Sermonette

William B. Noddy, Pastor

His Glory Non-denominational Community Church

Greetings, friends, brothers and sisters,

The response to my first sermon on the internet was overwhelming; shame on many of you and you know who you are. I won’t say it’s blasphemy to say such things about a man of the cloth who is spreading the good news of the Lord, but it certainly is rude.

To the rest of you, I say, Welcome! The Lord knows you and understands your suffering, Be Not Afraid.

Today, I am going to talk about forgiveness. Like grace, and mercy, and kindness, and niceness and goodness, forgiveness springs from The Lord Thy God. Forgiveness is the greatest of these that we get from the Lord, and I’ll tell you why: Because you and I are filthy sinners, wretched and disgusting to behold.

All of us, every one of us reading this and writing this right now, though of course my right now is not your right now, but this right now is right now to you, that’s part of the miracle of how God’s Word works, anyway all of us right now, are sinners. You certainly are, even I am.

Thank God the Lord can forgive us, for if He could not, such is the soil on our souls from our selfish and shameful and often even illegal sins that we would not be able to enjoy any of the other blessings of the Lord, once we sinned for the first time. For most of us, that was about age three. If it weren’t for the forgiveness of the Lord, we would have to go from about age three to eternity without ever knowing the goodness of God.

But, we don’t. Because, the Lord knows you, and understands your sins, and if your heart is contrite, and if in your heart you promise you’ll never sin again, even though you don’t know how you’ll get through the day without this or that disgusting diversion, the Lord will forgive you.

He may punish you, like a good Father will, perhaps even severely, and he may visit on you doubt and guilt and fear of exposure and discovery so powerful that sometimes you wish you could sit in the house in the dark all day, afraid to go out and be with people, but you have businesses to run and money you need, and so you go, though it’s hell. That’s what the Lord wants. He wants to remind you of hell, so you will curb your almost overpowering predilections. This is why, as a loving God, he might visit this kind of punishment on you even when you haven’t actually sinned yet. He knows you better than you know yourself; your view of yourself is limited to what your eyes can see and what things you’ve told yourself so you can live with yourself. You can’t even see the back of your neck or your forehead without a mirror. God’s view is from above, he sees the worm tracks you leave in the filth of your own making.

And so, He forgives you. Eventually.

Let me remind you, Brothers and Sisters, He won’t forgive you endlessly, even though in the Bible Jesus says He will. From experience we know that eventually a child will stumble on you in the act of sin, or a magazine you can’t explain will arrive at your PO box with the brown paper cover torn and the Post Mistress will tell key gossips, or you’ll be seen at an unexplained business fire, or a resentful neighbor will telephone a spouse and even parking down the block won’t help.

Then, my friends, your attention will have to shift to mercy. Mercy is like forgiveness, except it happens when forgiveness is worn out, and now you’re trying to negotiate a lighter sentence in purgatory, or at least avoid the endless agony of hell.

But, more on mercy another time.

When you should you and I forgive those who trespass against us? We should take our cue from the Lord. If they are still in hot water and suffering this way and that, it’s best to stay clear of them until things cool down. No point in trying to second-guess the Lord.

So, thanks to the goodness of the Lord’s forgiveness, we may Be Not Afraid, at least for awhile.

That’s today’s Sermonette. Don’t forget, you are always welcome to the His Glory Non-denominational Community Church, in the middle of town between the Chiropractor and the Tax preparer, you can’t miss it, we’ve just repainted the sign. You can make a tax deductible contribution to the Word of the Lord by simply bringing it to His Glory Non-denominational Community Church on Sunday, or simply dropping it off at my tax-preparation and chiropractic center in the middle of town. By the way, I’m sorry about the problem with the 2007 donations; it turns out that, at that point, the donations didn’t actually apply to a deduction, forgive me for that, please. But we’ve gotten the forms filled out right now, so now they do, so please, give. The Lord always appreciated your gifts, even if the IRS didn’t.

Thank you and God Bless you,

William B. Noddy, Pastor, His Glory Non-denominational Community Church