I rock in the name of God.

Where's my prize bitches?

Originally posted by rwingett
I have a grand sermon in mind, Brother Kirk. Maybe a bit too grand for the confines of this contest. I wonder if the judging could be held off until the following Sunday (June 17th). Furthermore, I wonder if I could get a bit of leeway on both the word count and on the one passage limitation?

OK, I've got my last judge in place for the first round. Here is your panel of judges: Me, DoctorScribbles, Bbarr, and Mimor. We are a diverse group with varying backgrounds.

We will evaluate 1) how you stay on topic, 2) how creatively you use your chosen Scripture passage, 3) keeping in integrity with the passage, 4) use of confessional (talking about yourself in relationship to your passage) preaching and 5) How persuasive you are in your writing.

I am hoping that the judges will use the format of the Great Debate to offer feedback to the participants. I forsee us having at least 6 rounds with a wide variety of topics, so do not be discouraged if you don't win or succeed in the first round. I would like all entries in by Saturday the 16th of June for our first round.

If Tammy Faye Bakker dies between now and then, I may delay a day or two for Shiva.

Originally posted by kirksey957
OK, I've got my last judge in place for the first round. Here is your panel of judges: Me, DoctorScribbles, Bbarr, and Mimor. We are a diverse group with varying backgrounds.

We will evaluate 1) how you stay on topic, 2) how creatively you use your chosen Scripture passage, 3) keeping in integrity with the passage, 4) use of confessional (talking abo ...[text shortened]... round.

If Tammy Faye Bakker dies between now and then, I may delay a day or two for Shiva.

Originally posted by Nemesio
Are we just posting the sermons, or submitting them privately and anonymously?

Nemesio

Originally posted by kirksey957
Can I take it that you are "in"?

Originally posted by kirksey957
I think we will want them posted in the forums so everyone can get an idea of what the judges are evaluating, much like what happened in the Great Debate. Plus if any are really good, we wouldn't want to stand in the way of someone finding religion or whatever. I must say I am personally looking forward to Rwingett's sermon from a curiosity point of view.

Can I take it that you are "in"?

Originally posted by Nemesio
Can't you let a man cogitate?

Originally posted by Hand of Hecate
I'd like to petition the panel of judges to allow more than one entry from each contestant.

Originally posted by kirksey957
Denied.

The holiness of God is love. The holiness of God is in the word “We.” True love—true agape—consists in relinquishing the boundaries that maintain the separateness of I and Thou: with regard to God, with regard to our neighbor, with regard to the world.

Relinquishing those boundaries entails risk. It is dangerous. One may be betrayed by the beloved; one might even die. One needs to bet one’s life—but that does not mean betting, or sacrificing, someone else’s life. There are no guarantees. If there were guarantees, then neither faith nor love would be required.

Self-expansion, self-revelation, for the sake of the beloved is risky. So, however, is self-enclosure. You can remain locked in the closet of “me, myself and I.” You can seek out the security of a guru or a holy cook-book that will provide detailed instructions for living, or cooking. You can seek salvation in submission. You can imagine that the “kingdom of heaven” is an individual affair. You can try to play it safe. And you can die of old age in your closet, unloving and unloved. You can live small—in the confines of your little “I”—and you can die small.

Or you can, as Zorba put it, undo your belt and go looking for trouble.

For if you go looking for love, you are looking for trouble. There is no such thing as riskless love. There is no such thing as a real love in which you do not risk your very life. And gladly—or not at all.

Love—let us be honest—is trouble and a confusion. I can no longer tell if I am I, or I am you, or We are a bit of both of us. When we make love, I sometimes do not know who is touching whom, who is calling whom, who is kissing whom. There is—in the most precious moments—only We. And in that We, where am I? In that fullness, where is my part? In that largeness, what of my littleness?

___________________________________

Fana

As long as there is herself and myself
—beloved and lover, an imagined mirage
cast in a dream of two mirrors—
love is the desperate, jealous flame of desire.

When the images join in a singular fire
—returning to only ourself and no other—
then love is the passion and pulsation of One,
forgetful of dreams imprisoned in a mirror.

And it begins again until it ends,
this rhythm of form and fullness and form.

How silly for the flame to fear
annihilation in the fire,

or waterdrops to be afraid
of falling once again
into the vastness of the sea.

____________________________________

A love that is frightened of such largeness of passion, in which the littleness of “I” is lost, is a pseudo-love that is frightened—of love itself. “Perfect love casts out all fear.” And yet, we sometimes seem frightened of fearlessness itself. “Be careful! You might make a mistake! You might commit a sin! You might lose your soul.”

And yet: “No one can have greater love than to lay down his soul for his friends.”

The “kingdom of heaven” is not an individual affair. Salvation does not proceed from spiritual masturbation. And God does not need to be stroked.

The “kingdom of heaven” is a love affair. You must risk the “I” for the sake of the We. The smaller for the larger, the part for the whole. Though, in fact, the part has its place only within the whole. No flame is kindled apart from the single fire.

For your true “I” is that We—everywhere that it is found, and it is to be found everywhere. “God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them.” And that God is all in all. That God is the ultimate We—in which and of which we are. The fire in which, how silly it is for the flame to fear annihilation.

That God’s name is not “I am that I am”—but We. The We, aside from which, no one is.

But none of this is law. Love is not only trouble and a confusion—it is lawless. One does not keep the books in love. Love keeps no accounts, nor does it hold court. A strict moral accountant should stay out of love, because love will muck up all her accounts. And “those who love much are forgiven much.”

Nor is love an act of submission—one “I” bowing down before another. Love is an expansion. An expansion of the “I” into the We. Two flames entangled in the common fire. In which one’s littleness is burnt away—into the fullness of the whole.

Or—why should the waterdrop be afraid, to fall once again into the vastness of the sea?

What God has changed in my life for the better, he can also change in your life for the better.

Many prophets claim to speak for the one God, yet none but Christ speaks with true authority on his behalf. None but Christ displayed the miracle power God alone can wield, and none but Christ rose from the dead by that same power. Yes, all these manifestations of power fly in the face of science and rationality, inviting the mockery of worldly-minded men and women, yet, unless the bible is a book of lies, we are all impelled to wonder if this man Jesus does indeed have authority over all things. If the bible correctly preserves his message and his deeds, we must ask, "Is he really who he says he is?" And if he is, what does that mean for me right now?

The implications of believing in him aren't solely having to do with our eternal destiny, after all, as some mistakenly believe; the implications are also for the present, where we struggle to pay bills, where we wrestle with depression, where recently deceased loved ones leave us alone to fend for ourselves; the eternal now, where we strain to find a few moments of peace; this very instant in which God himself is our neighbor--it is here where God's Kingdom abides! My message for you today is this: God is right here, right now, and his power is real. Faith in Christ is not merely about procuring after-life hell insurance, faith in Christ is meant to produce results now: transformation of character, joy, hope, peace, love, prosperity--in short, God's abundant life.

Thousands of mediocre congregations are content to preach to you a gospel of sin-management, wherein the focus is almost entirely upon one's eternal destiny, as if God has nothing for you now. Why was Abraham declared righteous? Was it because he believed God out of concern for his eternal destiny? No. He believed that God would provide for him a son in his old age--a present miracle. I tell you truly, this God who is the same yesterday, today and forever, remains as present to us as he was to Abraham. How could he not? Who among you would dare test the integrity of God's word? Who among you would step out in faith and heartily claim God's promises as Abraham once did? Do you know that those who trust in him will never be put to shame? Let me return, then, to what God has done for me and what he can therefore do for you...

What is more to be prized than deliverance from oneself? Let me ask that again. What is more to be prized than deliverance from oneself? Nothing. If there is a fear which paralyzes your will, deliverance from yourself delivers you from that fear. If there is a sin which entraps you in guilt and self-hatred, deliverance from yourself delivers you from that sin. If there is a heroic and righteous deed which you know must be accomplished, deliverance from yourself gives you the freedom to act, gracefully, devoid of vanity. Nothing is more valuable to God, the individual and society than deliverance from the self.

I used to be paralyzed with anxiety and depression since I was a boy up until I was in my mid-twenties. I'm half Native American and half Irish, and anxiety and depression run rampant in my family's genes, with the standard out being a life nursing a bottle of liquid-courage (go figure). I longed to be different and I was determined to steer clear of the bottle, even if it meant being chained by fear my whole life. And I was... up until I invited Jesus Christ into my heart one starry evening in the foothills outside of Ft. Collins, Colorado. That night I asked God for courage and he gave it to me--straight out--in the form of deliverance from myself. From that moment forward I have been able to look deeply into others' souls, where formerly fear had averted my gaze because of self-consciousness. In one single moment I was changed...

Deliverance from the self is, of course, the stated goal of every religion and psychiatry known to man, and we judge them all by their effectiveness. Humans can achieve great heights through employment of various prescribed practices of religious and psychiatric methods, but I tell you truly that none of them accomplish deliverance from the self with as much finality as does the cross of Christ. Because only Jesus Christ wields the authority and power to accomplish on our behalf what we ourselves cannot accomplish, not only in the life to come, but in this one as well.

"I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me" (Galatians 2:20).

Originally posted by epiphinehas
What God has changed in my life for the better, he can also change in your life for the better.

Many prophets claim to speak for the one God, yet none but Christ speaks with true authority on his behalf. None but Christ displayed the miracle power God alone can wield, and none but Christ rose from the dead by that same power. Yes, all these manifest ...[text shortened]... e faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me" (Galatians 2:20).

Without offering commentary on the sermons posted so far, I will say that they are the length we are looking for. It's always good to get out of church before some others so as to beat them to the buffet line.

Originally posted by vistesd
The holiness of God is love. The holiness of God is in the word “We.” True love—true agape—consists in relinquishing the boundaries that maintain the separateness of I and Thou: with regard to God, with regard to our neighbor, with regard to the world.

Relinquishing those boundaries entails risk. It is dangerous. One may be betrayed by the bel ...[text shortened]... hole.

Or—why should the waterdrop be afraid, to fall once again into the vastness of the sea?