SPECIAL DAYS: Passion/Palm Sunday

LESSONS: Philippians 2.5-11; Luke 19. 28-39

SERMON TITLE: Taking Sides

(Back to sermons for 2001)   (Back to sermons Home Page)     (Back to Shultz Home Page)


INTRODUCTION:

  1. Whose side are you on?
    1. Man in boat. (1)
      1. There is a famous Talmudic story about two men in a rowboat heading toward land.
      2. One man suddenly starts to bore a hole in the bottom of the craft.
      3. When challenged, he retorts angrily, "This is none of your business. I am boring the hole under my seat!
    2. Well-crafted resume (2)
      1. An applicant was being interviewed for a job.
      2. The employer held a glowing letter of reference and complimented the applicant on such an impressive letter.
      3. With modesty the reply came: "I'm glad you liked it. I wrote it my self."
    3. Approaching the dock. (3)
      1. Dr. William. A. Welch, a retired pastor in Bellevue, Washington, tells of a family sailing adventure.
      2. As they approached the dock, "The skipper (me, of course) called out to the deck hand (one of my sons), 'Release the jib sheet. We are coming about.'
      3. And the deck hand replied, 'Why?'
    4. It's your money, you should be able to do with it what you please.
    5. The latest Microsoft operating system is Windows Millennium, shortened to Windows Me.
  2. Do these illustrations communicate the underlying belief, theme of today's personal life in America?
    1. That's the kind of thing we are stuck with these days.
      1. Decide for yourself.
      2. Fulfill yourself.
      3. These are the motivations that cause our social solidarity to be broken.'
  3. It is not only the individual, can it be that it is also the church.
    1. Evangelist Tom Sine, in an interview with the Wittenberg Door (April/May 1982), describes how even the church reflects this overwhelming preoccupation with itself amid families fixing meals on dirty sidewalks, kids washing themselves in sewer water, refugees dying because of our disinterest. (4)

      (Top)    (Back to sermons for 2001)   (Back to sermons Home Page)     (Back to Shultz Home Page)

    2. "So much of our activity in the church does nothing more than serve ourselves.
      1. "He then goes on to quote African-American evangelist Tom Skinner, who says: "Let's quit kidding ourselves; we even tithe to ourselves."
      2. Sine then explains what he thinks Skinner means: "Everything we put into our churches we take back. We give to build more comfortable buildings, softer pews, nicer carpet, better air conditioning. We are not, as Bonhoeffer said, 'the church for others,' we are the church for ourselves."
    3. Does this appear lopsided or is it a way of taking sides?

MAIN BODY:

  1. We all take sides
    1. Political sides
      1. Political parties
      2. Political positions within the sides
        1. We are pro or con
        2. We are liberal or conservative
        3. We seek to influence the party in the direction that we believe it ought to go.
    2. Social Sides
      1. Abortion
        1. Rev. Phelps was recently in Madison with his card carrying supporters who had signs that proclaimed, "God hates Fags."
        2. A large number of pastors affix their signatures to an ad that appears in the Saturday Wisconsin State Journal opposing Rev. Phelps.
      2. Divorce
        1. Some believe that divorce is too easy and restrictions needed to be added to preserve marriages.
        2. There are those who believe that restrictions are the source of the phoniness that had to be created to end a marriage.
    3. Moral sides
      1. There are some people who believe that the Ten Commandments ought to be hung in public places and on classroom walls. That prayer and Bible reading should be used to start the public school day.

        (Top)    (Back to sermons for 2001)   (Back to sermons Home Page)     (Back to Shultz Home Page)

      2. Many are opposed to these steps because they do not want to be forced to listen to someone else's prayers and they do not hold to the teachings of the Ten Commandments.
    4. Athletic sides
      1. Which college or university did you attend.
      2. Which professional teams do you support.
  2. This is not something new but very old.
    1. It is Palm Sunday.
    2. We are familiar with the details of the story.
      1. Jesus is riding into Jerusalem.
      2. The Disciples are ecstatic
      3. The crowd is exuberant
      4. The Religious Leaders are desperately plotting.
  3. There are three sides to this equation (actually there are four).
    1. Whose side are you on?
    2. Do you have an opinion.
      1. You have heard of the old saying, "If you have two congregationalists, you have three opinions.."
      2. Well you are not on the side of the Religious leaders.
      3. What about the crowd.
        1. This exuberant group of people who are laying down their cloaks for Jesus to ride on.
        2. This happy band who are waving palm branches and shouting Hallelujah.
        3. This mob of people who will in a few hours cry out Crucify Him.
        4. You don't what to be on the crowd's side.
      4. Well what about the disciples?
        1. They have been with Jesus.
        2. They have heard him speak.
        3. They have observed and even participated in his miracles.
        4. In a few hours they will deny and desert him.
        5. Are you sure that you want to be a disciple?
    3. So what do we have left.
      1. Oh! We have the one riding on the donkey.
      2. He has also taken sides.
      3. He is on God's side.

        (Top)    (Back to sermons for 2001)   (Back to sermons Home Page)     (Back to Shultz Home Page)

      4. He is the only one in this whole marvelously played out scene who knows what is truly going on, where it will lead and how it is going to end.
  4. How do we get on the Lord's side?
    1. How do we really know which side we are on?
    2. We will take sides.
    3. There is no neutral ground.
    4. Jesus said in Matthew 12:25 through 32, (NRSVA)
      1. Jesus is countering accusations that he is casting out deamons by the power of Satan.


        2. 25He knew what they were thinking and said to them, "Every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and no city or house divided against itself will stand. 26If Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself; how then will his kingdom stand? 27If I cast out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your own exorcists cast them out? Therefore they will be your judges. 28But if it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come to you. 29Or how can one enter a strong man's house and plunder his property, without first tying up the strong man? Then indeed the house can be plundered. 30Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters. 31Therefore I tell you, people will be forgiven for every sin and blasphemy, but blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. 32Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.
         

      2. Whoever is not with me is against me.
      3. Whoever does not gather with me scatters.


        4. Attributed to Edmond Burke, one of the heros of the Revolutionary War is the phrase: "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men (and women) to do nothing."

        It bears out in the secular world what Jesus was teaching in the spiritual world.

      1. Whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit is in danger of committing an act that cannot be forgiven.
        1. It cannot not because it cannot but because the person who is so opposed to Christ will not ask.
        2. Or, that is will not ask unless circumstances make possible for the person to realize the need to ask and empower the cho8ice to do the asking.

          (Top)    (Back to sermons for 2001)   (Back to sermons Home Page)     (Back to Shultz Home Page)

  1. How do you know that you are on the Lord's Side.
    1. When you don't think and act like Pharisee's
    2. When you don't think and act like the crowd.
    3. When you don't think and act like the disciples in this episode.
    4. When you do think and act like the disciples after the resurrection.
    5. When you have the same mind as Christ Jesus.


      6. 5Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, 6who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, 7but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, 8he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death--even death on a cross.