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<div><span style="font-size: small">Sermons for Advent 3</span><span style="font-size: small"> </span></div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Luke 3:7-18<span style="color: black"> – <strong>“</strong></span><b>The Divine Opportunity</b><strong><span style="color: black">”</span></strong></span></div>
<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Luke 3:7-18 --<span style="color: black"> <strong>“</strong></span><b>Your Life as a Provenance of the Jesus Story”</b><span style="color: black"> by Leonard Sweet</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small"><span style="color: black">Luke 3 <font size="4">- </font>the sermon title <b>“</b>The Divine Opportunity</span><b>”</b> </span>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Opportunity
comes with so many different faces that we often don't recognize it.
That's probably why we sometimes miss its call. A previous generation
said that opportunity comes dressed in overalls. And they were largely
right, for nothing succeeds like hard work. Our generation thinks that
opportunity comes with a college diploma. It may, but there's no
guarantee. <br>
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The divine opportunity comes in what is, to our human eyes, the most
unlikely garb of all. It's no wonder we don't recognize it; or that,
recognizing it, we resist it. This Advent season is an especially good
time to experience the divine opportunity. Any time is God's season; but
because you and I find certain settings and circumstances especially
hospitable to religious experience, Advent and Lent are particularly
attractive.<br>
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The first Advent preacher, John the Baptizer, offered opportunity in a
compelling, almost ferocious way. When you read his words, you don't
think he's offering opportunity; I expect that if we had heard him in
person, we would have been even more doubtful. William Barclay said that
John's message "was not good news; it was news of terror" (The Gospel
of Luke, Westminster John Knox Press, p. 28). I understand what
Professor Barclay was saying, but I see it differently. It seems to me
that good news must sometimes come dressed in rough clothing. <br>
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That was surely the nature of John's approach…</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small"><span style="color: black">Luke 3 <font size="4">-</font> the sermon titled <b>“</b></span><b>Turning Potholes into Mud Puddles on the Bethlehem Road</b><b><span style="color: black">”</span></b><span style="color: black"> by Leonard Sweet </span></span>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Did
you hear? NASA is already testing prototypes of space suits for the
first astronauts who will walk on the surface of Mars. Scientists are
hoping this event might happen around 2030. That means by the time all
the infants playing baby Jesus in this year’s bathrobe dramas known as
“Christmas pageants” are getting their driver’s permits! </span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Right
now the space suit design weighs about one hundred pounds and
completely encases whoever wears the suit within a separate, sealed
environment. The environment on Mars is so hostile that for any human to
survive on its surface for even a moment, they must be completely cut
off from everything the red planet has to offer. Those first voyagers to
Mars will also be completely cut off from each other. If their
communication equipment works they will be able to speak to each other.
But there will be no other form of connection between them. Every Mars
astronaut will be physically isolated in their own private environment.
They will each walk alone on the surface of Mars. </span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Of
course, there are plenty of people who don’t believe we will ever get
there. In fact there are plenty of people, and lots of news coverage,
suggesting that we won’t make it to next Friday. If you are putting off
paying your VISA bill just in case the Mayan calendar is right and the
end of time will occur on 21-12-2012, then you need to find your
checkbook and a stamp. </span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Thank God Christians are on the road to Bethlehem, not on a road to nowhere…</span></div>
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<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small"><span style="color: black">The rest of this sermon can be obtained by joining </span></span><span style="color: black"><a target="_blank" __removedlink__1309720156__href="http://mail.churchmail.com/lists/lt.php?id=Kk8BCwAGDQdUDUkNAgJKDAtXUVw%3D"><span style="font-size: small"><font color="#0000ff">http://www.sermons.com/signup</font></span></a></span><span style="font-size: small"><span style="color: black"> </span></span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">You Must Get Past John</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">William
Willimon, Chaplain at Duke University, says that John the Baptist
reminds us of boundaries we must respect and gates we must pass through.
At Duke, Willimon reminds the students, "If you are going to graduate,
you must first get past the English Department. If you are going to
practice law, you must pass the bar. If you want to get to medical
school you must survive Organic Chemistry." Likewise, "If you want to
get to the joy of Bethlehem in the presence of Jesus, you must get past
John the Baptist in the desert." The word from John is "repent," which
means "about-face" or turning 180 degrees.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Richard A. Wing, Deep Joy for a Shallow World, CSS Publishing Company</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Seeing God </span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">There
is a story going around about a man who wanted to see and hear God. So
he went out to a hilltop and yelled and pleaded with God. "Speak to me!"
And a bird sang. And disappointed he again begged God to speak to him
and all he heard was the sound of children playing in the distance.
"Please God, touch me!" he cried and the wind blew across his cheek. And
discouraged at not having his plea answered the man prayed, "God, show
yourself to me!" And a butterfly flew across his path. And when he got
home, convinced that God had forsaken him, his daughter ran out to greet
him, but he felt abandoned by God. </span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Now
hearing a story like this, it is easy to see God. But in this story
this man was as certain about what it means to see and hear God as we
are about the end of the stories we heard today. <br>
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Sally Sedgwick <br>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Time to Act</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">Once
the eminent philosopher John Dewey found his son in the bathroom. The
floor was flooded and he was mopping furiously trying to contain the
water in that room, keeping the damage to a minimum. The professor began
thinking, trying to understand the deeper ramifications of the
situation. After a few moments, the son said, "Dad, this is not the time
to philosophize. It is time to mop!" <br>
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Baptism is our statement that we are ready to stop philosophizing and
ready to start mopping. Zig Ziglar reminds us that the largest
locomotive in the world can be held in its tracks while standing still
simply by placing a single one-inch block of wood in front of each of
the eight drive wheels. The same locomotive moving at 100 miles per hour
can crash through a wall of steel reinforced concrete five feet thick,
but it must be moving first. </span></div>
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<div style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="font-size: small">King Duncan, Collected Sermons, </span><span style="font-size: 12pt"><a target="_blank" __removedlink__1309720156__href="http://mail.churchmail.com/lists/lt.php?id=Kk8BCwAGDQdUD0kNAgJKDAtXUVw%3D"><span style="font-size: small"><font color="#0000ff">www.sermons.com</font></span></a></span></div>
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