2015-08-02,09 Cambrian Park Nazarene

by Tim IsbellThis web page contains worship notes for Cambrian Park Nazarene (San Jose, California) for the Sundays of August 2 & 9, 2015. You can also access this webpage by typing just cpn82015 into any browser.

Sunday August 2, 2015

Prayer Time Teachable Moment

I told a true story of a recent experience of blessing a new condo. The scriptures used in the blessing were Luke 8.1-3 and Colossians 1.9-14. For my notes of the blessing, click on House Blessing. For a better understanding of the Christian view on the spirit world, check out Powers of Darkness.

Two quotes from Timothy Keller's book Prayer:

  • We come to the Father not only in the Spirit but through the Son. (pg 73)

  • We can pray because Jesus Christ is our mediator giving us access to the throne of the universe and because the Spirit indwells us. (pg 83)

Sermon: Jesus Offends Everybody Sometime

(For the complete sermon notes, click on the title.)

Mark 6.1-13. The people from Jesus' hometown, reject him then Jesus sends out the disciples two-by-two.

Thesis: We are called to live like Jesus, attractive and at the same time selectively offensive.

This sermon is especially useful for two kinds of listeners: those who only want to share the pleasant stories about Jesus, and those who themselves are offended by some of the Jesus stories.

Sunday August 9, 2015

Prayer-time Teachable Moment

I used some material from Timothy Keller's book, Prayer, to help us add a bit of freshness to our prayer today - and throughout the week. The general concept is this:

Paul’s prayers in the epistles are not on escaping or dealing with the massive problems the people in Ephesus and other churches experienced. Paul prays to God to enlighten the hearts of his readers so that will know God better. We must have this perspective if we are to face life in any circumstance. (pgs 19-22).

In our prayer time, the focus was on how to pray for others, and also how this sort of heart development is sometimes an alternative to hard-core accountability.

For more helpful material on prayer, check out Concepts from Timothy Keller's book Prayer. Better yet, buy the book!

Sermon: Good News for People Around Here

(For the complete sermon notes, click on the title.)

This is a repackaging of the 3-sermon series “Good News for Everyone” into a single sermon. For more background on this general topic see Evangelism for the Rest of Us.

At the beginning of the sermon, I introduced Dr. Dean Flemming, my source for some of the core concepts in this sermon. Here is the list of his books:

  • Contextualization in the New Testament: Patterns for Theology and Mission

  • Recovering the Full Mission of God: A Biblical Perspective on Being, Doing, and Telling

  • NBBC, Philippians: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition (New Beacon Bible Commentary)

  • Why Mission? (Reframing the New Testament Theology). This one is just now being released, with a date of 11/2015)

Thanks for letting me worship with you!

Tim