Sermons on Joseph Smith:

Making Peace When There Is No Peace

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Jan 7, 2009

We would like to contribute to world peace, but how? Confront others with their wrongness; but before that, understand your own heart; and before that, be reconciled to God.

"Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God." Well, who wouldn’t like to be that?! Who wouldn’t want to be a peacemaker and be rewarded by God and by a grateful world? "Blessed are the peacemakers." The trouble is, it’s not that easy. You and I may fantasize ...read more

Scripture: Matthew 5:9

Denomination: Baptist

What To Do About A Broken-Down Church

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Jan 7, 2009

God is not committed to maintaining a church just because it is there. His commitment is to maintain us if we show compassion, particularly on the young. Restoration of our church life in challenging times begins with repentance, self-examination.

Two or three weeks ago, on a Sunday morning, I noticed several of you staring straight up here, right into the notch of this arch. I too looked up there, and what we all saw was a sizable piece of paint and plaster hanging there by a mere thread. It looked as though it was poised and ready just in ...read more

Denomination: Baptist

What To Pack In Your Travel Bag

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Jan 7, 2009

Service recognizing students as they leave for school: Pack in your travel bags warmth for others, but no destructive attitudes; and pack gifts to share but no self-destructive feelings.

Everyone say with me the key verse, "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good." Getting ready is the biggest part of taking a trip. It takes almost as long to get ready to leave home as it does to take the trip itself. Around our house, when we’re getting ready to go away, we have ...read more

Scripture: Romans 12:9-21

Denomination: Baptist

What's Done Is Done

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Jan 9, 2009

For Christmas Eve Communion: what God has done in Christ means that peace has been accomplished, and this world’s contradictions have been resolved. The Father’s love has embraced us.

“What’s done is done." We say it when we want to pronounce the final words, when we want to speak the ultimate truth. "What’s done is done", as if so obvious a truth really needed stating. "What’s done is done.” It becomes a way of insisting that there is no more to be said, no more to do, no ...read more

Scripture: Isaiah 9:2-7

Denomination: Baptist

When All Else Fails, Read The Instructions

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Jan 9, 2009

The Bible gives us understanding of human life and relationships, it equips us for effectiveness, and it is the standard by which a church becomes great.

Why do we prefer to stumble along and do a job halfway, when, with just a little effort, we could do it well? Why is it that we will take a stab at something we don’t know how to do, .we will fool with it, we will mess with it, but, if it takes some study to learn to do it right, we’re not ...read more

Scripture: 2 Timothy 3:10-17

Denomination: Baptist

When All Is Said And Done, It Isn't

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Jan 10, 2009

We come to a point when we feel depressed and think our lives have no meaning. Then God blesses us with physical, spiritual, and emotional sustenance, and sends us out to bless someone specific.

"What are you doing here?" What a question! Has anyone ever asked you that? "What are you doing here?" You were some place where nobody expected to see you, but you turned up, and that was the reaction. I have heard it in the grocery store. I cannot go to this Safeway up here without running into ...read more

Scripture: 1 Kings 19:1-18

Denomination: Baptist

Pointing To The Light Series

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Jan 11, 2009

John the Baptist knew who he was not and who he was, and accepted his task of pointing to Christ. Our mistakes are imagining that we are more than we are, or that we are less than we are. The real task is: just point to the light.

My son and his wife live in a five-level townhouse in Reston, Virginia. You enter into a kind of combination corridor and stairwell at the second level. Typically I turn right when I arrive and go into the kitchen area. But when I leave that level to go to another one, I walk out of that kitchen ...read more

Scripture: John 1:1-28

Denomination: Baptist

Turn Aside And Look Series

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Mar 1, 2009

We so often live with tunnel vision. But if we turn aside and look at what God is doing, we will find an experience that will not end, a mission that will direct our lives, and a presence that will never leave us.

I confess to a malady known as “tunnel vision”. Tunnel vision is being able to see only what is straight ahead, as if I were going through a tunnel, and there is nothing to see on the sides, only the light at the end of the tunnel. Tunnel vision is not so much a condition of the eyes as it is of ...read more

Scripture: Exodus 3:1-15

Denomination: Baptist

A Loaf Of Bread, A Jug Of Wine, And Laughter

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Mar 3, 2009

Dated 1989. Our faith is not joyless. God uses the simplest of things to bring us support and gladness in the midst of difficult times.

Says the poet, "A loaf of bread, a jug of wine, and Thou beside me singing in the wilderness … Wilderness were paradise enow" The very picture of romantic fulfillment. All I need is a chunk of good fragrant bread, a flask full of the vintner’s art, and you whom I love, and I will be fulfilled. ...read more

Scripture: Ecclesiastes 10:19

Denomination: Baptist

The River Jordan: How We Got Over Series

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Mar 3, 2009

Many things look impossible, particularly if we are worn down by the "too much" of survival. But there are those who go before us and test the waters and make a way for us. We need to do the same for others. Black History Month

Have you enjoyed watching the Winter Olympics? Isn’t it amazing what those skaters and the skiers can do? Isn’t it astounding that human bodies can plummet down slopes and whiz through channels at what seems like supersonic speed? I’ve only seen snatches of the Olympics, but I’ve thoroughly ...read more

Scripture: Joshua 3:7-16

Denomination: Baptist

The River Nile: Drawn Out Of The Waters Series

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Mar 4, 2009

Racism grows out of the fears of the oppressors and attacks the leaders of those they fear. But God draws out of the waters that were intended to drown those whom He will use to lead His people to victory.

The River Nile. The great river of Egypt, a historic stream that rises in the heart of Africa and flows northward for hundreds and hundreds of miles, bringing life to Egypt. Langston Hughes says, "I’ve known rivers; I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in ...read more

Denomination: Baptist

What It Takes To Be Heard By God

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Mar 5, 2009

If you want to be heard by God, make sure God and not others are your audience, make sure that it is really you who is speaking, and make sure to forgive and to receive forgiveness.

The morning worship service had reached an emotional climax during the pastor’s fervent prayer. He had carefully crafted it with fine liturgical phrases, hallowed by centuries of use. It was backed up by a throbbing organ, playing a hymn that gently drew worshipers back to thoughts of that amazing ...read more

Scripture: Matthew 6:1-15

Denomination: Baptist

When Life Turns Sour Series

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Mar 15, 2009

When life turns sour, tell yourself the truth, complain to God, and He will deliver. Message focuses on Dylan Thomas’ poem, "Do not go gentle into that good night; rage, rage against the dying of the light."

On a warm spring evening in 1952, at his home in Swansea in Wales, David John Thomas lay on his deathbed. Once a soldier who had fought in the Second World War, later an English teacher, Thomas had become very frail in his later years. There was no doubt that he would die soon. There was no ...read more

Scripture: Job 10:1-22

Denomination: Baptist

Letting The Pro Do It: Job's Friend God Series

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Mar 17, 2009

We want to manage our own spiritual lives, but the truth is we do not understand,nor do we know enough. Trust God, who has vindicated our hope in Christ the sufferer now victorious.

There is a certain kind of person who seldom trusts anybody but himself to get things right. Some of us want to have our hands in every stewpot, we want to be up to our ears in every enterprise, we want to do it ourselves, or else we are afraid it won’t be done right. Do you remember that a few ...read more

Denomination: Baptist

Walk The Walk, Sing The Song

Contributed by Joseph Smith on Mar 17, 2009

To have singing joy in our hearts, we must be ready to serve when God’s time comes, to discern the will of God, and to avoid all escape mechanism.

I would wager that most of you can finish this sentence. You will have heard it a thousand times. Try it. "If you are going to talk the talk, then you have to what?" "Walk the walk". If you’re going to talk the talk, then you have to walk the walk. It means, of course, that what you profess ...read more

Scripture: Ephesians 5:15-20

Denomination: Baptist