Our church is currently going through the 10 Statements of Faith (Doctrines) that our church holds to. Today's sermon, which I gratefully managed to make today although I seemed to have had a relapse yesterday of the stomach bug....
Today's sermon was just powerful. It was on "Christ's work on the Cross" (the doctrine of salvation). Last week's sermon on Christ--fully man and fully God, apparently led to the salvation of six or seven people. I would not be surprised to find out that today's had similar results because it was moving to me as a believer for the last....22 years (whoa!) Pastor Jason used the analogy of moving a heavy rock up a hill only for it to tumble back down and we humans never being able to push it over the top of the hill. (He referred to the Greek legend of Sisyphus I think it was). As he talked about Christ bearing our own rocks of guilt and sin at the cross, it struck me just how much we must believe that is is fully God to not be crushed by the magnitude of all of our rocks that we throw at him by calling on Him as our Savior. But I was also struck by the sheer pain of having been one, by sinning, to throw that sin at Him.
Pastor Jason also shared a powerful statement about how Christ's Sacrifice and Forgiveness was the only way for any us to be saved, even for people like Ted Bundy who professed Christ as his Savior--and that would make him one of the family of God. We are all sinners--all lawbreakers no matter how "great" or "small" the sin, Christ paid for it all. This also reminds me of the moving witness of faith and forgiveness of the Amish people affected by the schoolhouse murder a few years ago. God in Us can forgive even the most painful of sins because he forgave us for all the hurts we have caused others.
Again, if you'd like the link to the audio file of the sermon, please let me know.
Posted by Anna at February 22, 2009 08:55 PM | TrackBack