The Tale of Three Trees
Lent: A Journey to the Cross • Sermon • Submitted
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· 118 viewsA wrap up of the story of the Three Trees and a thought for Communion
Notes
Transcript
13 No one has ever gone to heaven and returned. But the Son of Man has come down from heaven. 14 And as Moses lifted up the bronze snake on a pole in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, 15 so that everyone who believes in him will have eternal life.
32 And when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself.”
Each tree lifted up Jesus in some way!
Each tree carried Jesus in some way to its world.
Like the trees we have a way that God has fashioned us to lift Jesus in our world.
7 A spiritual gift is given to each of us so we can help each other. 8 To one person the Spirit gives the ability to give wise advice; to another the same Spirit gives a message of special knowledge. 9 The same Spirit gives great faith to another, and to someone else the one Spirit gives the gift of healing. 10 He gives one person the power to perform miracles, and another the ability to prophesy. He gives someone else the ability to discern whether a message is from the Spirit of God or from another spirit. Still another person is given the ability to speak in unknown languages, while another is given the ability to interpret what is being said. 11 It is the one and only Spirit who distributes all these gifts. He alone decides which gift each person should have.
11 Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. 12 Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ.
How do you carry and lift Jesus up in your world?
What do YOU do to take Jesus to our world?
How do you live your life in such a way that Jesus is lifted up?
May we lift Jesus so he can draw all people to himself and show all people the Father!!
But, this story also tells us about God's love.
When we see the cross we see God's love for us.
16 “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. 17 God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him. 18 “There is no judgment against anyone who believes in him. But anyone who does not believe in him has already been judged for not believing in God’s one and only Son.
6 When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. 7 Now, most people would not be willing to die for an upright person, though someone might perhaps be willing to die for a person who is especially good. 8 But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.
13 You were dead because of your sins and because your sinful nature was not yet cut away. Then God made you alive with Christ, for he forgave all our sins. 14 He canceled the record of the charges against us and took it away by nailing it to the cross. 15 In this way, he disarmed the spiritual rulers and authorities. He shamed them publicly by his victory over them on the cross.
The third tree does indeed direct our attention to God and God's love!
1 See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.
As we receive communion
…this morning may we ponder God’s love for us.
Love that saves us, forgives us, transforms us and unites us.
But, also love that send us out into the world.
To LIFT UP Jesus to the world we encounter SO THAT our world can have the opportunity to know God’s love for them!