Our God is the Vine; we are the branches. To remain fruitful in life we need to stay connected to him. A large part of that is connecting others to the Vine as well. This week we take a trip to Philippi, a Roman colony in the ancient world to see the Apostle Paul in action.
“Follow me!” This is Jesus’ call as he gathers his first disciples. In this season of Epiphany we see Jesus reveal himself to be the Savior of the world. In the Gospel of John he shows his divine power. This catches the attention of the disciples, but it is the Word of God that creates faith.
The waters of the Jordan washed over Jesus as John baptized him. Those same waters of baptism washed over the jailers family in ancient Philippi. Still today the waters of baptism flow in churches around the world. In Jesus the Father is well pleased with all of us.
“Oh, what of that? …and what of that?!” The sower sows his seed. With a wanton disregard for the safety of the word he casts it like a sower in an ancient field. Some of the seed falls on rocks, some among weeds, some on the path, and some on fertile soil. This Sunday we’ll look at Jesus’ famous Parable of the Sower. We’ll see how this impacts our life and how we are planted by God’s word.
When (Jesus) saw the crowds, he had compassion on them. What was the problem? They were like sheep without a shepherd. What was the solution? Send out the shepherds. Jesus send his disciples to serve God’s people with the word. The dual focus this Sunday is on helping hurting people with the gospel of forgiveness in Jesus and sending people to do that work. We continue our sermon series Witnesses for Christ under the theme: Witness through Compassion.
The call of Matthew is powerful example of mercy from our Lord. Matthew didn’t fit the description of a model Jew. He wasn’t a logical choice, according to the logic of that time. Most people wanted to stay away from tax collectors and sinners. Jesus went out of his way to minister to those who need mercy. This Sunday we saw how we can Witness to Those Who Need Mercy.
