THE BULLDOG AND THE SKUNK by Ray Pritchard In last Sunday’s sermon I mentioned that my friend Dennis Baker had told me years ago that not all hills are worth dying on. Sometimes we fight over things that don’t really matter and end up wasting lots of time and emotional energy with very little to show for it. One of the…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2001Once there was a man who became unhappy in his church and so he left it in search of something better. He told his friends that he was searching for the perfect church. Finally, he found a church that met his exacting criteria. In his eyes, it was perfect in every way-a perfect pastor, a perfect staff, a perfect building, p…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2001Many years ago, in another time and another place, the church I then served as a pastor was preparing to go through a major building campaign. Our program was similar in some respects to what we are attempting to do here at Calvary. In one major aspect things were quite different because that church met in rented facilities…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2001Several people have asked about my personal future as pastor in light of the proposed expansion program. Put bluntly, they want to know, Am I planning to stay or to leave or what am I planning to do? Let me say frankly that my staying as your pastor has nothing to do with the expansion program. I won’t stay longer if we bui…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2001Five weeks from today our church members will meet to decide on the proposed expansion program. Within the next few days you will receive a brochure in the mail that explains the proposal in great detail. Then we will have a series of open forums where you can ask questions and get more detailed information. Eventually the …
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2001It may interest you to know that our church has just celebrated its 86th birthday. We may not look or feel 86 years old, but that’s how old we really are. Our congregation was born in the early months of 1915 when a handful of men and women met together to consider the possibility of starting an independent church in Oak Pa…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2001On this Easter Sunday we join with Christians around the world to celebrate the resurrection of our Lord and Savior. But how do we know that 2,000 years ago a man named Jesus actually died and came back from the dead? The only way to answer that question is to examine the original documents-the four gospels of the New Testa…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2001Monday This is Holy Week. Today is Monday. On Friday Jesus was crucified. In his first words from the cross […]
Text: VariousNext month Timothy McVeigh is scheduled to be put to death for his part in the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City that killed over 160 people. In a recently-published book he has freely admitted his own guilt and even defends what he did. This would appear to be a good test case for the debate over capi…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2001For the next few weeks I want to use this space to discuss some “hot topics.” The first one is indicated by the title, although no one ever puts the question in precisely this way. Let’s begin with the words of I Corinthians 6:9-10, “Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Ne…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2001