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Third Sunday after Epiphany (cycle a)
HumorPeace & JusticeNexGen Worship | Clergy Tips
Lent Devotional  | Valentine's Day 
 

Texts & Discussion:

Isaiah 9:1-4
Psalm 27:1,4-9
1 Corinthians 1:10-18
Matthew 4:12-23

Other Resources:

Commentary:

Matthew Henry,    Wesley

Word Study:
Robertson

This Week's Themes:

Light of the World
Unity of Believers
"Be Ye Fishers of Men"


 



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Prayer&Litanies
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Sermons:


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The Lighthouse
Matthew 4:12-23
HW in HI  

Good morning. I want to talk a little bit this morning about a lighthouse. When I was a little kid, there was a lighthouse at Makapu’u on Oahu, and one at Lanikai near Kailua. Are there any lighthouses around here?

Well, this is a story about a lighthouse. This lighthouse is on a dangerous coast where there are a lot of shipwrecks. This lighthouse was very simple, and had just one boat. But the people who volunteered there were committed and kept a constant watch over the sea. Looking for ships in distress. When a ship went down, they unselfishly went out day or night to save the lost.

So many lives were saved by that lighthouse that it became famous. Then a lot of people wanted to be associated with it, and give their time, talent, and money to support the important work of the lighthouse. New boats were bought, new crews were recruited, and they had a formal training session. As the membership in the life-saving station grew, some of the members became unhappy that the building was so simple and that the equipment was so old. They wanted a better place to welcome the survivors pulled from the sea. So they replaced the emergency cots with soft beds and put in better furniture and enlarged and decorated the place.

The lighthouse became a popular gathering place for its members. They met regularly and when they did, you could see how they loved one another. They greeted each other, hugged each other, and shared the events of their lives.

But something funny happened. Fewer and fewer members were now interested in going to sea on life-saving missions; so they hired lifeboat crews to do this for them. Then a big ship was wrecked off of the coast, and the hired crews brought into the life-saving station boatloads of cold, wet, dirty, sick, and half-drowned people. Some were first-class cabin passengers of the ship, and some were the deck hands. The beautiful meeting place became a place of chaos. The plush carpets got dirty. Some of the exquisite furniture got scratched. So the property committee immediately had a shower built outside the house where the victims of shipwreck could be cleaned up before coming inside.

At the next meeting of the lighthouse members there was disagreement. Most of the members wanted to stop the club's life-saving activities, for they were unpleasant and expensive. Other members insisted that life-saving was their primary purpose and pointed out that they were still called to be a lighthouse and a life-saving station. But they were finally voted down and told that if they wanted to save the lives of all those various kinds of people who would be shipwrecked, they could begin their own life-saving station down the coast.

And they did. As the years passed, the new lighthouse experienced the same changes that had taken place in the old. The new lighthouse became a place to meet regularly for fellowship, for committee meetings, and for special training sessions about their mission, but few went out to the drowning people. The drowning people were no longer welcomed in that new lighthouse. So another life-saving lighthouse was started further down the coast. History continued to repeat itself.

If we were to visit this coast today, we would find a number of adequate meeting places with ample parking and plush carpeting. Shipwrecks still happen, but most people drown.

That story was written by Thomas Wedel almost 50 years ago. Today we have modern radios and Loran for ships to communicate. But I’m guessing that story was about more than lighthouses.  [continue]