’t and to try only drives us to despair.

Thanks be to God for Christ!  In Christ our hearts are made new and our sins are forgiven.  We are given hearts of flesh to replace those dead hearts of stone.  Although we still sin we know our sins are forgiven and covered by the blood of Christ.  We once wanted only to engage in our wickedness and now we desperately want to be like Jesus.  In Christ death is defeated!  We now are free to laugh and enjoy what God has given us!  We need not despair over our sin because Christ died for us!  We need not try to keep God’s Law to save ourselves because Christ kept it perfectly and in Him we are made righteous.  What love, what Grace, what Mercy!

Leviticus 14:1-32

At first glance, this passage in Leviticus 14 is simply a set of ceremonial rules to make a formerly leprous man ceremonially clean once again.  This passage is not giving rules for making a leprous man clean or verifying the leprous man had been cleansed (that was provided in the immediate context).  But, if a man had been cleansed, this passage lays out some rules to make him once again clean and acceptable to come back into the camp of God’s people.

This is more than just an emotionless, rote religious ceremony.  In the rules themselves we can see something of the holiness of God.  It is interesting that it is not enough for the leprous man to simply be made well, but that that man must also take the extra steps to be made clean.  It’s not enough to simply not be dirty or defiled, but to be even in the same camp as God a man must be truly clean and set apart

Yet, who can really do this?  If simply having leprosy was enough to defile you before God, what about the more vile and wicked things we do?  Do those not separate us from God even more?  After all, the man cleansed from leprosy had to take two birds, kill one, dip the live bird (along with hyssop, cedar and scarlet yarn) in the blood of the dead bird (over running water) and then sprinkle that blood and water mix over the man seven times (the number of completeness) in order for the man to come back into the camp.  Yet, that man was still not ready to enter his tent, as he had a bit of bathing and shaving and waiting to do and then he had to sacrifice a spotless lamb for a guilt offering and some grain for a grain offering and after all of that, then he could be cleansed!

Thank God for Christ!  In Christ we are cleansed!  We’re washed with HIS blood and clothed with HIS righteousness.  We no longer need the sacrifices of lambs and birds and grain to atone for our defilement.  Christ’s work on the Cross was greater than Namaan’s miraculous healing at the hand of Elijah or Christ’s healing of the Ten Lepers.  His sacrifice was complete and his body was broken and bruised.  Like the killed bird and the sacrificed lamb, Christ was slain so that we might be acceptable before God.  In Christ and Him alone we have access to the Father and we are always admitted into His body, the Church.  Christ’s work accomplished a spiritual cleansing; something much deeper than anything the Old Testament priest could provide. In Christ, that work of salvation has been completed and our sins are forgiven and Christ loves us and we are loved by the Father, no matter our sicknesses, foibles or sins.  In Christ even the poorest and nastiest and grossest of us can have forgiveness and admittance and access to the Father.  Thanks be to God!

This is a very clever, strange, creative and beautiful tribute to sticking it out.  All around, a wonderful video.

Stop Motion | The Long Haul from DUMAIS on Vimeo.

It moved from “I like” to “I love” to “I do” and “I will, for all time, ’till the end when we die”

In sickness and health is our promise to love one another as husband and wife

Now Lovers, once friends; now friends, ever lovers, from yellow to red is the path our love treads

My heart is now hers and her heart is now mine, for all time, ’till the end when we die

“If we act in a wrong spirit, we shall bring little glory to God, do little good to our fellow creatures, and procure neither honor nor comfort to ourselves. If you can be content with showing your wit, and gaining the laugh on your side, you have an easy task; but I hope you have a far nobler aim, and that, sensible of the solemn importance of gospel truths, and the compassion due to the souls of men, you would rather be a means of removing prejudices in a single instance, than obtain the empty applause of thousands. Go forth, therefore, in the name and strength of the Lord of hosts, speaking the truth in love; and may he give you a witness in many hearts that you are taught of God, and favored with the unction of his Holy Spirit.”

- John Newton

Sermon Poetry, 4 October 2009
Sermon Title – “A Review of the Advantages and Difficulties of the Christian Life from Ephesians”
Sermon Text – Ephesians 4:17-32
Preacher – Pastor Larry Vincent

Good God, I’m a sinner
I love myself more than my neighbors around
My love is for me more than the Father, my God
Lord, save me by slaying my heart

Sweet Jesus, I’m helpless
I haven’t the strength to obey your commands
Your Salvation can’t come from keeping Your Law
Lord, save me by Jesus Your Son

Holy Spirit, I’m failing
Without Your good work, I will not become holy
I can’t and I won’t grow by myself in this world
Lord, save me and bring me to glory

I’m a Husband, a Father, Employee and Churchman
I’m called to obey in the paths that I tread
Without Jesus’ love and His Grace I will falter
Lord help me to love and to live for Your Name

Lord, bring me repentance
To honor Your name
So I’ll be like Jesus
Your mercies proclaim