Such as some preach…
(1) Expository sermons
This type of sermon generally is used in preaching on a large passage of scripture or one of the books of the Bible.
(2) Textual sermons
The Textual sermon is similar to the Expositor sermon using only a smaller passage of scripture, instead of using a large passage of scripture.
(3) Topical
Topical Sermon focuses mainly on a particular topic, or a topic within the text. Points do not necessarily come from one single text
The topical sermon both topical and textual sermons, the Bible passage is used as support material for the topic.
In expository sermons, the Bible passage is the topic, and support materials are used to explain and clarify it.
(4) SERMON SERIES
Sermon series is more like a combination of expository and textual forms of sermon. They are taken from the passages itself and then made into an exposition.
(5) Narrative sermon
The narrative sermon generally is composed of using a Bible story and making comparison to make a spiritual point.
(6) Some preacher preaches SCATTER BRAINS SERMONS.
Whatever triggers their brain pops out of their mouths.
They have no theme, they just chase RABBITS and it is no telling what is going to come out of their mouths
Illus: A pastor announced after the close of the service, the Church Board gathered at the back of the sanctuary for the announced meeting.
• But a stranger was in their midst — a visitor who had never attended their church.
• “My friend,” said the pastor, “Didn’t you understand that this is a meeting of the Board?”
• “Yes,” said the visitor, “and after today’s sermon, I suppose I’m just about as bored as anyone else who came to this meeting.”
The reason I mention these types of sermons is to mention I believe if the Apostle Paul was here on earth preaching today, I believe he would use all five kinds of these sermons in his preaching except for the SCATTER BRAIN SERMON.
BASEBALL
For example, in reading the scriptures we can see that Paul refers to sports, such as:
(1) Boxing
(2) Running the race
(3) Wrestling
Paul knew something about sports and if Paul was living today he might take the game of FOOTBALL and make some spiritual similarities as I will do today in this sermon.
Most of us agree that football fans fall in the category of being strange!
Illus: Erma Bombeck said, if a husband watches more than 3 football games a week the wife should have him declared legally brain dead and have his estate probated.
But one thing that you will notice among football fans is all the bragging that takes place among them about their team.
Illus: Many of you may not be aware of this, but when Mickey Byrd was in high school someone wrote an unsigned letter to South Carolina football coach and told him that Mickey was the best football player to come out of his home town in its history.
They interviewed him and told him that they had gotten a letter saying that he was outstanding football player.
• He said, "I don't like to brag but I do alright."
• They said, "We hear that you can run pretty fast. Can you run the hundred in 10 seconds?"
• He said, "The last time I ran it I did it in 9.2 seconds." They replied, "That's unreal.
• We also heard that you can kick a football pretty good."
• He said, "To tell you the truth I can kick a football so hard that in the last three weeks I kicked the football so hard it just burst into pieces."
• They said, "That's almost unbelievable."
• "What else can you do?"
• "I can throw the football 70 yards in the air with pin point accuracy.
• I can run the ball. I can tackle. I can block. There's not anything that I cannot do on a football field!"
• Finally the coach said, “Wait a minute. There's got to be a problem. I bet you're dumb and you can't make the grades necessary to stay on the team. If we give you a scholarship you'll flunk out."
• Mickey said, "No, I'm a straight “A” student. I've been a straight “A” student since I was in kindergarten. I've never made anything but straight A's on everything I've ever done."
• The coach finally said, "I just can't believe it. Don't you have at least one weakness? There's bound to be at least one weakness in your life. Tell us what your weakness is."
• Mickey thought about it for a minute and finally said, "Well, I do lie a lot when it comes to football!"
If the Apostle Paul was alive and played football he would be telling the truth that he was truly an outstanding football player and he made TOUCH DOWN AFTER TOUCH DOWN!!!
As I already mention the apostle Paul in his writings often referred to various types of sports, such as:
• Running a race
• Boxing
• Wrestling
Sometime back I preached a sermon that I believe if Paul was living today he would preach on baseball.
(1) Using first base as salvation. That is, if you do not tag first base there is no need to go to the other bases. It is a MUST YOU HAVE TO TAG FIRST BASE BEFORE YOU GO ANY FURTHER.
(2) Second base baptism. The first thing a person is commanded to do after salvation is follow the Lord in Believer’s baptism
(3) Third base is church membership. A Christian should unite with a Bible teaching church in promoting the gospel
(4) Home plate represent Heaven
Paul would have preached a sermon on baseball.
An most likely today if the apostle Paul was preaching today he would preach a sermon on football.
Why?
Because there are many similarities between football and the Christian life.
Such as…
I. Paul was proud to be on God’s team
Look at Galatians 6:14 But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.
The cross stands as the greatest event in the whole history of the universe.
There is no salvation and no hope outside the cross of Christ.
The cross is the dividing barrier in the world. You are on one side or the other and cannot be in the middle. You belong to Christ, or you are against Him.
Matthew 12:30 He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad.
• A person who has not been crucified at the cross cannot claim to be on God’s team.
• There are two systems, and you belong to only one.
• Paul was very proud to be on the Lord’s team.
Galatians 6:14 But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.
He was PROUD to be on God’s team!!!
Illus: For example,
In this congregation we have those who are proud to be on the team of…
• The Clemson “Tiger” team
• The South Carolina “Game Cocks” team.
They will only boast on their Team.
Illus: They wear hats, jerseys, and have bumper stickers on their car to let everyone know they are proud of their team.
Paul was so proud to be on the Lord’s team that he said if the crowd knew what He knew about Christ, THEY WOULD NOT HAVE CRUCIFIED THE LORD JESUS.
Paul is telling us also in 1 Corinthians 2:8 Which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
Paul was PROUD to be on the Lord’s team, and he BOASTED OF IT!!!
Before we go any further, I want to take a look at this word boasting.
• The word boasts means to get glory from.
• It can also mean to vaunt oneself, meaning to blow your own trumpet and announce your importance and impressiveness to the world.
The cross was the only substance that Paul would glory in. The salvation Jesus procured, and the hope of all mankind in redemption, is the only aspect Paul would boast about.
It means he believed it and took great delight in making it known.
This is unlike the Pharisees who took delight in themselves and wanted to be noticed.
The cross stands as the greatest event in the whole history of the universe.
Paul was very proud to be on the Lord’s team!!!
Illus: Football fan will wear the color of their team proudly. He/she is always ready to tell someone about their great team.
For example, according to I Peter 3:15, we read, “…ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear.”
Paul was proud to be on God’s team!!!
Also, we see a similarity in football in the Christian life…
II. You have to have respect for your opposition STRENGTH.
Illus: Rush Limbaugh when he was alive on his radio program was talking about who would win the Super Bowl.
He said you can tell for sure who will lose when they arrive to play when they get off the airplane.
How?
He said the team that unloads off of the airplane with their CAM CORDERS will lose.
He said they have not come to play football they are on a vacation, not to BEAT THE OPPOSING TEAM.
We Christians are in the biggest battle that has ever been fought on the face of the earth and we have to recognize SATAN IS SERIOUS IN THAT HE HAS COME TO DEMOLISH EVERY CHURCH ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH.
We do not have to fear the devil but we certainly better not under estimate his desire and ability to win.
He has beaten some churches so bad they have had to close their doors in defeat.
Illus: According to Lifeway Research about 4,500 Protestant churches closed in 2019, the last year data is available, with about 3,000 new churches opening.
That is a 1500 difference!!!
With this scoreboard the devil is putting a brutal beating on God’s Church today.
Again, we do not have to fear the devil but we certainly should healthy respect for him as a formidable enemy.
Illus: Many of the churches today remind me of Samson and Delilah, SAMSON WAS PLAYING BUT DELILAH WAS SERIOUS!!!
Illus: Many of the churches today makes you think of children PLAYING CHURCH.
• Preachers pretending to be preachers
• Sunday School teachers pretending to be teachers
• Ushers pretending to be ushers
• Deacons pretending to be deacons
• Church members pretending to be Christians
In this age of AI, we now have robots that dress up and look like humans. Push a button and they can talk and walk.
• Many fear that these robots are going to take the jobs of the American people…THIS IS A REAL CONCERN!
• But a danger that is more dangerous than that we have HUMANS who profess to be Christians who play church each week in some churches.
WHERE IS THE SERIOUSNESS IN MANY CHURCHES TODAY, IT IS ONLY A GAME THAT SOME CHURCHES PLAY EACH WEEK.
Illus: When the church service is over they put the church service on the SHELVE until next week and they play this same game week after week!!!
Illus: Many churches today remind me of the song in 1959 by the Platters “Oh YEA, I AM THE GREAT PRETENDER.
Illus: Did you ever wonder if the people who wrote the Bible actually expected the readers of the letters to do what they said?
• I mean, did they really think that what they said was so important?
• Would they play church and pretend what they said was important.
The things we find in the scriptures God expect us to believe in what the Bible teaches and not play church
If Paul was living today he would most likely make reference to football because of the similarities between football and Christianity
• God’s people have got to be SERIOUS in serving the Lord if they expect to beat the devil.
• Because one thing for sure he is SERIOUS in trying to defeat God’s people.
Another similarity we Christians have with football…
III. BOTH HAVE SPECTATORS.
And we Christians have people watching us daily.
Paul is a man who played in the game of life and his career as a Christian is soon coming to an end. He has had a lot of opposition in the Christian life, but He has scored “touchdown after touch down!”
Look at II Timothy 4:6-8, we read, for I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. 7 I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: 8 Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.
As Paul is writing this about his successful life as a Christian I think it would be safe for him to say, “I scored touch down after touch down!” He is, in effect, writing his own epitaph.
You know what an epitaph is don’t you?
Let me share with you some real epitaph, such as:
• “Here lies Lester Moore. Four slugs from a forty-four. No Les. No Moore.”
• Here lies
Johnny Yeast
Pardon me
For not rising.
• In a Georgia cemetery:
"I told you I was sick!"
• Here lies an Atheist
All dressed up
And no place to go.
• Dr. Fred Roberts, Brookland, Arkansas had this written on his tombstone, on two words: Office upstairs!
What would you like for someone to write on your tombstone?
Hopefully your loved ones will not carve on your headstone when you die.
Here lies John Doe
Who died at 85, but stopped living at 43.”
All his life he never did anything
He was only a Spectator!!!
Can you imagine anything anymore horrible to stand before the Lord and your life only reveals you have only been a spectator your whole life.
Using the football analogy Paul’s epitaph could have easily been “Touch Down!”
I believe Paul would describe the football field also as….
IV. A BATTLE FIELD
Illus: The Bible describes the life of a Christian in four ways:
• As a journey,
• As a battle,
• As a pilgrimage,
• As a race.
I believe we can call the football field a BATTLE FIELD.
So often Christians seem to think that life is a PLAY GROUND, but in actuality the Bible says it is a BATTLE GROUND!
War is a fact of life! We have people who live in this dream world of living in a world without wars.
• Nonsense! There will always be evil dictators like Hitler, Saddam Hussein, Asama Bin Laden and Putin that wants the world to bow down to them.
And they will slaughter people by the millions to bring this about and someone has to stand up to these THUGS and say, IT IS TIME THAT THE HUMAN RACE ELIMINATE YOU!
• The same thing can be said about the Christian life. There are those who want to live in a dream world and think that THE CHRISTIAN LIFE is one big PLAY GROUND where we all can have fun!
It would be nice if that was the case, but there is a devil out there that does everything that he can do to turn life into one big BATTLE GROUND and we have to be willing to PUT ON THE ARMOUR OF GOD and go to war with that rascal EVERY DAY OF OUR LIFE!
Football fans put football first in their life. So does the true Christian
The football fan has made football their god. You can see this crowd up in the grand stand in snow, ice and freezing rain.
And Christianity is similar in that we do not allow anything to come between us and the God we serve.
We are on the battlefield; we are fighting a SPIRITUAL WAR.
Illus; I am on the battle field for my Lord.
Illus: We have heard that the war in Iraq is different than any war we have ever fought. In the past we knew where the enemy was and we could attack them at any given time.
But in Iraq we are fighting terrorist that looks like everyone else and do not know who we are fighting. But even though we cannot see them we know they are there!
• Also, in the Christian life while we cannot see the enemy, it is also vitally important that we recognize that we are in a war with Satan.
But at the same time we cannot see the ENEMY also we cannot see Lord.
This is what makes this SPIRITUAL WAR WE FIND OURSELVES VERY DIFFICULT.
WE LIVE IN AN INVISIBLE WORLD, WE CANNOT SEE THE ENEMY.
There is an INVISBLE WORLD that EXISTS just as much as there is a VISIBLE WORLD.
Just because you and I can not see anything does not mean it does not exist.
For example:
(1) You and I can not see electricity but all we have to do to do is stick our finger in an electric socket and we will find out immediately, electricity can not be seen but it is DOES EXIST.
Listen, you and I can not see electricity, BUT IT IS THERE even if we can not see it!
(2)You and I cannot see the wind, but yet we step outside we feel the wind blowing against our faces.
There are many things we can not see, but we know they exist.
Most of us accept reality when it comes to those things see, hear, touch, smell, or taste.
For example:
• The Bible I am holding in my hands is real I can see it.
• These pews are real because I can see and touch them.
• The roast in the oven I know is real because I can smell it.
• I know these things are real because I can experience them with the senses God has given me.
But when we begin to talk about that which is invisible, those things that we cannot be seen, heard, touched, smelled, or tasted, we tend to think that those things are not real.
And if we think they are real they seem to be at a lesser level of reality than the visible world. Nothing could be further from the truth:
Paul said in Ephesians 6:12, we read, for we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
Listen, the fact is:
• While we exist in this present visible world
• We also exist simultaneously in the unseen world that Paul describes here.
If we are going to be able to say at the end or our life like Paul did, “Touch Down!” we are going to have to recognize we live in a VISIBLE WORLD but also in an INVISIBLE WORLD EACH DAY!
Beyond this world of our senses is the unseen world and I am here to tell you even though you cannot see the devil is there doing everything he can do to trip you up as a Christian.
It is in this unseen world that we fight against the principalities and powers that seek to do us harm. If we are going to score a TOUCH DOWN, it is essential that we recognized THE INVISIBLE WORLD in which we also live.
Also, if we are going to score a TOUCH DOWN, we are going to have to recognize His army is with us.
Once Elisha and his servant were confronted with the army of King Aram which had surrounded the city. The servant saw the chariots of the enemy and began to despair.
The servant saw how that they were surrounded and said
• "Ah, my lord, what will we do now?"
• Elisha said "Don’t be afraid!" Elisha told him. "For there are more on our side than on theirs!"
• Then Elisha prayed, "O LORD, open his eyes and let him see!"
• The LORD opened his servant’s eyes, and when he looked up, he saw that the hillside around Elisha was filled with horses and chariots of fire. 2 Kings 6:15b-17
If we are going to score a “Touch Down” we have to recognize WE LIVE AN INVISIBLE WORLD and also those we are fighting an INVISIBLE ENEMY!
But while we recognize the enemy is REAL AND INVISIBLE so the LORD JESUS! If we are going score a “Touch Down” we need to recognize also-WE DO NOT FIGHT FOR VICTORY, WE FIGHT FROM VICTORY.
In other words, we have already won this battle, only the enemy does not know it yet!
Conclusion:
What kind of epitaph will men place on your headstone?
• Got knocked down and did not get up!
• Fumble the ball and advance the enemy position
• Or that you scored a “Touch Down!”
We have looked at:
I. We live in an invisible world
II. We are fighting an invisible war.
III. Our foe is formidable.
IV. We must respect our foe.
V. We do not fight for victory, we fight from victory.
Illus: I am like the fellow that is reading a book where all the bad guys are doing the winning. But he would often turn to the end of the book and read the last few pages. And every time he did this he would smile. Someone asked him why he was smiling reading that book about those bad fellows, he said, “Because I have looked at the last chapter of the book and I know how things are going to end!”
And that is the way it is with Christian life, we have read the last chapter, and we know how this thing is going to end.
