All Sermons in The Gospel of Matthew

(Text and Audio) Title: The 4000 Sometimes the most difficult passages to teach are the ones that are the most familiar to us.   I know you are all very familiar with the account of the feeding of the 5000, and I have no desire to reinvent the wheel for you this morning, but I…

(Text Only) Title: Walking on Water Today we continue with our second well-known Gospel story.  Today, Jesus walks on the water.  As I stated last week, I’m sure you’ve all heard countless teachings on this well known story and I have no desire to re-invent the wheel for you this morning. Instead, I want to…

(Text and Audio) Title: The Men of Gennesaret It’s funny how we see different types of writing in the Gospel of Matthew.  In chapter 13, we studied 8 parables and their meanings in depth, and it took us 4 months to work through our study of that one chapter. Today, after a mere 4 sermons,…

(Text and Audio) Title: Truth Vs. Tradition Most “fun” I’ve ever had writing a sermon. “Scribes”  experts in the Jewish Law (Lawyers) “Pharisees” the most prominent spiritual and political party of the Jews “from Jerusalem”  These men were not from Gennesaret, they had traveled a great distance (about 100 miles, no small distance in those…

(Text and Audio) Title: The Pharisee You Know In last week’s sermon we went to great lengths to demonstrate and illustrate the dangers of placing one’s personal conviction upon another as a binding law.  Today what we will do is look at just how dangerous such attitude and behavior can be. The Quote The scathing…

(Text and Audio) Title: An Interesting Response I think there are a few noteworthy points to consider with Jesus’s 2 part encouragement.  It’s subtle, but there is some insight into the will of God even in these three words, “Hear and understand…” POINT:  Jesus can issue “commands” that are from his sovereign will, but from…

(Text and Audio) Title: Defilement From Within I think the interesting work here is “also.”  Jesus had an expectation that the masses would be confused by his teaching, for not all of them had been given ears to hear.   He had an expectation that the Scribes and Pharisees would also not understand, for he…

(Text and Audio) Title: Three Rebukes I know it seems like I say this every week, but today we look at an especially interesting passage in the Gospel of Matthew.  In today’s text, we will examine a conversation between Jesus and a Gentile woman who is asking Jesus to heal her daughter.  Now, this is…

(Text and Audio) Title: The Qualification of the Creator On the importance of understanding audiences.  Last week Jay and I had dinner and told him the story of this comedienne back in the 80’s who talked about her son repeating everything they said.  (You’re a lying man!) Remember last week when I noted that Jesus’…

Title: The 4000 Parallels: While these miracles of Jesus feeding the masses from a very small supply are truly amazing, there is a precedent for them in scripture.  Some of you may recall the rather obscure story of Elijah in 2 Kings 5 Elijah feeds 100 men from one knapsack of food. (V. 38)  We…

(Text and Audio) Title: A Sign From Heaven, Part 1 In examining the passage this morning, a passage that I fully admit is one of my favorite in all of scripture, both because of the precise way that Jesus’ answers the request and because of the implications of what Jesus says to them in responding,…

(Text and Audio) Title: A Sign From Heaven, Part 2 In a way, I feel like I’ve painted myself into a corner with this sermon.  I’ve already confessed to you how much I love this passage.  I’ve told you that few passages in Scripture have had the same impact and effect on my personal theology…