Picture a Repentant Christian

06/25/2017

1. He is Humble
2. He is Earnest

SERMON TEXT:  Psalms 119:97,99-103

Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day long.
I have more insight than all my teachers, for I meditate on your statutes.
I have more understanding than the elders, for I obey your precepts. I have kept my feet from every evil path so that I might obey your word.
I have not departed from your laws, for you yourself have taught me. How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!

Bible Readings

FIRST LESSON:  Exodus 3:1–15

Now Moses was shepherding the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, a priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 2The Angel of the Lord appeared to him in blazing fire from within a bush. Moses saw that the bush was on fire, but the bush was not burning up. 3So he said, “I will go over and look at this amazing sight—to find out why the bush is not burning up.”
4When the Lord saw that Moses had gone over to take a look, God called to him from the middle of the bush and said, “Moses! Moses!”
Moses said, “I am here.”
5The Lord said, “Do not come any closer. Take your sandals off your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.” 6He then said, “I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.”
Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.
7The Lord said, “I have certainly seen the misery of my people in Egypt, and I have heard their cry for help because of their slave drivers. Yes, I am aware of their suffering. 8So I have come down to deliver them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. 9Now indeed, the Israelites’ cry for help has come to me. Yes, I have seen how the Egyptians are oppressing them. 10Come now, I will send you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.”
11But Moses said to God, “Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh, and that I should bring the Israelites out of Egypt?”
12So he said, “I will certainly be with you. This will be the sign to you that I have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will serve God on this mountain.”
13But Moses said to God, “If I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what should I say to them?”
14So God replied to Moses, “I am who I am.” He also said, “You will say this to the Israelites: I am has sent me to you.”
15God also told Moses, “Say this to the Israelites: ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob—has sent me to you. This is my name forever, and this is how I am to be remembered from generation to generation.’

SECOND LESSON:  1 Timothy 1:12–17

I give thanks to the one who empowered me, namely, Christ Jesus our Lord, that he treated me as trustworthy, appointing me into his ministry. He did this even though formerly I was a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a violent man. But I was shown mercy, because I acted ignorantly in unbelief. The grace of our Lord overflowed on me along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. This saying is trustworthy and worthy of full acceptance: “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners,” of whom I am the worst. But I was shown mercy for this reason: that in me, the worst sinner, Christ Jesus might demonstrate his unlimited patience as an example for those who are going to believe in him, resulting in eternal life. Now to the King eternal, to the immortal, invisible, only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.

VERSE OF THE DAY:  2 Corinthians 5:19

God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation

GOSPEL: Matthew 9:9-13

As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting in the tax collector’s booth. He said to him, “Follow me.” Matthew got up and followed him.
As Jesus was reclining at the table in Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were actually there too, eating with Jesus and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
When Jesus heard this, he said to them, “The healthy do not need a physician, but the sick do. Go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.’ In fact, I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”