Sunday sermons

I am emotionally coming down from Sunday. There was a lot of excitement. I think the service at the retirement home went well. DS and DW were wonderful to work with. DS did great at leading worship. DW opened and closed with prayer. She also stepped up to give a different example during my message. I do have trouble calling it a sermon. FWIW my sermon was based on Matthew 11:29-30 and Psalm 131. It was very personal.

Both sermons I heard had something to do with John 17, the High Priestly Prayer of Jesus. It is a bit like the words used at communion to prepare us for the meal. Jesus is acting as a representative before God in our behave, what a priest does at a sacrifice. That is what communion commemorates, a sacrifice.

MP spoke in the morning and used the first part of chapter 17. His point, as clear as I can remember, was that we will have persecution. We are to persevere. Without looking at my notes, that is what I remember. Now that I think about it I think I have it all wrong.

The evening sermon including the final part of John 17 in the lectionary readings. But RC spoke mainly on Revelation 22. For the third time he asserted that Revelation was written to warn the Christians about the impending destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem itself. Jerusalem and all the inhabitants with put to the sword in 70 AD. It is said that many Christians knew to get out beforehand and were thus saved from the slaughter.

Anyway RC was interested in the penalty sections of Revelation 22 which are passed over in the usual appointed readings.

verses like: Revelation 22:15 (ESV) Outside are the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.

and like: Revelation 22:18-19 (ESV) I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, (19) and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.

These verses, especially the last two are pretty unsettling. One does wonder who John thought he must ad this strong curse.

Perhaps it was because he felt it so important that believers take this vision seriously and get out before the great judgment that God is about to take on the people of Jerusalem and the Jews in general.

RC read a little from Foxes Book of Martyrs specifically about how tradition tells us some of the disciples died.

Most know that John was banished to Patmos. But it is reported he finally left there and finally died of old age in Ephesus. But Foxe says that before he was banished he was boiled in oil which did not hurt him. So they banished him as an alternative.

RC mentioned that the famous seven cities of Asia Minor that he addressed specifically were places where he established the first churches.

We had a substitute leader in the evening choir since J&J F went to the graduation of a grandchild. That is a good reason to be gone. It went without a hitch. I got there late, as did several others I found out later, since I was the last to arrive. It was a great service for me to participate in.

Often when we practice a tricky musical passage I end up not remembering what was corrected in the service. But for once I actually did remember, praise the LORD.