Sermon: July 18, 2010

So here's a rough outline of my sermon from Sunday...okay a little more than an outline but here's the message...well what I remember of it.

Texts: Exodus 17:1-7 & John 7:37-39

-General Assembly Young Adult Advisory Delegate-What does that even mean?
-Expectations-Still don't know how this experience will impact my life
-What did I see?
-Opening Worship-Festival like, Baptism, Celebration
-Festival of Booths
-Rooted in Israels desert wanderings
-Our opening worship was rooted in our own wanderings as a denomination.
-Bruce's sermon-It's not about us...it's about God and what God is doing among us.
-Moses striking the rock
-We need to be more like Moses and less like the Israelites
-They quarreled amongst themselves and asked "Is the LORD among us or not?"
-Moses stopped, listened to God, followed God's directions, and was looking for God to be standing in front of the rock so that it could be struck and the people could drink.
-Each Sunday we gather
-We should look for God to be standing in front of a rock that needs to be struck
-We need to drink, so that from our hearts will flow rivers of living water
-Book of Order quote: Church's mission at the RISK of losing its life.
-GA Risk taking: YAAD's Plenergizing, Bow tie gang dancing, Commissioners sharing their struggles with one another, Inter-generational church listening to one another to better understand one another.
-The streams of living water from the 219th GA were "transplanted"
-Planes carried these streams to places all over the world
-BUT
-They all flow forth from the center, that is Jesus Christ is head of the church. THAT statement needs no amendments, no substitute motions, no perfecting, no questions of clarification.
-The streams of living water that flow from the believers heart WILL impact our neighborhoods, communities, and the world around us.


Somewhere in there was a quote from the Book of Order that included various readings from G.3.0200-G. 3.0401
Which reads as follows:
a. The Church is called to tell the good news of salvation by
the grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ as the only Savior
and Lord, proclaiming in Word and Sacrament that
(1) the new age has dawned.
(2) God who creates life, frees those in bondage, forgives
sin, reconciles brokenness, makes all things new, is still at
work in the world.
b. The Church is called to present the claims of Jesus Christ,
leading persons to repentance, acceptance of him as Savior and
Lord, and new life as his disciples.
c. The Church is called to be Christ’s faithful evangelist
(1) going into the world, making disciples of all nations,
baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son
and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all he has
commanded;
(2) demonstrating by the love of its members for one
another and by the quality of its common life the new
reality in Christ; sharing in worship, fellowship, and
nurture, practicing a deepened life of prayer and service
under the guidance of the Holy Spirit;
(3) participating in God’s activity in the world through its
life for others by
(a) healing and reconciling and binding up wounds,
(b) ministering to the needs of the poor, the sick, the
lonely, and the powerless,
(c) engaging in the struggle to free people from sin,
fear, oppression, hunger, and injustice,
(d) giving itself and its substance to the service of
those who suffer,
(e) sharing with Christ in the establishing of his just,
peaceable, and loving rule in the world.
The Church is called to undertake this mission even at the risk
of losing its life, trusting in God alone as the author and giver of
life, sharing the gospel, and doing those deeds in the world that
point beyond themselves to the new reality in Christ.
The Church is called
a. to a new openness to the presence of God in the Church
and in the world, to more fundamental obedience, and to a more
joyous celebration in worship and work;
b. to a new openness to its own membership, by affirming
itself as a community of diversity, becoming in fact as well as
in faith a community of women and men of all ages, races, and
conditions, and by providing for inclusiveness as a visible sign of
the new humanity;
c. to a new openness to the possibilities and perils of its
institutional forms in order to ensure the faithfulness and usefulness
of these forms to God’s activity in the world;
d. to a new openness to God’s continuing reformation of the
Church ecumenical, that it might be a more effective instrument of
mission in the world.