I’ve devoted the month of January to preaching four sermons on the letters to the seven churches in Revelation 2-3. Four . . . seven . . . how does the math work for this? I got this idea from Dr. Grant Osborne, a professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School.
Osborne notes that three pairs of churches receive similar messages. So, he suggests the following sermon series from Revelation 2-3:
Sermon 1 - The problem of orthodoxy without love (Ephesus)
Sermon 2 - The problem of tolerance (Pergamum, Thyatira)
Sermon 3 - The problem of suffering (Smyrna and Philadelphia)
Sermon 4 - The problem of secularity (Sardis and Laodicea)
I worked with this a bit and developed four sermons around the theme of “What Christ Wants From Our Church.” Here are the big ideas for these sermons:
1. What Christ wants from our church is an undying love (Ephesus)
2. What Christ wants from our church is patient endurance (Smyrna and Philadelphia)
3. What Christ wants from our church is pure worship (Pergamum and Thyatira)
4. What Christ wants from our church is intimate trust (Sardis and Laodicea)
This four-week series has provided an effective challenge for our church as we begin a new year. I can see this series also working well at the beginning of the fall or even as a follow-up to Easter (this is what the resurrected Christ wants from your church). Of course, if you want to extend the series a bit, you can always lengthen it to seven weeks!
Posted by Steve Mathewson at 9:43 AM on January 25, 2008
Comments
This is a great resource. I was speaking with a co-pastor this week about this very topic--we need to prepare a series of sermons about how to be a part of the church. We are a 1 year old church in a southern city that has seen 3/4 of the churches move out to the suburbs. The people we are meeting have never been part of a church, have left God behind or really don't know what separates a church from a humanitarian non-profit. We like preaching out of chunks of the Bible, so this is helpful. Do I need to cite you in the sermon or bulletin or can I do a simple clip art of you on our website? Thanks so much!
Posted by: Jason on February 1, 2008