Untitled Sermon (2)

Irrisistable Part 1

Good Evening! It is so great to be with you and to be your guest speaker for this week away.

Irresisitable. That is the theme of this year’s week away. I wonder what you find Irresitable? The dictionary definition of the word is something that is ‘too attractive and tempting to be resisted.’ Why don’t you turn to someone next you and ask them something that they find irresistable?

I was finishing off writing this talk a few weeks ago on one of the hottest days of the years. I had a can in the cupboard and I just couldn’t resist

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5k8mGU54V2U

I love coca cola. I mean when you watch that video it just looks so amazing.

As you may know the title of this week’s theme is irresitible. I wonder what you find irresitible? I want to share something of my childhood with you about what I found irresistible.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRdoa5SwVhw

Irresistable Definition: too attractive and tempting to be resisted. I got completely taken in my this colourful little monkey and his animal friends. I mean the song, the fun, the animals the chocolate. It was irresistible. Isn’t that what the advert makers were trying to do. I remember me and my sister actively campaigning and singing the tag line of the avert ‘cos I’d rather have a bowl of coco pops!’ Eventually we got a bowl of coco pops and as the milk was poured in and the milk turned into this chocolate fountain of delight. I was so excited. I remember ensuring that I got the biggest spoonful and takig a big mouthful. The irony is, I hated it. It was too sickly. I had been undone by the marketing ploys of nestle. I wonder how many other people got taken in.

In our first passage in the Bible today it says this

The New Revised Standard Version Jesus Cleanses a Leper

40 A leper came to him begging him, and kneeling he said to him, “If you choose, you can make me clean.” 41 Moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, “I do choose. Be made clean!” 42 Immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean. 43 After sternly warning him he sent him away at once, 44 saying to him, “See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.” 45 But he went out and began to proclaim it freely, and to spread the word, so that Jesus could no longer go into a town openly, but stayed out in the country; and people came to him from every quarter.

I find this so interesting because its the opposite of the marketing industry. So far in Mark’s gospel Jesus has been baptised and gone into the wilderness in Mark 1:9-13. Then Jesus has started to proclaim the ‘good news of God’ in verses 14 and 15. We come to this amazing story in Mark 1:16 where Jesus calls two people

As Jesus passed along the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the sea—for they were fishermen. 17 And Jesus said to them, “Follow me and I will make you fish for people.” 18 And immediately they left their nets and followed him. 19 As he went a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John, who were in their boat mending the nets. 20 Immediately he called them; and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men, and followed him.

The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1989), Mk 1:16–20.

The New Revised Standard Version Jesus and Zacchaeus

He entered Jericho and was passing through it. 2 A man was there named Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was rich. 3 He was trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was short in stature. 4 So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way. 5 When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today.” 6 So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him. 7 All who saw it began to grumble and said, “He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner.” 8 Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” 9 Then Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham. 10 For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”