Before you get to reading this post (and please do), a little house cleaning.  I’ve been reading a series by the pastor of a church in Great Britain, Jon Gleason, to which I want to recommend you.  He’s been preaching on bibliology and has written corresponding posts to those sermons:  inspiration, inerrancy, authority, preservation.  These are great work, especially significantly good work on the inspiration part.  Please read them.  Here are the various offerings (part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8).

We had a little down time in uploading sermons to our church website, but there is a regular flow of them again here.

Proceed to the post without passing go.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Al Davis, NFL Hall of Famer and owner of the Oakland Raiders, died during this professional football season.  He gets credit for his famous slogan, “Just win, baby.”  This, I believe, reduced his football philosophy to its bare minimum.  You don’t get points for artistic value, just another number in either the win or the loss column, so just win, baby.

If you reduced what Jesus did in His ministry, it would be “just preach.”  I’m going to drop the “baby” part, but I get the “just…” aspect, so that will stay.

The Raiders could have won the yardage war, won the turnover battle, won the quarterback rating, but lost the game and, therefore, failed.  They could have been the most entertaining, lost, and so failed.  I recognize they have done a lot of losing in the last decade, but that’s not my point.  I’m more of a 49er guy myself, but I’m just sayin’ that I get what Al Davis was talking about, football-wise.

As we evaluate the life of Jesus, he was in Judea and preached.  He went to Galilee and preached.  He traveled to Samaria and preached.  He crossed over to Perea and preached.  He left for Caesaria-Philippi and preached.  He moved up to Tyre and Sidon and preached.  He preached everywhere.  He preached in every town and village in Galilee.  He just preached.

He just preached, and then what do we do?  We often don’t preach.  We invite.  We plan events.  We put on things.  We coordinate.  And then don’t preach.

Rushing yards, good.  Passing yards, good.  Tackles, good.  Sacks, good.  Excitement, good.  And then lose the game—well, the ultimate in bad.

If you preach, then you won.  You did what you were to do.  You followed Jesus’ example.  You reached the goal.  Even if none to few were saved.

Draw a circle around your area on a map.  Has your church, have you, been to everyone in that area to preach?  If not, then maybe you really are missing why you’re still here.