All posts by Paul Tillman

call to worship, passion week

Call to Worship: Palm Sunday

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This Call to Worship was inspired by Mike Cosper’s A Call to Worship for Palm Sunday – From Philippians 2.

One of the stories we have of Jesus in the Gospels is the temptations of Jesus by Satan. Jesus was tempted for 40 days, and overcame Satan. Someone could easily think that after beating Satan, Jesus went through the rest of his life never facing temptation again,  but we should consider Palm Sunday. Before Jesus entered Jerusalem, he had been telling his disciples that he was going to suffer and die in Jerusalem. Then when he arrived at Jerusalem, he is greeted as king. Jesus could have declared his kingship, and been supported; that had to be a temptation. It is very similar to a temptation by the devil. Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. “All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me” (Matt. 4:8-9). We are thankful that Jesus did not give in to temptation to be made king by the devil or human means.

Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form, he humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal’s death on a cross. Therefore, God elevated him to the place of highest honor and gave him the name above all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Philippians 2:6-11

©2011 Paul Tillman

call to worship, sacrifice

Call to Worship: How to Save a Life (not the way of The Fray)

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I became an uncle, as well as a father this year. I unfortunately could not find the original story to link back to, but this week’s sermon theme reminded me of a news story in which an uncle saved his niece when the deck they were on collapsed. He realized the deck was collapsing and they could not get to safety, so he picked her up, protected her in a bear hug, and took the force of the fall himself. They both survived, the niece with barely a scratch, but the uncle broke his back. (If anyone remembers this story and has a link, please send it to me.) Continue reading Call to Worship: How to Save a Life (not the way of The Fray) →

Israel, travel log

Israel Log 12 March 2011

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Church of St Anne

On our final day in Israel, nearly everyone chose to return to the Jerusalem Old City. At first many of use toured together visiting stations we missed along the Via Delarosa. St. Anne’s Church is the first Station of the Cross and is the only intact Crusader Church in the country. Saladin preserved this church to use as an Islamic school. It is there that we saw the ruins of what was the Pools of Bethesda. Continue reading Israel Log 12 March 2011 →

Israel, travel log

Israel Log 11 March 2011

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Again, wanting to ensure we “got our money’s worth” Dr. Williams ran us ragged through Jerusalem and a few outlying areas. I would like to say parenthetically, that although most of these sites are the mostly likely places that these events occurred, and experiences there can be, and we moving, it struck me how we have covered over all these places that would be fitting memorial, a pillar of stones as was done in the Old Testament, with all the trappings of Christendom. I would have preferred to climb a dusty rocky hill to the place where Christ was crucified like Balian did in Kingdom of Heaven, than climb a narrow staircase in an Orthodox church filled with shiny icons, only to see a two-foot by four-foot piece of the hill under a glass case. In some cases, I would have rather stood on the rock than those marble floors, but perhaps that is my Protestant background showing through.

The Garden of Gethsemane Continue reading Israel Log 11 March 2011 →
Israel, travel log

Israel Log 10 March 2011

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al-Aqsa Mosque

The crescendo hit early today, and the rain stayed with us all day. We began with a visit to the Temple Mount. Although the mosque on the mount is impressive, as a Christian I found the visit underwhelming and intrusive. I may understand better why the Jews have such a problem with regard to this mount. That is where their temple has been since Solomon, and it has been sacred space for them since Abraham, yet there is not a trace of anything Jewish atop the mount. Continue reading Israel Log 10 March 2011 →

Israel, travel log

Israel Log 8 March 2011

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Today is the day I dealt with my issues about real and pseudo biblical sites. Up until now we had been visiting archeological sites, but today we began to visit sites “where tradition says” something happened. During the trip, I asked Dr. Williams, “How much stock do we put in tradition when evaluating a site?” Dr. Williams did not even pretend that some of these traditional sites were the actual place where a biblical event took place. Instead he reminded us that part of being a Christian is faith, not faith that an event happened at a certain place, but that the event happened. Where we remember the event is not as important. Furthermore, when an actual site is found it often becomes a shrine that overshadows the event.

Paul being baptized by Shawn Continue reading Israel Log 8 March 2011 →