brokenness on Seven Deadly Sins

The Old Testament portrays the world as it is, no holds barred. In its pages you will find passionate stories of love and hate, blood-chilling stories of rape and dismemberment, matter-of-fact account...

His teeth were like the Ten Commandments: all broken.

Merciful and Holy God, We bow before You in heartfelt confession, acknowledging that we are a broken people, living in a broken world. This world is dark with the stain of sin. Your design for creatio...

I am a bow on your hands, Lord. Draw me, lest I rot. Do not overdraw me, Lord. I shall break. Overdraw me, Lord, and who cares if I break?

Come now, and let us reason together, says the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be like wool. Rend your heart, and not...

Almighty God, too often we settle for brokenness in our lives. Rather than offering forgiveness, we hold onto offense. Rather than pursuing justice, we turn away . Rather than offering mercy, we c...

We want to avoid suffering, death, sin, ashes. But we live in a world crushed and broken and torn, a world God Himself visited to redeem. We receive his poured-out life, and being allowed the high pri...

Preaching Commentary The teachings contained in this passage are, for my money, as difficult to preach as any lectionary text. Not only is each teaching difficult in its own right, but each has also...

To live, we must daily break the body and shed the blood of Creation. When we do this knowingly, lovingly, skillfully, reverently, it is a sacrament. When we do it ignorantly, greedily, clumsily, dest...

Our courteous Lord does not want his servants to despair because they fall often and grievously; for our falling does not hinder him in loving us.

Hope remains possible even amid our failures—whether we disappoint God, let down our families, or fall short of our own expectations—because divine compassion operates like an inexhaustible well. Each...

Almighty God, too often we settle for brokenness in our lives. Rather than offering forgiveness, we hold onto offense. Rather than pursuing justice, we turn away. Rather than offering mercy, we...

The church is not a museum for pristine saints, but a hospital ward for broken sinners.

Preaching Commentary Straight Talk from Jesus Jesus Christ did not mince words.  He seems to have always spoken the unvarnished truth, but, I think, with a smile on his face and compassion in his a...

Human beings do not readily admit desperation. When they do, the kingdom of heaven draws near.

God of mercy, in your gracious presence we confess our sin and the sin of this world. Although Christ is among us as our peace, we are a people divided against ourselves as we cling to the values of a...

Jesus, we receive your blessings and pray for the Holy Spirit to make them real in our lives. Renew a right spirit within us, a poor spirit, a spirit that knows our deep need of your grace and deliver...

Gracious God, on Sundays we come to this place and you fill us up with your goodness and light and we are renewed. But when we go out into the world, we fall short in so many ways. We confess that we ...

As for Christians, well, we really have just one thing going for us. We have publicly declared… that we are desperately in need of Another to give us his righteousness, to complete us, to live in us. ...

Almighty God, we come to You now as Your children because we know we are broken and sinful and need You so much. We have broken our relationship with You and have done things that have hurt You, other...

Where there’s humility there is majesty; where there’s weakness, there’s might; where there is death, there’s life. If you want to get these things don’t disdain those.

Leader: Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed are those who take refuge in him! People: Oh, fear the Lord, you his saints, for those who fear him have no lack! Leader: The young lions s...

Evil and suffering are real . . . They aren’t an illusion, nor are they simply an absence of good. We are fallen creatures living in a fallen world that has been twisted and corrupted by sin, and we a...

Leader: How good it is to sing praises to our God! People: Great are You, Lord and mighty in power. You understand everything about each one of us. You heal the brokenhearted and bind up our wounds....

Preaching Commentary Stop!!!  Do not read further until you have ordered and read Tim Keller’s brief yet very significant book, The Prodigal God: Rediscovering the Heart of the Christian Faith . ...

Excursus on Ash Wednesday The Meaning of Ashes Ashes represent many things. The heaped up ashes in a hearth may indicate the benefit of warmth on a cold winter’s night. The charred remains of a per...

The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places.

In a letter to his son, J. R. R. Tolkien famously wrote, “We all long for [Eden], and we are constantly glimpsing it: our whole nature at its best and least corrupted, its gentlest and most humane, is...

Stop!!!  Do not read further until you have ordered and read Tim Keller’s brief yet very significant book, The Prodigal God: Rediscovering the Heart of the Christian Faith .  Hopefully you are alre...

There is a strength, a power even, in understanding brokenness, because embracing our brokenness creates a need and desire for mercy, and perhaps a corresponding need to show mercy. When you experienc...