paravanes:meditations

**This is the text from a sermon I preached yesterday (October 27, 2019) at Fort Street Presbyterian Church in Detroit, Michigan. The text includes the prayers at the beginning and end of the sermon and a few of my personal notes to enhance the delivery of the sermon. ( Sharing this sermon ("The Heart and Soul of the Gospel") in part or as a full document is permitted. Attribution (credit to the author) will be appreciated. -Deborah) Thank you Lord for calling us into your kingdom, into your power, and into relationship and connection with you. Show us how to live the purposes for which we were created. Show us how to live as authentic witnesses to the truth of your word. Amen. Passage from Colossians 1:9-14 (NIV) 9  For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, [ a ...

Several Sundays ago, we had a last minute emergency regarding a guest minister and I was asked to preach if the guest was unable to make it. I agreed, and began to think about what I would say to the congregation. I meditated on what is the most important reminder the church universal needs regarding who we are and why we are here.  I was led to this passage from 2 Timothy 1:12: “…I am not ashamed, because I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him for that day.” Here are the words of a man facing execution, a man  who has been abandoned by his associates and betrayed by those who thought he could rely upon. This man, Paul the apostle, is facing death because of his testimony for and about Jesus Christ. Paul, a man who was widely regarded as a powerhouse intellectual in his day and time, had been cajoled and laughed at for believing in fairy tales and false truths as he traveled, taught, and...