Fellowship Dallas Weekly Sermons

As we come to the end of Paul's second letter to Timothy, we come to the end of Paul. He is dying and he knows it. So his words are as weighty as they are tender. He sums up his life in three short verses, three profound statements that explain how to live life to the fullest.

I don’t know about you, but goodbyes are particularly difficult for me. My wife and I are in the process of saying goodbye to something. We’ve been spending a lot of time with our girls, trying to make as many memories as we can because we are saying goodbye to our family four. Soon we will be a family of five. Our son is due any day now.

2 Tim. 3:10- 17...As I worked my way through our passage this week, I remembered Lawnchair Larry Walters. I've told you about him before. He was the unemployed truck driver who, in 1982, decided to tie a few weather balloons to his lawn chair so he could float above a SoCal neighborhood for a while. Armed with a pellet gun, he planned to shoot the balloons one at a time until he came back to earth...

As most of you have heard by now, we are on a journey of “calling each other to live out our God-given purpose in Christ every day.” That is our new mission and that is where God is taking us. And implied in that are a few assumptions: 1. That your God-given purpose can be known and that you’ve made progress in knowing it. Part of the journey is helping each other do just that. 2. That you WANT to...

There is an old story preachers love to tell about a guy who is seeking guidance for his life. Not knowing where to turn, he picks up a Bible, opens it to a random page, and points his finger on a verse. It lands in Luke 15:16 on the parable of the Prodigal Son which says, “and he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate.” Not fully convinced that this was God’s will for his life, he...

In a recent meeting, one of our pastors shared the story of Matt Emmons, an Olympic athlete who competes in the three position shooting event. The Olympics has been the setting for so many inspiring stories over the years. We have seen the thrill of victory but we have also witnessed the agony of defeat. One of the most heartbreaking moments of the 2004 Athens Olympics happened away from the camer...

It's a familiar story. The son of a famous actor is found dead on the floor of his 2 million dollar Hollywood Hills home surrounded by pills, booze and cigarette butts. The father grieves publicly alongside his latest wife. He was always a peripheral figure but his son was never able to step out of the shadow of his famous father. He died at 36. Friends say the young man was upset when his dad eve...

Have you ever thought about all the stuff we have to know to function in life? Thinking back over my week I had to draw upon knowledge from the fields of theology, business, history, psychology, sociology, medicine, finance, transportation, politics, entertainment, and more. The amount of knowledge we are required to know can overwhelm us. One of the challenges of living in a world where we are bo...

High School...shared Christ with team mate. Made fun of me. Suddenly I was ashamed. How did that happen? One minute I felt really good, Jesus and me sharing the gospel. The next minute I felt shame as if Jesus had tricked me. "What's up with that Jesus? I put in a good word for you and my reward is shame and embarrassment? I don't get it." Apparently neither did Timothy...v. 8.

If you believe in God, how would you prove it? What does devotion to God look like? Fifteen years ago today we learned that there are some people who believe that loving God means killing others - 2,996 others to be exact. The events of 9/11/2001 provided a stark contrast between a worldview that believes loving God requires hating others and a worldview that believes loving God is demonstrated be...

About five years ago, or so, a new phenomenon creeped into social media. It began with Facebook, spilled over into Instagram, and now is a part of every social networking experience – no matter what app you use. You can’t go online and look at the lives of the people you follow – your friends or your family or even complete strangers – without seeing a picture of . . . someone’s food. Pictures of...

"The best defense is a good offense." That is not only the Strategic Offensive Principle in warfare but it is also true when it comes to football...and sin. Rather than allowing the seven deadly sins kill us, the Bible says we can actually put sin to death. We can kill sin. "For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will l...

On one of our trips to Israel I encountered a powerful temptation of biblical proportions. We were staying at the Dead Sea. Everyone decided to take a dip in that saline-saturated water so I took the elevator to my room on the 12th floor to change into my bathing suit. As I was returning to the elevator I looked down and, to my surprise, I could see a woman on the roof of a smaller hotel who was s...

In 2003, an album dropped that launched the career of a new artist. The album shot to number one on the charts and would be the best selling album of the entire year. Not only was it the number one album of the year, it also contained the number one single of the year. And since its release 13 years ago, it has sold over 12 million copies.

Good morning everyone. My name is Richard Kerry and I serve in two roles here at Fellowship – High School Pastor and Counseling Pastor. It’s a privilege to be with you this morning as we continue our series covering the Deadly Virtues. Gary started the series two weeks ago by talking about Vainglory and then moved on to envy last week.

Envy, like vainglory, is a disordered desire. Somebody has received something, some gift or advantage or benefit, that you would like to have. That doesn't necessarily make you envious. The desire to succeed or to win or to be chosen is a good desire when it inspires you to imitate someone who is worth imitating. But that desire becomes twisted when it is tinged with resentment toward the person w...

We face some serious problems as a nation. Seven serious problems to be exact, seven vices that plague our country and disturb the peace. Drugs, domestic abuse, homelessness, income inequality, immigration, racial division and political chaos? That's a pretty good list but those are merely seven symptoms of much deeper problems. The seven greatest threats to this nation are: vainglory, envy, anger...

Where were you on Thursday night, July 7? I remember almost everything. After eating dinner and putting our twins to bed, Jen and I went out on a small date. One of the pastors from White Rock Fellowship came over to the house to stay with our girls while we were gone. Before leaving, I had a long conversation with him about what was next for our two churches in the aftermath of the killings of Al...

At some point our disturbing dreams will be reduced to manageable memories but not today. Chaos...disbelief...anger...sadness...reflection . The persistent unrelenting questions that linger after a tragedy. Questions that dog us and evade answers. There are a lot of question marks on the minds of people in this room.

We are considering the relationship between religion and politics. Does the Bible offer guidance on the relationship between church and state? Attitudes toward politics these days seem to vacillate between two opposing opinions. The first approach could be called a desire for dominance. This is the view that because Christianity has been the dominant religion in America, God has blessed our nation...

You have heard it said there are two subjects we should never discuss in public - religion and politics. For the next couple of weeks, I would like to talk about both. Call me crazy (you wouldn't be the first) but two of the most impactful subjects in life should not be left out of the conversation. Let's start with politics.

In the summer of 2002, my wife Martha gave me a surprise gift. It wasn’t for any particular day or event. It was just a gift, out of the blue. Based on its size, shape, and weight, I was pretty confident my present was a new music CD. I’d recently purchased a new car with a sweet sound system and thought Martha was giving me a gift to listen to at an irresponsible volume. Was it The Who, The Polic...

At the end of the letter to the Ephesians, the apostle Paul reports that he is in prison for preaching "the mystery of the gospel." In 6:18 He says, pray in all ways, at all times, with all perseverance for all the saints. And then he adds, pray "also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains, that...

We are at war. "For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places." Eugene Peterson says it this way, “This is no afternoon athletic contest that we’ll walk away from and forget about in a couple of hours. This is for keeps, a life-or-death...