Sunday Homily

This week we hear about David’s eventual rise to the throne. Although there are hurdles, David succeeds and takes his rightful place as the anointed king of Israel. David balanced great strength with great worship. Worship and prayer require vulnerability, humility and effort. The success of David’s kingdom will not be determined by David’s power nor by his ingenuity or wisdom or eloquence or even his good looks. The kingdom will be built on David’s trust in the power of God!

Last week we talked about inquiring of the Lord, asking God for His wisdom and counsel. There are some things you don’t need to ask God what his counsel is, because he’s already given it to you. It’s already in his Word, it’s already in the scriptures. So we don’t need to ask God about things that he’s already told us are wrong. See, David knew what was right in this weeks story because he loved God’s law. He loved God’s teaching.

David escapes from the court of King Saul, and his life takes a few twists and turns.  I encourage you to read 1 Samuel so you can read it for yourself, but eventually, we are told in 1 Samuel, "David departed from there and escaped to the cave of Adullam (Ad-dual-am), and when his brothers and all his father's house heard it, they went down to him."

Welcome to the second week of our summer series, David for King. The story of David is one of the most important, detailed, sprawling, cinematic stories in the whole Bible.

“I will bless the Lord who counsels me; even in the night my heart exhorts me. I set the Lord ever before me; with him at my right hand I shall not be disturbed.” (Ps 16:7-8)

The half-truth we want to discuss today is one that exists between Christians, and is an important element of our Catholic faith. This half-truth is that Holy Communion is only a symbol.  A symbol represents something.  Holy Communion represents God’s love for us, but it is much more than that.  So if anyone says communion is a symbol, that is true, but it is only half true.

Today we want to confront this half-truth that all religions are the same, deep down.  Now, that is true if you mean that all religions struggle with, and attempt to answer, the same questions.  They struggle with questions such as what is the very foundation of reality.  Does God exist? If God exists, what is God’s nature?  Is there one God or many gods?  If God exists, what does he expect of us?  Does he expect anything of us?  What happens to us after we die?  These and many other questions are questions that various religions attempt to answer.  Religion is a set of beliefs that attempt to explain what life is all about, who we are, and the most important things human beings should spend their time doing.

Welcome to the second week of our message series Half-Truth.  Our culture often has half-truths.  Half-truths are beliefs that are kind of right, but not completely.  Just as if you get it half right when you put the right street address in your GPS, but the wrong town, you arrive at the wrong destination, if we buy into these half-truths of culture, then we wind up at a place we do not want to be.

A half-truth is a statement that includes some element of truth; the statement might be partly true, but in leaving out the rest of the truth, it brings about a deception. The half-truth often leads us to embrace a whole lie.  In this series, we will confront popular misconceptions and errors in thinking that our culture believes. This series deals with basics of our faith: the Ascension, Pentecost, the Trinity and Corpus Christi. We will explore each of these truths of our faith and show the popular misconceptions they refute, including: there are many ways to God, all religions are the same, you don’t need a Church to connect with God, The Holy Eucharist is just a symbol.

At the Council of Jerusalem, it was decided with the Holy Spirit not to make it difficult for the Gentiles to come to God. They were going to put rungs on the ladder so that Gentiles could easily come to Christ. Basically, what they said is: We ought not make it difficult for the Gentiles to turn to God. We ought not make it difficult for people to come to church. There’s a groundbreaking idea: we ought not make it difficult for people to come to church! Let’s make it easy—as easy as possible for people who are interested in turning to God and learning more about Him to get started.  In this message, we will look at the truth that the natural inclination of Churches is to become insular, but to fulfill the mission given to us we must make it easy for people to come to Christ as a community. We will look at how we are partnering together to make it easy for people to come to Christ at every age level.

A place where it becomes impossible not to share Jesus with the world!

The early Church broke new ground because they were able to bring the Gospel into places that had never heard it. They didn’t fear failure but persevered and kept sharing the Gospel. As followers of Christ, it is our job to share the good news with people who don’t know the good news. We have an opportunity to break ground with people who don’t know Jesus. Like Paul and Barnabas we must persevere and not fear that not all our efforts will be successful.

One of the most appealing things about the early church was the clear and direct communication of what was required of a follower of Jesus. One of Jesus’ new requirements for us after the new covenant is that we should not be afraid. In Acts 5, the Sanhedrin arrested the apostles and ordered them to stop speaking in the name of Jesus. They replied that they “must obey God rather than men.” The apostles left that meeting “rejoicing that they had been found worthy to suffer dishonor for the sake of the name.” Imagine how different our world might be if we fearlessly obeyed God rather than man. Let’s make it appealing for others to turn to God by living lives confident in the resurrection.

The Church was a place where people could come to be healed. They were able to have success solely because they had the power of Holy Spirit upon them. The same power is available to us too. In this message, we will look at how the Church broke new ground by bringing healing to the people of the first century and how we can still accomplish this mission today. As more and more people’s hearts are healed through the Church, more people will be drawn to it.

 Easter celebrates the most groundbreaking event in history.  And it’s impact is still being felt. Over a billion people all around the world this morning are gathering to celebrate a Jewish carpenter from an obscure village who lived 2,000 years ago.