WHY YOU OUGHT TO PRAY FOR YOUR ENEMIES by Ray Pritchard I suppose one of the hardest commands in the Bible to obey is the command of Jesus that we should pray for our enemies. It is hard because prayer is the last thing we want to do for our enemies. Mostly, there a lot of things we would like to do to our enemies–like ge…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2002SAVED IN THE NICK OF TIME by Ray Pritchard Recently I heard about a man in his 80s who came to Christ shortly before he died. It happened like this. For nearly his entire life, the man had lived without any conscious dependence on God. He wasn’t an atheist or an agnostic and he wasn’t an evangelist for his unbelie…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2002PREPARATION: WHERE VICTORY BEGINS by Ray Pritchard “The horse is made ready for the day of battle, but victory rests with the Lord.” (Proverbs 21:31) When the Bible Bus passed through Proverbs 21 earlier this week, a long-forgotten melody rolled through my mind. Over 20 years ago, when Joshua was only two or three…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2002RECITING PSALM 119 by Ray Pritchard Tuesday was one of “those days” for me, a day when I started out behind and never really caught up. As I thought about it later, it seemed like a “disheveled” day, which is a strange word but perfectly describes how I felt. There was one bright spot–and only one–in…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2002GENTLENESS: POWER UNDER CONTROL by Ray Pritchard “A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.” Proverbs 15:1 I have a friend who learned this verse the hard way. Whenever she said something in a harsh tone, her mother made her write this verse 50 times on a sheet of paper. It must have worke…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2002THE OVERCOMING SERIES by Ray Pritchard Everyone has a story to tell, even the people who seem to smile all the time. This is one of the first things a young pastor learns when he graduates from seminary and begins his ministry. Some people look so well-adjusted and happy that you think they don’t have a care in the wor…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2002BROKEN, THEN BLESSED by Ray Pritchard The story I’m about to tell comes from a friend who has been going through a very hard time. The precise details don’t matter except to say that this friend has struggled in his job for a long time and hasn’t been able to take care of his family the way he would like. He tried and tried…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2002GOD’S WRAPPING PAPER by Ray Pritchard Not long ago I had lunch with a man who said he was trying to “recover from God’s goodness.” That statement is so unusual that it arrests the mind. What did he mean, to “recover” from God’s goodness? We usually speak of “recovering” from sick…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2002IT’S HARD TO LET GO by Ray Pritchard The man and the woman involved in this story don’t know each other and will almost certainly never meet each other. They have nothing in common except that the woman sent me an e-mail (she lives in another country) and the man dropped by to see me this week. Here is part of wha…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2002FAITH AND DOUBT AT GROUND ZERO by Ray Pritchard Researchers tell us that one of the central questions arising out of the ashes of 9/11 is a spiritual one: Where was God when those planes crashed into the World Trade Center? Sometimes the question is put in terms that are agonizingly personal, such as the father who lost his…
Sermon Series: Ponder This - 2002