Podcast Bible Study on Luke 14:1-14

A Bible Study taught by Pastor Lewis Polzin on August 28, 2013 at Trinity Lutheran Church in Bemidji, MN, on Luke 14:1-14. This Bible Study will help to lay a foundation for the sermon that is preached the following Sunday.

The sermon recording may also be accessed by clicking the title of this blog post and playing it in your browser.

Podcast Sermon: Luke 13:22-30

A sermon preached by Pastor Lewis Polzin on August 25, 2013 at Trinity Lutheran Church in Bemidji, MN, on Luke 13:22-30. The text of this sermon may be found at the following web address: http://apastoralapproach.blogspot.com/2013/08/sermon-luke-1322-30.html. The sermon recording may also be accessed by clicking the title of this blog post and playing it in your browser.

Sermon: Luke 13:22-30

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  Amen.

The text this morning is from the Gospel of Luke, the 13th chapter:

He went on his way through towns and villages, teaching and journeying toward Jerusalem. And someone said to him, “Lord, will those who are saved be few?” And he said to them, “Strive to enter through the narrow door. For many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able.”

Thus far the text.

Dear friends in Christ,

     I have to confess something.  I, your pastor, Lewis Polzin, love Japanese game shows.  Now, normally, loving a game show wouldn’t be a problem.  And really, this isn’t.  But it is weird.  Imagine taking something like Wheel of Fortune, mixing it with Capture the Flag, standing on your head while wearing a wetsuit, throw in monkey, and act like everything is comepletely normal.  And that’s a very mild Japanese game show.  

     Now, it’s not just the game show I love, but really a game in it that is just fantastic.  You might have seen it on the Ellen show, if you watch that.  Or you might have caught clips on YouTube.  It’s called Human Tetris.  In Human Tetris, a person standing at the end of a long runway, must contort his body in order to pass through a wall that is hurtling at him.  The catch is that, cut out of the wall, is a shape that could be anything.  I’ve seen numbers, letters, a person doing the splits in the air, a tiny hole, everything and anything you possibly could or could not imagine.  If a person doesn’t mold his or her body to that exact shape, the wall bears down on them, smacks into their miscontorted body, and throws them into a pool of water where everyone laughs at and mocks them.  They have a very small margin for error.  Most people miss it, and it’s hilarious.  I promise.

Podcast Bible Study on Luke 13:22-30

A Bible Study taught by Pastor Lewis Polzin on August 21, 2013 at Trinity Lutheran Church in Bemidji, MN, on Luke 13:22-30. This Bible Study will help to lay a foundation for the sermon that is preached the following Sunday.

The sermon recording may also be accessed by clicking the title of this blog post and playing it in your browser.

Podcast Sermon: Hebrews 11:17-31, 12:1-3

A sermon preached by Pastor Lewis Polzin on August 18, 2013 at Trinity Lutheran Church in Bemidji, MN, on Hebrews 11:17-31, 12:1-3. The text of this sermon may be found at the following web address: http://apastoralapproach.blogspot.com/2013/08/sermon-hebrews-1117-31-121-3.html. The sermon recording may also be accessed by clicking the title of this blog post and playing it in your browser.

Sermon: Hebrews 11:17-31, 12:1-3

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  Amen.

The text this morning is from our reading of the Epistle to the Hebrews, the 11th and 12^th chapters:

By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son, of whom it was said, “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.” He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back…Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted. 

Thus far the text.

Dear friends in Christ,

     Paul Harvey, many of you remember him well, had an old radio show, News and Comment, with perhaps his most famous segment, The Rest of the Story.  In this segment, Paul Harvey grabbed his listeners with fascinating tales and long-forgotten facts about people like Richard Nixon, Charles Manson, Paul McCartney, or Adolf Hitler, or things like the light bulb, the history of basketball, Julio Gallo wine, or the invention of the laptop.  Paul Harvey was a master storyteller in just three minutes.  And he did that by making you feel the story, know the story, be interested in the story, and, ultimately, be a part of the story, hiding the common detail that binds it all together, transporting you into the circumstances that drove the story to Harvey’s ultimate conclusion, “Now you know… the rest of the story.”

     What the author of Hebrews is doing here in chapter 11 is the very same thing.  For his listeners, he is his generation’s Paul Harvey, and the rest of the story that he is telling takes us to his ultimate conclusion: Jesus.  The story being told wraps you inside the history.  And the history is like a time machine, transporting you across time and space.  It makes you realize that you are part of the bigger story.

     And so we are.  We are part of the bigger story. And the only thing that matters to our story this morning is faith.  It isn’t the people of the story; it’s faith.  You see, the author here recounts how the old saints were like Jesus, what they did through Him.  He doesn’t tell the whole story right away.  He tells about Jesus.  What matters is Jesus, what matters is forgiveness, what matters is faith.

Ordination and Installation Service of Rev. Lewis R. Polzin

On August 11, 2013, I experienced the third most important event in my life, following my baptism into Christ's Kingdom and my wonderful marriage to Elizabeth, by being ordained into the Office of the Holy Ministry at Trinity Lutheran Church in Bemidji, Minnesota, and subsequently installed as their pastor. Thanks be to God that He has brought me safely thus far, and that, by the Office He grants me in my ordination as a pastor of His Church, He leads many sheep to pasture. What a great joy this day was, and one that I will remember forever.

Podcast Bible Study on Hebrews 11:17-31, 12:1-3

A Bible Study taught by Pastor Lewis Polzin on August 14, 2013 at Trinity Lutheran Church in Bemidji, MN, on Hebrews 11:17-31, 12:1-3. This Bible Study will help to lay a foundation for the sermon that is preached the following Sunday.

The sermon recording may also be accessed by clicking the title of this blog post and playing it in your browser.

(Apologies for the awful recording. This should be fixed in future recordings.)