Additional Thoughts on Our Theological Vision – Core Values: Infant Faith (Rayburn)
Pastor Nicoletti has been preaching each morning on Faith Presbyterian Church’s Theological Vision and has followed those morning sermons with an evening sermon expressing further thoughts on the morning’s theme. […]
Our Theological Vision – Core Values: Deep Exposition of the Holy Scriptures
“Our Theological Vision: Core Values: Deep Exposition of the Holy Scriptures” 2 Peter 1:19-21, Luke 24:13-32, 1 Corinthians 10:1-15 March 13, 2022 Faith Presbyterian Church – Morning Service Pastor Nicoletti […]
Infant Faith, Luke 1:39-45
Pastor Rayburn preaches on the doctrine that covenant children can be believers from the womb. CCLI Copyright License 751114; CCLI Streaming License CSPL116892
The People of the Nativity, Luke 2:1-20
“The People of the Nativity” Luke 2:1-20 December 16, 2018 The Rev. Dr. Robert S. Rayburn I could have chosen any number of paragraphs in Luke 1 and 2 or […]
A Time for Angels, Luke 1:5-10
“A Time for Angels” Luke 1:5-20 December 9, 2018 The Rev. Dr. Robert S. Rayburn This morning we turn from the Psalms to the Gospel narratives of the birth of […]
The Substitution, Luke 23:13-25
Text Comment
v.13
You’ll notice that Pilate also called “the people” together, how he did so and how many we are not told. He knew how bitterly the clerics hated Jesus but perhaps the general population would be more kindly disposed. …
Ordinary People Behaving Very Badly, Luke 22:63-23:12
We left Jesus in the hands of those who had arrested him in the Garden of Gethsemane and who then took him to the house of the high priest. Luke then interrupted his account of the Lord’s interrogation to recount Peter’s betrayal. We r…
Peter’s Fall, Luke 22:54-62
We left Peter, no doubt chastened by the Lord’s having rejected his violent act, cutting off the ear of the servant of the high priest with his sword as he had, though Luke does not mention that that act had been performed by Peter. But when…
Judas and His Crowd, Luke 22:47-53
Text Comment
v.47
In other words, this happened immediately upon the Lord’s return to his disciples who had been asleep in the olive grove and the arrival of Judas and the others interrupted the conversation he was having with th…
Gethsemane, Luke 22:39-46
After a month’s hiatus we return to the Gospel of Luke, taking up where we left off, with the Lord in the Upper Room, having spent the evening with his disciples over a Passover meal.
Text Comment
v.39
Luke says only that wh…
A Different Life, Luke 22:24-38
In the Gospel of John we learn that the hours the Lord spent with his disciples in the Upper Room that Passover night were crowded with interactions and conversations of various kinds, including his washing the disciples’ feet and his long d…
The Lord’s Supper, Luke 22:1-23
The Lord’s public teaching was now concluded. With chapter 22 Luke begins the account of the Lord’s passion. That account begins in the Gospels, as you know, with the hours the Lord spent with his disciples over the Passover meal. It w…
I Dreamed a Dream, Luke 21:5-38
I’m going to depart this morning from my ordinary practice of commenting on the text as I read it. It is a longer text, as you see, and so loaded with material that begs for comment it would be difficult to get through it and still have time…
Motives, Luke 20:45-21:4
We have before us this morning two short paragraphs which together disclose a fundamental principle of both biblical anthropology (that is, its teaching about human beings) and biblical ethics (that is, its teaching of the moral standards that gove…
Answering Life’s Questions, Luke 20:19-44
Remember, we are now in the Passion Week, in the first half of that week. Each day the Lord would come into the city from Bethany, where he had spent the night at the home of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. Each morning he would arrive in the temple an…
Jesus and His Adversaries, Luke 20:1-19
Text Comment
v.1
“Preaching the gospel” is an arresting description of the content of the Lord’s sermons in Jerusalem. More on that later.
This group that came to question him was a delegation, perhaps an official …
Triumph and Tragedy, Luke 19:28-48
Technically, Luke does not tell of the Lord’s entry into Jerusalem, only what happened as he drew near to the city, but as the end of the chapter makes clear, he did enter the city, so the editors are not incorrect to entitle this paragrap…
Did Jesus Really Say That?, Luke 19:11-27
It is wonderful reading through the gospels. They are works of pure genius. There were a great many miracles that our Savior performed and they might have been related to us one after another after another so that even an account of the miraculous he…
Conversion, Luke 19:1-10
Text Comment
v.1
Apparently Jesus had not intended to stay in Jericho, he was passing through. Events would change his plans! A remark like this reminds us how completely the Lord lived a human life. As with any man, events altered hi…
Faith at Work, Luke 18:31-43
It has been some weeks since we were last in the Gospel of Luke, so let me remind you where we are. The days of the public ministry are near an end. The Lord has spent some months traveling through Perea, east of the Jordan, and though Samaria, no…
Ride Your Tiger, Luke 18:18-30
We’ve come in the Gospel of Luke to the eighteenth chapter and the paragraph that begins with v. 18, “The Rich Ruler” or, as Matthew tells us, “The Rich Young Ruler.”
As so frequently in the Bible, the author gives…
The Lord and Our Children, Luke 18:15-17
As you may remember, since Luke 9:51 we have been in a section of the Gospel of Luke in which most of the material — both historical narrative and teaching — is without parallel in the Gospels of Mark and Matthew. Assuming Mark to have been the …
Understanding the Problem, Luke 18:9-14
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Don’t Give Up, Luke 18:1-8
The editors of the ESV entitle this paragraph “The Parable of the Persistent Widow.” You may remember that it was always called in ages past “The Parable of the Importunate Widow.” But “importunate” has fallen ou…
The Coming of the Kingdom of God, Luke 17:20-37
All the Jews of that time, readers of the Bible as they were and believers in biblical prophecy as they were, expected at some point what the prophets called “The Day of the Lord.” Like their ancestors, they tended to indulge the illus…
What Believers Do, Luke 17:11-19
It is sometimes possible to follow Luke’s thinking in the arrangement of his material and perhaps that is possible here. The recognition that it is impossible for us to put God in our debt — the subject of the previous verses — leads natur…
What a Life!, Luke 17:1-10
What we are about to read is a collection of pieces of the Lord’s teaching that in three of the four instances are found in the other Gospels, though in different settings. The last piece, the parable of the “unworthy servant,” i…
The Great Reversal, Luke 16:19-31
We have before us this morning another of those most memorable of the Lord’s parables that are found only in the Gospel of Luke. One such is the parable of the Good Samaritan, another the parable of the Prodigal Son, and today the Parable of…
Strong Words, Luke 16:14-18
Tucked between two more memorable and intriguing pieces of the Lord’s teaching — the parable of the dishonest manager and the parable of the rich man and Lazarus — we have these few verses that record teaching that, in largest part, is fou…
Did He Really Say That?, Luke 16:1-13
This parable, among all of the Lord’s parables, is widely thought to be the most difficult to interpret. There are too many questions without absolutely certain answers. The largest problem of interpretation is created in v. 8 by what s…
A Picture Worth a Thousand Words [No Audio], Luke 15:11-32
The chapter began with two short parables: the lost sheep and the lost coin. We come now to the third parable in this set, the parable of the lost son. However your ESV editors didn’t dare call it that because it has been beloved throughout …
Ex Hypothesi, Luke 15:1-10
Luke chapter 15, one of the best known and best loved chapters of the Bible, having left its mark on Christian art and Christian hymnody, is composed of three parables, all devoted to the same general theme. Two of them are short and they are foll…
Reasons Not to Be a Christian, Luke 14:25-35
Once again this morning we find ourselves considering teaching that bears on the great themes that have occupied us for a number of weeks. In the previous paragraphs the Lord has spoken of bringing not peace but a sword, that he would be the cause…
The Great Banquet, Luke 14:7-24
We are still at the banquet to which Jesus had been invited by a prominent Pharisee on a Sabbath day. They were setting a trap for him and hoped to catch him in something he said. But they got for their pains memorable table-talk such as they ha…
The Lord’s Sabbaths, Luke 14:1-6
While you are turning up Luke 14:1-6 I’ll mention that Mr. and Mrs. Bechtel are in Salem, Oregon today to be with Chris and Jackie in expectation of a baby to be born to them relatively soon. As a result we have been listening to the piano r…
The Scandal of our Faith, Luke 13:10-35
We are taking a bit longer reading this morning, four paragraphs, but though devoted to different subjects, they combine to make a point.
Text Comment
v.13 Notice that the woman glorified God. She may not have under…
Premonition of Doom, Luke 12:54-13:9
In our reading this morning, we are continuing the theme of some of the other specimens of the Lord’s teaching that make up this section of the Gospel. We have heard the Lord warn his hearers that those who refuse to acknowledge him before m…
Not Peace but a Sword, Luke 12:49-53
We are still in a section of the gospel devoted to specimens of the Lord’s teaching. The Lord came to bring peace, but some things are more important than peace, or better, sometimes division and conflict are necessary finally to obtain true…
How Much Longer?, Luke 12:35-48
We are in a section of Luke’s Gospel devoted to the Lord’s teaching and among the various pieces of that teaching are several that have cast our attention forward to either the end of life or the end of history. We have called this &ld…
Consider the Lillies, Luke 12:22-34
The paragraph we have before us this morning continues the thought of the parable of the rich fool. That will be obvious to you as we read, but Luke leaves us in no doubt by his use of the word “treasure” both in v. 21, in the concludi…
Sub Specie Aeternitatis, Luke 12:13-21
This is material in the gospel arranged according to a theme. The Lord may have delivered this teaching at different times, but Luke has collected them here. You will be able to see very quickly next Lord’s Day how the next paragraph follows…
Gospel Contradictions, Luke 12:1-12
We’ve come in our sermons on the Gospel of Luke to chapter 12 and the first three short paragraphs of that chapter, vv. 1-12. The Lord has just completed a series of addresses against the Pharisees and these three paragraphs seem to continue…
What Went Wrong?, Luke 11:37-54
Text Comment
v.38 The translation provided in the ESV is a perfectly fine example of a contextual rendering: “he did not first wash before dinner.” Perhaps “lunch” would be better than “dinn…
Too Late, Luke 11:27-36
We have before us a text that you basically never hear preached unless the minister you are listening to happens to preach through entire passages or books of the Bible. This is not a text that ministers themselves find particularly easy to preach…
Jesus on Jesus, Luke 11:14-26
All the Gospels record that demon possession could have a variety of physical and psychological effects. We have discussed the phenomenon of demon possession and the Lord’s power over demons already in this series of sermons because we hav…
How to Pray, Luke 11:1-13
In this section of Luke, full of material that we do not find in the other two synoptic Gospels, Matthew and Mark, we find this teaching about prayer that Matthew includes in his body of the Lord’s teaching (Matthew 5,6 and 7) that we know …
First Things First, Luke 10:38-42
Once again, as is the case with most of this material in these chapters of Luke, we have an incident not recorded in the other Gospels though it concerns people mentioned in the Gospel of John. There is a question as to why it is located where it …
The Good Samaritan, Luke 10:25-37
Remember, we are near the beginning of a long section of the Gospel of Luke, often referred to in biblical scholarship as Luke’s “great interpolation,” that mostly contains material that is not found in the other Gospels. Assumin…
The Time of the Lord’s Favor, Luke 10:1-24
We’ve come to Luke 10 and will read the first twenty-four verses. We are in that section in the Gospel of Luke that contains material not found in Matthew and Mark, the other two synoptic Gospels. Luke alone records that in addition…
Our Lord’s Extremes, Luke 9:57-62
Last time we considered a section of short paragraphs, each of which in one way or another revealed some defect in the character and behavior of the disciples. We took encouragement from the fact that even the truest disciples of Jesus were then, …