Category: 2014 Sermons

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Sermon Audio: How Can I Be Sure?
Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Luke 1:5-25
Duration: 22:24
Size: 10.2 MB

Luke-The Investigative Gospel
How Can I Be Sure?
Luke 1:5-25

The gospel of Luke breaks a silence that has lasted for over four hundred years.

Zechariah was an ordinary country priest, one perhaps as many as 20,000 estimated to be living in Palestine at the time.

I wonder what that says about our own attendance in “worship services”, we come to worship God but do we have any idea that we might actually meet up with Him.

This man, John, who would come to be called “the Baptist“, was to be an extraordinary man!

In spite of Zachariah’s godliness, his obedience to the law and a lifetime of service in the ministry, his faith was weak when it came to believing such a promise.

Zachariah in asking, “How can I be sure”, is in effect asking for a sign.

God kept his promise, just as he always does, and Elizabeth, in spite of her years, conceived a child.

Application

First, our impossibilities are only the platforms upon which God is able to do his best work.

Second, God’s delays are not denials. Never confuse a wait with a no.

Third, when God does choose to intervene it is always for His glory and our good.

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Sermon Audio: Can We Trust The Map?
Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Luke 1:1-4
Duration: 23:18
Size: 10.6 MB

Luke-The Investigative Gospel
Can We Trust The Map?
Luke 1:1-4

Today, I want us to begin on a journey which will lead us to a treasure.

This passage, right at the beginning of this gospel account tries to define for us the credentials of this treasure Map.

Is the Author Credible?

This letter doesn’t have any identifying statement. But we do have some clues.

What we have here is a 2 volume set, written as a history of the Christian church, to some important official.

Really there is no other credible option and there is almost unanimous agreement between scholars today that Luke was the author.

To him, this was no mere game – his whole purpose of life, everything he held dear depended on getting the facts straight.

Are the sources of information credible?

The information that was gleaned however, in this and other accounts was directly obtained from eyewitnesses to the events.

Like he himself, their lives had been changed and so their testimonies were not distant memories, but dynamic and trustworthy accounts of what had happened to change their lives.

Is the method used to make the Map credible?

Luke declares to us that he himself investigated the information.

For Luke, this was achieved by publishing his work while many of his sources were still living.

Is the purpose for writing credible?

Luke’s reason for writing this account was so that Theophilus could know for sure what he had been taught.

As we look into Luke’s Map of Jesus’ life over the coming months, I pray that our eyes would be opened to see Jesus afresh.