Download audio Download sermon John 1:1-14 Last Lord’s Day morning, from Romans 1:1-6 we considered the fact of the incarnation of God: that Jesus was God himself, now become a man for us and for our salvation. This morning I want to consider with you the nature of the incarnation, or, at least, what we […]
Lessons and Carols including portions of congregational singing on Christmas Day.
Download audio Download sermon Romans 1:1-6 It is time to turn away from Genesis 24 to subjects appropriate to the Advent season. The text I have chosen for this morning’s sermon is useful in particular for the artless way in which it speaks of the stupendous, world-shattering, human life-transforming thing that happened that first Christmas. […]
Download audio Download sermon Daniel 3:1-30 Chapter three is the self-contained narrative of a single episode in the life of the Hebrew exiles, though interestingly not of Daniel himself. Was he untouchable because of the favor that he had done for the king? No one can say. It happened, as the previous events, during the […]
Download audio Download sermon Genesis 24:10-28 We read last time of Abraham’s determination to get a wife for his son Isaac, a woman who was not a product of Canaanite culture but was spiritually fit to be the matriarch of the covenant people. He had not told his servant precisely how to find such […]
Download audio Deuteronomy 16:1-17
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Download audio Download sermon Daniel 2:31-49 Last time we read that Nebuchadnezzar had a disturbing dream and, desperate to know what it meant, had demanded that his advisors describe the dream and then provide an interpretation. Obviously he thought that a reliable interpretation could only be guaranteed if the omen-readers could tell him the content […]
Download audio Download sermon Genesis 24:1-9 After more than a year in the book of Acts we return this morning to the interrupted series of sermons on Genesis. We left the narrative as Abraham buried his wife Sarah in a burial plot he had purchased in the land of Canaan, an act of faith in […]
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Download audio Download sermon Daniel 2:1-30 The chapter before us – a single, self-contained narrative – is quite long, some 49 verses in our chapter 2. For that reason I’ve decided to take only a portion of the chapter this evening, vv. 1-30. The substance of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream we will leave until next time. The […]
Download audio Download sermon Acts 28:17-31 We come this morning to the end of the Book of Acts. If you are interested, this is the fifty-fourth sermon in the series. In some ways, of course, as we will see, the book ends in medias res. There is no ending in the sense that there is […]
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Download audio Download sermon Daniel 1:8-21 Last time we spoke of the opening paragraph of the book of Daniel as something of the thesis of the book: a book that describes the faithful people of God in the midst of a great trial that God himself had created for them. The Lord gave Jehoiakim into […]
Download audio Download sermon Acts 28:1-16 Paul and the 275 others on the ship had made their way safely to shore on what proved to be the island of Malta. Text Comment v.2 “Native people” is literally “barbarians,” a term which in that time probably meant simply someone who didn’t speak Greek, though it […]
Download audio Download sermon Daniel 1:1-7 The story of Daniel begins as the long story of Judah’s spiritual decline and rebellion against God draws to its close. The third year of Jehoiakim was not the end of Judah. The event being described in the first verses of chapter one was a preliminary incursion by the […]
Download audio Download sermon Acts 27:1-44 Paul had appealed his case to Caesar, as was his right as a Roman citizen. Festus, the new governor, unlike Felix, neither hoping for a bribe nor obliged to do the Jews a favor, sent him on to Rome for his case to be heard there. Text Comment v.1 […]
Download audio Outline Handout “None Other Lamb”
Download audio Download sermon Daniel 1:1-2 I have not preached through the book of Daniel since 1983, when very few of you were in the church and many of you were not yet in the world! It is time to consider this book together. The times have changed since 1983 and in a direction that […]
Download audio Download sermon Acts 26:1-32 Last week we considered the circumstances that provided an opportunity for Paul to make still one more defense of his life and conduct, this time before the governor, Festus, and one of Rome’s client kings, Herod Agrippa II, and his sister, Bernice. Now we hear the defense itself. Text […]
Download audio Philippians 1:3-11
Download audio Download sermon Acts 25:1-27 We left Paul last time in Caesarea where he had been incarcerated for the previous two years. At the end of the previous chapter we read that Felix, the Roman governor, had been replaced by Porcius Festus, whose responsibility Paul had now become. According to Josephus, Felix was recalled […]
Download audio Hymn “None Other Lamb” Notes Remarks Life is sung in different volumes. The mother’s lullaby is softer than the University Fight Song, the ballad than the National Anthem. And so it is with psalms and hymns. This obvious fact has been somewhat obscured in our day by the distorting effect of amplifiers, because […]
Download audio Psalm 119:97-104
Download audio Download sermon Acts 24:1-27 Paul has been taken from Jerusalem to Caesarea for his own safety and for the adjudication of charges made against him by the Jewish leadership in Jerusalem. Text Comment v.2 Isn’t it amazing how similar that world was to ours today? The Jews came to present their charges, but […]
Song of Songs Case SS Class Part 12
Download audio Download sermon Psalm 4 Text Comment v.2 Now comes the complaint, the account of the problem. Some scholars have taken the problem to be a continuation of that faced in Psalm 3, viz. the rebellion of Absalom and the civil war that resulted, and take the actual statements of the psalm as simply […]
Download audio Download sermon Acts 23:11-35 Paul has been placed under guard by the Roman authorities in Jerusalem. Remember, Jerusalem was not the capital of the Roman province of Judea. That was Caesarea, a new and beautiful city built by King Herod the Great on the Mediterranean Coast, where Paul was soon to be taken. […]
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Download audio Pastor Rayburn interviews Gregory Wilbur who is Chief Musician of Cornerstone Presbyterian Church, Franklin, Tennessee, and the Dean of New College Franklin as well as a senior teaching fellow. For over a decade he has taught the arts (music, drama, art history, and aesthetics) as well as literature and rhetoric. As a composer, he has […]
Download audio Luke 2:41-52
Download audio Download sermon Acts 22:2-23:11 To be frank, I’m not entirely sure what Luke would say if I were able to ask him why he included the narrative we are about to read. It is interesting, to be sure, and it carries the story along – explaining how it was that Paul was taken […]
Download audio “Hail, Gladdening Light” “Man of Sorrows” Notes Remarks We have encouraged you to sing four-part harmony and to learn how to do so if you are not yet able to sing the alto, tenor, or bass line. We said last time that there are good reasons for a Christian congregation to sing in […]
Download audio Download text Some time ago one of you, reflecting on this series of sermons on the doubts that rise in Christian minds, mentioned to me that he thought a great source of doubt was the fact that, in many modern minds, the church maintains positions that have been discredited in the culture. He […]
Download audio Download text Acts 21:37-22:22 As we left Paul last time, he had been beaten by a Jewish mob in the Temple’s outer court and then put in protective custody by the Roman tribune. Text Comment v.38 Greek was the language of Egypt at this time, so the question that begins v. 38 might […]
Download audio Download text So far in this series we have considered among the causes of Christian doubt, of a shaken faith, either teachings of the Christian faith that cause concern or offense – the doctrine of hell, for example – or facts of life that we struggle to reconcile with our Christian convictions – […]
Download audio Download text Acts 21:27-36 I suspect there are a few of you who recognize my sermon title but are trying hard to remember where you have seen or heard that phrase before. Well keep at it for another week or two and I’m sure it will come to you. Paul is now in […]
Song of Songs Case SS Class Part 11
Download audio Hymn “Man of Sorrows” Notes Remarks After a false start some months ago, we are beginning our lessons in congregational singing, this time with a more complete plan in place. We hope to continue most, if not every Lord’s Day evenings in which we do not observe the Lord’s Supper. The point […]
Download Text WIC Kick-Off Dinner Remarks Dawn Darby September 15, 2016 Why the Theme, Sisters in Christ? This year the WIC Council wanted to highlight the theme, Sisters in Christ. Why did we choose that theme? Because women need friendships with other women and as Christians, we are not just friends, we are sisters. […]
Download audio Download text We have recently considered, as another source of Christian doubt, that is, another reason why the faith of even devout believers is sometimes shaken, either the suffering that Christians themselves must endure – sometimes almost unbearable suffering, sometimes literally unbearable in the case of suicides – or the suffering they observe […]
Download audio Download text Acts 21:16-26 Chapter 20 and the first part of chapter 21 told the story of Paul’s trip from Greece to Jerusalem, partly by land, mostly by sea. Now he has arrived. Luke is about to tell us what happened when he and his Gentile converts, the representatives of his Gentile churches, […]
Song of Songs Case SS Class Part 10
Download audio Download text “Fathers and Mothers in the Faith” 2 Corinthians 6:1-13 – September 4, 2016 Pastor Nicoletti Faith Presbyterian Church – Evening Service I’ll be continuing my occasional series on 2 Corinthians this evening. To refresh our memory a little bit, Paul has been dealing with several themes in this letter. One of […]
Song of Songs Case SS Class Part 9
Download audio Download text Acts 21:1-16 Remember, Paul is en route to Jerusalem in the company of a number of representatives of his Gentile congregations who are bringing with them a substantial sum of money for the relief of the poorer members of the church. He planned his itinerary so as to reach Jerusalem before […]
Download audio Download text Last week we began our consideration of the challenge to the Christian faith posed by the suffering that we find in this world, both its universality and its intensity. Would a good God, such as Christians confess, allow so much misery in a world he controls? Would he permit so many […]
Download audio Download text Acts 20:13-38 Paul was en route to Jerusalem, needing to reach the capital by Pentecost. As Luke tells us in v. 16, he was in a hurry. But, having left Ephesus some months before, he was anxious to have a final word with the leadership of the church there. Text Comment […]
Download audio Download text The world is full of woe. Who can deny it? The Christian life is full of woe. Who can deny it? The Bible certainly does not. When Job’s friend Eliphaz observes that “man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upwards” (5:7) or when Job himself remarks “Man who is born […]