Resurrection Philadelphia Sermons

Matt 20:1–16 When we ignore or minimize the importance of the original context, our default position will be to fill in the textual backdrop with our own social context. In other words, we will assume that things in the biblical context are just like they are in our own. So there is no way to attain a reading of a biblical text without a context. - Jeannine K. Brown, Scripture as Communication

Luke 19:1-10 Ezekiel 34:11-16 The gospel story is precisely this: it is a story. It is not a collection of esoteric philosophical musings, nor is it a reflection upon a series of mystical experiences or contemplative insights. The gospel story is a narrative, or rather a series of narratives; it issues from the testimony of those who saw and heard and touched; it is witness to that which became vi...

Ezekiel 43:1–5 and 47:1–12; Rev 22:1–5 "We need a way of approaching Scripture that will move us very concretely from our overreliance on information gathering to an experience of Scripture as a place of intimate encounter." - Ruth Haley Barton, Sacred Rhythms

Ezekiel 37:1–14; John 20:19–23 Whenever we pick up the Bible, read it, put it down, and say, "That's just what I thought," we are probably in trouble. The technical term for that kind of reading is "proof-texting." Using the text to confirm our presuppositions is sinful; it is an act of resistance against God's fresh speaking to us, an effective denial that the Bible is the word of the living God....

2 Samuel 6:1-11; Luke 8:40-48 We do not invite the text into a transformation of its original meaning, into a new application geared toward our thought forms; rather, the text invites us into a transformation of allegiances and commitments, which will manifest itself in behaviors appropriate to our social worlds. - Joel Green, "Practicing the Gospel in a Post-Critical World"

Daniel 5 Luke 20:5-19 Our understanding does not seamlessly conform to God's reality, and instruction that suggests otherwise inevitably distorts the truth. The explanatory power such instruction generates is a mark of propaganda, not faithful Christian witness. Good teachers do not make Christianity easier for students by providing them with counterfeit clarity. If anything, they "jack up the pri...

Genesis 18:16–33; Matthew 11:20–24 Interpretations of Scripture are not just right and wrong, although at times such categories are useful and necessary. But perhaps ultimately a more adequate way of judging our readings is the way we judge works of art - according to the standards of beauty. To what extent do our readings reveal the intricacy, the wondrous quality of what the biblical writers cal...

Genesis 3; Matthew 4:1-11 Biblical authority is tied inseparably to the author's intention. God vested his authority in a human author, so we must consider what the human author intended to communicate if we want to understand what God's message is. Two voices speak: the human author is our doorway into the room of God's meaning and message. Thus, when we read Genesis, we are reading an ancient do...

Acts 8:26-40

Romans 8:12-17; John 3:1-17

Acts 2:1-21; John 15:26-27, 16:4b-15 The Spirit is given to begin the work of making God's future real in the present. ... Just as the resurrection of Jesus opened up the unexpected world of God's new creation, so the Spirit comes to us from that new world, the world waiting to be born, the world in which, according to the old prophets, peace and justice will flourish and the wolf and the lamb wil...

Ephesians 4:1-16; John 20:19-29 "I believe that we need to rethink the nature and priority of the corporate body, the church. Throughout biblical history God has been gathering people together so that in them and through their life together he might work out his purposes for the world. It was never simply about God calling out an individual so that he or she might walk with God. No, when he called...

John 15:9-15