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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">The Triumph of Jesus </span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">In
1896, after fifteen centuries, Athens renewed the Olympic games, thus
fulfilling the dream of Baron Pierre de Coubertin of France. You can
imagine how proud the Greeks were to host the first modern Olympics. You
can also imagine how disappointed they were at their athletes' lack of
success in event after event.<br>
<br>
The last competition was the marathon. Greece's entrant was named Louis,
a shepherd without competitive background. He'd trained alone in the
hills near his flock. When the race started, Louis was far back in the
pack of marathoners. But as the miles passed he moved up steadily. One
by one the leaders began to falter. The Frenchman fell in agony. The
hero from the United States had to quit the race. Soon, word reached the
stadium that a lone runner was approaching the arena, and the emblem of
Greece was on his chest! As the excitement grew, Prince George of
Greece hurried to the stadium entrance where he met Louis and ran with
him to the finish line.<br>
<br>
In this sports tale we have something of the history of the human race.
Most historical figures make their impact, achieve a measure of fame,
books are written about them, but as the years go by they begin to fade.
Less and less is written or spoken of their lives until they rest in
relative obscurity.<br>
<br>
With Jesus Christ, however, one finds quite an opposite phenomena!
Christ started from way back in the pack. He was born in relative
obscurity, never had many followers, commanded no army, erected no
edifices, wrote no books. He died young, was buried in a borrowed grave,
and you'd think he'd be quickly forgotten.<br>
<br>
But, no! His reputation has grown so that today he is worshiped on every
continent, has more followers than ever before, sixteen times has his
picture been on the cover of Time magazine, and his sayings have been
translated into more than 200 languages.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Stephen
M. Crotts / George L. Murphy, Sermons For Sundays: After Pentecost
(Middle Third): The Incomparable Christ, CSS Publishing Company, Inc. </span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="layout-grid-mode: line; font-size: 12pt">Call Him God</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="layout-grid-mode: line; font-size: 12pt">In his book <u>Mere Christianity</u>, C.S. Lewis addressed the inclination to say nice things about Jesus, but to stop short of calling him God.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="layout-grid-mode: line; font-size: 12pt">He
wrote, “I am here trying to prevent anyone saying the really foolish
thing that people often say about Him: “I’m ready to accept Jesus as a
great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God.” That is
the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the
sort of things that Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He
would either be a lunatic—on a level with a man who says he is a poached
egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice.
Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or
something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and
kill him as a demon; or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and
God. But let us not come with any of that patronizing nonsense about his
being a great human teacher. He has not left that open t
o us.
Nor did he intend to.” </span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="layout-grid-mode: line; font-size: 12pt">C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, MacMillan, 1943, p. 55-56, with thanks to Paul Janke</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Public Notions of Jesus' Identity</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Some,
said Peter, say that you are Elijah. Now why would people think that
Jesus was the long deceased prophet Elijah. Elijah was, of course, a
highly revered personality in the religious life of the Hebrews. His
defeat of the 450 prophets of Baal on the top of Mt. Carmel was a story
that was known even by the little children. It was a commonly held
belief among the Hebrews that one day Elijah would return and that would
mark the end of the world. In the very last passage in the Old
Testament, in the Book of Malachi, we find these words: "Behold I will
send you Elijah the prophet before that great and dreadful day of the
Lord comes."</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Most
of you have read Charles Schultz's comic strip Peanuts. One day we see
that the television is on but there is no one in the room listening to
it. The announcer is talking about a golf tournament that is in process.
He says: Smith has to make this putt to win the championship. There
will be no tomorrow." And just as he says, "There will be no tomorrow,"
in walks Lucy. She immediately goes into a panic and starts running
around and yelling to the other children: The world is coming to an end.
They just announced it on television. Her panic quickly spreads as we
see all the peanuts kids as they go wildly screaming about. Finally in
the last square we see all of the children huddled on top of Snoopy's
doghouse waiting for the end of the world. And Charlie Brown finally
speaks up with a puzzled voice: I thought that Elijah was supposed to
come back first."</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Well
Charlie Brown knew his Bible. Elijah was supposed to come back before
the end time. When the disciples told Jesus that some people thought he
was Elijah, they were expressing a common thought among the people that
the end was very near.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Staff, <a target="_blank" href="http://mail.churchmail.com/lists/lt.php?id=Kk8FAwUCCQZRRAMDB0sDAABWWg%3D%3D"><span style="color: purple">www.eSermons.com</span></a> </span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">_______________________</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">A Point of Reference</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">The
state highway department in Pennsylvania once set out to build a bridge
working from both sides. When the workers reached the middle of the
waterway, they found they were thirteen feet to one side of each other.
Albert Steinberg, writing some time ago in the Saturday Evening Post,
went on to explain that each crew of workmen had used its own reference
point. No wonder they did not connect.<br>
<br>
In that same article Steinberg tells about a small disc on the Meades
Ranch in north central Kansas where the thirty-ninth parallel from the
Atlantic to the Pacific crosses the ninety-eighth meridian running from
Canada to the Rio Grande. The National Oceanic Survey, a small federal
agency whose business it is to locate the exact positions of every point
in the United States, uses the scientifically recognized reference
point on the Meades Ranch. So far, no mistakes have been made, and none
are expected. All ocean liners and commercial planes come under the
survey. The government can build no dams or even launch a missile
without this agency to tell it the exact location to the very inch.
"Location by approximation," the article goes on to say, "can be costly
and dangerous." <br>
<br>
That's why there is so much chaos in our society today. Everyone's using
their own reference point. What we need is a universal reference point
so that we can say, "Here. Here is how the good life is lived."<br>
<br>
For Christians there is such a reference point - and that is Jesus. What
would Jesus do? That is the question that continually helps us in our
quest for right living. Jesus not only revealed the character of God but
he also patterned the ideal life for humanity.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">King Duncan, Collected Sermons, <a href="http://www.sermons.com/" target="_blank">www.Sermons.com</a></span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">________________________</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">One Generation Away from Extinction</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">It
has been pointed out that the Church is always one generation from
extinction. If we don't spread the Gospel, it will be just one
generation away from disappearing from the face of the earth. It's a
compelling idea, isn't it? It enhances our sense of Christian
responsibility. We need to get out there and work for the Gospel or the
Church could fade into history.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Perhaps
you have heard the old story about Jesus appearing in heaven just after
his resurrection. Jesus is giving a progress report on all that has
happened while he was on earth. Moses is there and he asks him, "Well
Jesus, did you leave things in capable hands?"</span></div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"> </div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Jesus responds, "I did. I have left behind Mary and Martha and Peter and the other disciples."</span></div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"> </div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Moses said, "What if they fail?"</span></div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"> </div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Jesus said, "Well, I have established the Church and filled it with the Holy Spirit and they will carry on."</span></div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"> </div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">And Moses said, "What if they fail?"</span></div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"> </div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Came the reply, "I have no other plan."</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">There's
a great tension there. God is at work here in our church but we've been
given the keys of the Kingdom. We have work to do and Christ calls us
to it. The prophet Micah put it this way: "do justice, love mercy and
walk humbly with thy God."</span></div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"> </div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Brett Blair, <a target="_blank" href="http://mail.churchmail.com/lists/lt.php?id=Kk8FAwUCCQZRRAMDB0sDAABWWg%3D%3D"><span style="color: purple">www.eSermons.com</span></a> </span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">________________________________</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">People See Things Differently</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">People
see things differently all the time. For example, three people – a
minister, an archaeologist, and a cowboy – were getting their first look
at the Grand Canyon one day. The minister exclaimed, "Truly this is one
of the glories of God!" The archaeologist commented, "What a wonder of
nature this is!" And the cowboy said, "Can you imagine trying to find a
lost steer in there?" People see things differently.<br>
<br>
The Messianic hope of those in the Jewish community who held such a
belief was that the Chosen One would reestablish the supremacy of Israel
among the great nations of the world. The assumption was that this
would be accomplished in a violent and vengeful manner, with the
forceful overthrow and total destruction of the current ruling powers.
But before this happened, the prophet Elijah would return to herald the
coming of the Chosen One. As a result of these hopes, Jesus had to
somehow communicate to his disciples and others who had such high hopes
for him that what he was offering was something completely different
from what they expected.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Johnny Dean, The Pop Quiz, <a href="http://www.esermons.com/" target="_blank">www.esermons.com</a></span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">_________________________________</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Authority</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">What
did Jesus mean by "the keys of the kingdom?" The day in which Jesus
spoke there were religious teachers known as scribes. These scribes were
the teachers of the bible. The scribe wore around his waist a belt and
on that belt hung some keys which were symbolic of the knowledge of that
scribe.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Jesus
said, “I am going to give you keys that will unlock heaven and will
lock up the powers of hell and bind the devil and loose the power of
God." What are those keys that Jesus gave to Simon Peter and what are
those keys he has given to you. The keys of the kingdom are the glorious
Gospel of Jesus Christ.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Adrian Rogers, Sermon on Matthew 16:13</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">Our Greatest Need</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 10pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">If
our greatest need had been information, God would have sent us an
educator; If our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent
us a scientist; If our greatest need had been money, God would have sent
us an economist…</span></div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: 12pt">The conclusion to this list and for many additional illustrations and sermons for Proper 16 can be accessed at <a target="_blank" href="http://mail.churchmail.com/lists/lt.php?id=Kk8FAwUCCQZTRAMDB0sDAABWWg%3D%3D">www.Sermons.com</a>.</span></div>
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