St. Paul's Lockport Sermons

Sermon by Rev. Daniel Greg, pastor of Lutheran Church of the Holy Spirit, Elk Grove Village, Illinois. For Family retreat vespers service.

Sermon for the Ninth Sunday after Trinity Last week I spoke about our need to read the scriptures daily in order to distinguish between true and false teachers. You might have started reading, or have read before, and think, it’s mostly a bunch of stories, how does this help? Today I will tell you how to make the scriptures yours. They are your family stories. You are brought into the family of Ch...

Sermon for the Eighth Sunday after Trinity False prophets never appear to be false by outward signs (wool). What is wool? Wool is not evil. Wool is good, but it is not a good indicator is someone is a true or false prophet. Their fruits will be false teaching. You know their fruits by knowing the true teaching of the scriptures.

Sermon for the Seventh Sunday after Trinity Paul compares slaves to impurity and lawlessness to slaves of righteousness. As he says, when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. Just like the slaves were free of all other duties, those who are enslaved to sin are certainly free from righteousness, from following God’s way. You hear people flaunt this all the time. They sa...

Are are two ways - the way of the righteousness of the Pharisees and scribes, which leads to death, and the way of the higher righteousness of Christ, which leads to life. The way of life is a way of reconciliation.

Sermon for the Visitation of Mary Mary’s song shows that God never forgets his promises. He remembers. His ancient promise to Abraham, the tenant of Hebron 2000 years before Mary, is fulfilled in her, his descendant, and her Son, Jesus Christ, as they come to his town to meet Elizabeth. It’s nothing to the eye, but all history is centering around this point, this person, Jesus, a little baby in he...

Guest sermon by Rev. Dan Gensch

Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Trinity Judge not, and you shall not be judged. There we have – there is a judgment! It’s not that there is no judgment at all. And you should have noticed from the creeds and other parts of scripture that we believe Christ is coming to judge all the living and the dead on the last day. Our command not to judge is not, don’t judge, it’s mean – it’s don’t judge, a...

Sermon for the Third Sunday after Trinity The Pharisees and scribes are indignant that Jesus would associate with open sinners, even though these sinners and repentant and want to learn from Jesus. Jesus masterfully demonstrates to them the value that God sees in sinners. First he deals with money, which the Pharisees love, and finally gives the example of two sons who reject their father's love i...

Sermon for the Second Sunday after Trinity Those who have the pride of man-made religion will never enter the Lord's banquet. True Christians show true humility.

Sermon for the First Sunday after Trinity Jesus speaks of two men - a rich man who feasted sumptuously every day, and Lazarus, a poor beggat lying at the rich man’s door. Both of these men die. Both, we can assume, are Jews, and therefore in the flesh they are sons of Abraham. But Lazarus is carried by the angels to Abraham’s bosom and the rich man is not. Even though they are both related to Abra...

Sermon preached on the Saturday after Holy Trinity, 2024

Sermon for the Feast of Holy Trinity Some may say the Athanasian Creed is all just words. But that is how we know things, by words, the words that God has given us. What difference does it make that God is Trinity? Why all these words are needed for us to know?

Sermon for Bonnie Fox's memorial service on Pentecost Tuesday, May 21, 2024.

Sermon for Pentecost Maybe you know Pentecost comes from “fifty” means fifty days after easter. Originally, it was a feast fifty days after Passover, the feast of first fruits. Traditionally it was thought to be the day Moses gave the law to the children of Israel on Mt Sinai. We can even connect the physical first-fruits in the OT Pentecost with the spiritual first-fruits the beginning of the chu...

Sermon for the Sunday after Ascension. Guest preacher Rev. Richard Bellas

Sermon for the Ascension of Our Lord Guest preacher Rev. Richard Bellas

Sermon for Rogate This means that Jesus here has laid out what is necessary for true prayer in the time of His resurrection and ascension – that is, our time now. You may have heard of many things that people have said are needed for a good prayer, or maybe just assumed some, and we will get to some wrong assumptions. But there are five things Jesus lays out here as necessary for true prayer. The...

Sermon for Cantate on the baptism of Mila Marie Lo Dolce.

Sermon for Jubilate, the fourth Sunday of Easter As you may know, I have had close personal experience recently with the example from the gospel lesson today - A woman, when she in labor, has sorrow because her hour has come, but as soon as she gives birth to the child she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world.

Guest sermon by Rev. Richard Bellas on Misericordias Domini, the Third Sunday of Easter

Sermon for the Annunciation of Our Lord We celebrate this because at this point God has become man, one of us, and will always be man. He is man then, today, and will be man forever. Our brother goes before us into eternal union with God.  What does the Son of God do when he takes on human flesh? He releases us from our bondage to the Law.

Sermon for Good Friday Tenebrae Vespers by Rev. Rich Bellas.

Sermon for Good Friday Chief Divine Service Jesus Christ is the King of Truth, who has freed us from fear of the kings of the world, and brought us into his kingdom by His blood, so that like Him we may fear, love, and trust God above all things. 

Without the Lord’s Supper, even though we still have preaching but the commemoration of Christ’s death can become nothing more than a mental exercise, or a physical exercise of coming to church and thinking, speaking, or praising. These are all good things, but come up short of the fullness of what Christ wants to give us through His Passion.