April 6, Communion Sunday

Lesson: Mark 12.28-29

Sermon Title: Questioned

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INTRODUCTION:

  1. Questions!

    1. Everyone has questions.

    2. Everyone has a right to know.

      1. This was an old slogan for a news providers.

      2. One was print and the other television.

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MAIN BODY

  1. For a number of years I offered the congregations the opportunity to "Ask Questions of the Minister."

    1. These were serious questions and important to the questioner.

    2. For instance:

      1. March 29, 1992

Would you preach a sermon on the fact that there are "so many" good people in this world and in this and other congregations of churches?

Most of the ministers preach on the evils of the world and how bad everybody is and that we're all going to hell and how corrupt we are.

The people in the Church, congregations are the ones that need the support and help and uplifting each Sunday.

Many people already "beat-up" on themselves and suffer from inferiority . What we all need is a "lift" and an up-beat message.

      1. October 27, 1996

Looking in the question box I discovered a note attached to a letter to the editor of the Mukwonago Chief concerning President Clinton's veto of the Partial Birth Abortion Bill. The note reads: "I think this has to be addressed in all churches in America. This cannot be ignored anymore. The people must know where the President stands on this issue." I doubt that many people do not know where the President stands on the issue.

Earlier this past week, in the mailbox was a letter dated October 28, 1996 which reads:

"Pastor Shultz, My program for October 27, 1996 shows, 'Questions of the Minister,' will be answered on the last Sunday of the month. The item in the Question Box was not a question. Maybe that's why it was missed. When you get aged the first thing to go is the mind (I think).

"The question is, Do you believe in partial birth abortion like the President does?"

"It is my hope that you find time next Sunday before the election to answer this. This is important."

      1. Another question dated October 26, 1996, was actually answered in November.

Questions of the Minister: "Dear Les, What is your opinion of what Dr. Kevorkian is doing and do you believe it is right or wrong for people to engage his services. Signed" (I would like this person to remain anonymous.)

      1. February 23, 1997

If you try and fail do not give up, the Lord will help you succeed. To rise to hope and love you must believe in the Lord. Be good to those who may not be good to you. You can only change the heart with warmth and love. When a person goes to heaven, what might be a way God provides their happiness if in fact they have had two spouses on earth? Do we communicate with those we knew on earth or only with God?

      1. August 30, 1998

"What's this all about--this thing called living... "What is God's purpose for mankind other than being a good steward to the creation?"

What is God's purpose?

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  1. Jesus was asked Questions of the Messiah.

    1. He was asked about the payment of taxes.

    2. He was asked about the resurrection.

    3. One of the most important questions that he was asked had to do with which of all the commandments was the greatest.

      1. It is good to ask questions of Jesus.

      2. He answered all the questions, though, perhaps, not in the way the questioner anticipated.

      3. The game show "Who Want to Be a Millionaire?" provides three lifelines to the contestant who does not know the answer to the question.

        1. Fifty-Fifty, take away half of the answers.

        2. Ask the Audience, perhaps the majority will be correct.

        3. Ask a Friend, you have 30 seconds to provide the question and the four answers to a friend who may or may not give you the right answer.

      4. Jesus is better than all these options.

      5. He knows the right answer and will share it with you.

  2. After the Pharisee's, the Herodians, and the Sadducees's were done, a lawyer, a scribe, stood up and asked Jesus a question.

    1. In itself the question is a worthy, and noble one.

      1. It was an inquiry becoming on the part of the scribe who urged it, and fit for the consideration and judgment of Jesus.

      2. It respected commandments, and thus recognized the rule of a just God, and the duty of man's obedience and compliance.

      3. It concerned morality-the highest of all human interests.

      4. It expressed an evident desire to do what was right, and to give precedence to what should be acknowledged best.

      5. There can be no nobler inquiry then this.

        1. What is the will of God?

        2. What is the duty of man?

        3. What shall I do?

      6. In its spirit and purport, the question was commendable.

    2. There was no hesitation in the Master's reply to the question proposed; the challenge was at once taken up.

      1. And divine wisdom was shown in the reference to the Mosaic Law, the very words of which were quoted.

      2. Those who understood were uplifted by·the revelation of truth.

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  1. The hostile were silenced; for who of the Jewish rabbis could call in question the authority of there own sacred books?

    1. Love is represented as the sum of the Divine commandments.

      1. The Pentateuch contained the commandments that Jesus repeated, but they were included in a vast body of information that they were hard to find.

        1. It could scarcely be said with justice that love was the most prominent of the Mosaic commandments.

        2. Christ's independence, discernment, and legislative authority were shown in his fixing upon the two requirements which occur in different books and in different connections, and in bringing them out into the light of day, and exhibiting them as in his view of surpassing importance, and so promoting them as the laws of his spiritual kingdom through all time.

    2. God himself is love!

      1. Christ is the expression and proof the Divine love; and it is therefore natural and reasonable that love should be the law of the Divine kingdom, the basic rule of the spiritual family.

      2. The Object of supreme love is God himself.

        1. The God is assumed.

        2. You cannot love an abstraction, a power; only a living being, who thinks, feels, and purposes.

      3. The unity of God is asserted.

        1. When Jesus lived on earth, the Jews were no longer subject to the temptation to idiolatry.

        2. Twice a day the faithful stood and prayed the Shemi.

          1. We will explore the unity of God in more detail next Sunday.

          2. This is important and vital for our understanding of God and love.

      4. The relationship between God and man is presumed--"your God;"·for he is ours and we are his.

      5. The claims of God are implied

        1. His character is established.

        2. His treatment of men and women is reinforced

        3. His redeeming love in Christ is revealed.

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CONCLUSION:

  1. Which commandment is the first of all?

    1. The first is "Hear O Israel, The Lord our God, the Lord is one.

    2. You shall love the Lord your God with all.

  2. We will explore the all in the sermons to come.

  3. In the meantime we accept God's love in the Eucharist and we declare our love for God through our receiving, eating the bread, and drinking from the cup.

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