We continue our series on The Seven Deadly Sins. Sunday’s subject is GREED.

From the sermon:

Greed is truly a root sin; One that leads to other sundry and vices. Greed will cause us to lie, steal, take shortcuts and rationalize. Yet we give greed respectable titles like financial success, economic security, the good life. These are noble sounding but reality bending.  Consider this: “the media features and we are drawn to stories extolling thirty year old millionaires who have achieved their fortunes within a decade of graduating college. Rarely do we ask if such a goal is commendable, at what psychological or spiritual cost it was achieved, if ruthless or immoral means were used and what good will be done with all this wealth.” Let’s face it. We assume a person of means is to be respected, admired and followed. We never give much thought to how they made their money. How they spend it or don’t. How they treat their employees or fellow human beings.

Title: The Seven Deadly Sins: Greed

                    Bible Passage: Matthew 6:24

We continue our series on The Seven Deadly Sins. Sunday’s subject is ANGER.

From the sermon:

Who here hasn’t felt the flush of anger rise within you? Who among us hasn’t had a strong desire to hit the wall or kick the dog? How many of us have stomped up the steps or out the door? Anyone laid awake and plotted revenge? It’s a bad demon this anger. But it may surprise you to know that in the history of the church, there has been disagreement over the issue of should anger really be considered a sin? It’s the only one of the seven attributed to both God and Jesus. The desert monk, Evagrius felt that anger was a gift given by god so we would rise up against true evil. It’s anger that causes us to rally against injustice in this world. Read the Hebrew prophets and hear their rage at the inequality and bias of their world. This is the anger of righteous indignation that leads to defense of the poor, the downcast and downtrodden. Anger can be energy for a needed burst of passion or juice to get the gears going.

Title: The Seven Deadly Sins: Anger

                    Bible Passage: Matthew 5:21-26

The next subject in our series, The Seven Deadly Sins, is LUST.

The Bible text is from Matthew five:

 ²⁷ You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ ²⁸ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. ²⁹ If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. ³⁰ And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to go into hell.

From the sermon:

The disciple of Jesus doesn’t disconnect the body from the mind. We realize, as taught in our text that what we allow to filter in and settle in the contours and crevices of the psyche eventually affects our bodies. In Matthew, Jesus radically re-defines adultery and gives much stricter dimensions to lustful thinking. Christ teaches it isn’t enough to refrain from the overt act but that the battle begins in the imagination. As someone said, “It isn’t a sin to look once, it is to look twice”. Or in other words, to let the dangerous thoughts multiply. Frederick Beuchner describes it this way, “after a while, x-rated titillations tend to turn tawdry and tedious, even days later, they keep flickering away somewhere in the back of the mind to a captive audience of one.”

Title: The Seven Deadly Sins: Lust

                    Bible Passage: Matthew 5:27-30

Nowhere is the seriousness of this catalog of vices more questioned than with today’s focus; GLUTTONY. Certainly, Gluttony is dangerous in the sense of being unhealthy but deadly? A capital sin? A root sin? Anger can lead to murder. Greed can lead to theft. Envy can lead to despair. But what’s the worst thing gluttony can lead to? High cholesterol… Extra pounds… Premature death…? These are all pretty bad but driving too fast can also kill us before our time. Of all the things that can destroy the soul, we want to focus on overeating? Even Jesus was charged with feasting too much and called a glutton in Luke’s gospel.

Title:   The Seven Deadly Sins: Gluttony

           Bible Passage:   Matthew 5:6

This Sunday is July 4th. We’ll take a break from our sermon series on the Seven Deadly Sins to consider how the formation of the Church can find parallels in the birth of our nation. Both institutions can trace their origins to a revolution which sounds noble but can be riddled with challenges.

From the sermon:

What a radical word “revolution” is. It’s revolt against the established rule, whether good or bad. It’s an invitation to chaos and uncertainty. Revolutionaries are by definition troublemakers who stir the pot of unrest. They are despised by the established powers. Our nation was formed when rabble rousers of all sorts decided to overthrow the government of King George III.  It was audacious, a bit foolish, and doomed to failure. It was a dwarf picking a fight with a giant.

Sermon Title:     Revolution, Constitution, Institution

   Bible Passage:    Galatians 5:1

Last week we started a series of sermons on the seven deadly sins. The desert fathers were the first to teach on the deadly sins, also known as capital sins, or “root sins.” It was felt that if you dug down past everything else, all other forms of transgression, you were left with these seven vices. Today we consider envy. Like most of the seven sins, there is no one here unfamiliar with envy. As a child someone else had a toy we wanted. As a teenager someone else received the scholarship we wanted. As a twenty something someone else got the job we wanted. Somewhere along the line someone else has possessed or received recognition, attention, or possessions we felt we needed, deserved or simply desired.

Title: The Seven Deadly Sins: ENVY
Bible Passage: GENESIS 4:1-16