dent

whoever dent is he has been tagging the area around my church's building, (Church of Christ in Falls Church) along with this truck he has hit some bridges and other structures.

a prayer for guidance

LORD,
i am unsure of where
to go.
my directions are
unclear.
i do not know the
way.

open my eyes,
so i may see where
i am going.
take my hand
so that you may
guide my way.
speak in my ears
so i may hear
your directions.

i ask for your guidance
in your Son's
Name
amen

community: safety, danger and Jesus

on september 24th i preached about the community of God's people. it is both the safest place in the world and the most dangerous. community is very important to Jesus too. after you listen to it tell me what you think.

click here to listen or download

i used a short video clip title me|church it is an igniter video click here to watch it

Sarah's Show

sarah's show is posted on sparky philms

click here

new video on sprkyphilms

go to sparkyphilms.blogspot.com and check out my latest vlog post!

i preached the worst sermon

last sunday night i preached what i titled "the worst sermon" but a better name was suggested to me by friend jim "it's about the worst sermon."

it centers around the worst of all sinners and what he or she seeks when they become one of God's people.

click here to listen

me at my theater

last week i was at the richmond work camp with my teens and on thursday night we went to the byrd theater!

why i am a proud acu alumni!

recently soulforce's equality ride stopped at acu. this is a bus of lesbia, gay and bisexaul college students protesting religious based vilonce against lesbians, gays and bisexuals. the other "christian" colleges and universities they visited gave them the cold shoulder and their bus was vandalized at some places.

acu's reception was different. they invited them on campus and had discussion forums withe the equity riders and acu students. the riders were invited to chapel and worshiped at the univeristy church's sunday night communion service.

acu policy on the sinfulness of the homosexaul lifestyle and sexual practices have not changed but they showed the riders love instead of the hate they had been recieving else where. for more info chech out these websites

http://www.acu.edu

the optimists

soulforce's report on thier visit to acu

preachermike.com

The Last Meal of Jesus

The Last Meal
His Words not Ours!
Mark 16.14-20

In what is sometimes called the long ending of Mark we find our last meal. Jesus appears to the 11 remaining apostles and takes them to task for still having a hard time believing the reports of his resurrection.(Mark 16.14) They like us are stubborn and lack faith. In spite of their stubbornness and lack of faith Jesus has a job for them to do. He tells them that they are to go into all the world and preach the Good News to all creation. (Mark 16.15) They are to go everywhere and tell everyone the Message of Jesus. People who believe this message and are baptized will find salvation. (Mark 16.16) There are also signs which confirm the message and the salvation. (Mark 16.17 & .18) We see all of the signs mentioned here (ecept for drinking poison) in the story of the early church we find in Acts. The believers will drive out demons in Jesus name (Acts 8.6-.8,16.16 & 19.12), speak in tongues (Acts 2.3, 10.46 & 19.6), pick up snakes with no harm (Acts 28.4 & .5) and heal people (Acts 3.1, 5.12 & .15-.17, 8.6-.8, 9.34, 14.8-10 & 28.7-.9)

After sending the Apostles out Jesus is taken into heave and sits at the Right Hand of God. (Mark 16.19) The Right Hand of God is a place of power, rest, authority and salvation. In the Song of Moses after the Israelites have crossed the Red Sea he tells us that the right hand of the Lord is majestic in power and shattered the enemy. Psalm 118.15 & .16 as well as Isaiah 62.8 describe the power of the right hand of God. The right hand of the Lord is described as bringing salvation in Psalm 20.6 and 98.1. Finally it is a place of rest Psalm 110.1 describes the Lord (Jesus) sitting at THE LORD's (The Father) right hand until his enemies are made the Lord's footstool. Jesus gets to rest while the enemies are his footstool by the Father. This passage is also quoted in Matthew 22:43-45, Mark 12:35-37,Luke 20.42-.44, Acts 2:34-36 and Hebrews 1:12-14 to describe Jesus Christ our Lord.

The story ends with the disciples going everywhere and preaching and the Lord works with them. Jesus confirms his word by the signs that accompanied it.(Mark 16.20) It is not the word of the disciples or of other men that they preach but is it the Lord's Word! This is the same Message we take with us as well. When we share the Good News of Jesus it is not our words but it is his word. He works with us to confirm what we are saying. We are not left alone in this world to do the Lord's work but he is working with us. Imagine that the Lord is working with you to confirm His word. It is not our power. It is not our word. Instead it is the Lord's power and the Lord's word!

Meals of Jesus: Come and Eat

Meals of Jesus: Come and Eat
John 21.1-.25
This sermon was delivered on the evening of November 27th 2005, there is a video clip of of John 21.1-.25 from the movie The Gospel of John.

The Meals of Jesus: Resurrection, Witnessing and Waiting

The Meals of Jesus: Resurrection, Witnessing and Waiting
Luke 24.36-.49
Acts 1.3-.5

    Luke is in a hurry to end his Gospel account so he wraps things up fast leaving us with just one meal after the resurrection.  This meal takes place immediately after Cleopas and his traveling companion return from Emmaus.  They had traveled all day with a stranger who turned out in the end to actually be the resurrected LORD Jesus Christ.  Cleopas and his friend leave Emmaus immediately and return to Jerusalem.  They find the 11 Apostles to share what had just happened to them.  As they are all talking the LORD Jesus Christ appears in their midst. (Luke 24.13 - .36)
    The 11 and those with them are troubled, full doubt, full of joy and amazed!  Can this really be Jesus returned or it is a ghost?  Jesus makes a very strong point to show them that he is not a ghost or an illusion but that he is an actual physical person.  To do this he has them touch him and see his wounded hands and feet (Luke 24.39).  Then he eats some fish in their presence (Luke 24.41).  He is not a ghost.  He is not an illusion.  This is not a body double or a pretender.  This is not a counterfeit resurrection or tall tale but the real thing!  Jesus is physically resurrected.  The raised body is the same body that died.  It bears the scars of the death he went thru!
    After they touched him.  After they saw his hands and feet.  After they watched him eat.  He reminds them that he had been telling about this the whole time (Luke 24.44).   He tells them that all this was to fulfill what was written about him in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms (Luke 24.44).  The suffering, death and resurrection of the Christ/Messiah was not something new but part of god's the plan the entire time.
    At the end of this visit Jesus does something interesting.  First, He opens their mind so the can understand the Scriptures (Luke 24.45).  Then he tells them that they be witnesses and will go preach repentance and forgiveness (Luke 24.46 & .47).  Finally he tells them to wait (Luke 24.48).  Instead of sending them out immediately to bear witness they are to wait till they are clothed with power from on high (Luke 24.49).  They are waiting for the Holy Spirit.  They can not be witnesses without God's power.  They cannot preach without God's power.  They must wait for the Holy Spirit to come and give them the power, courage and strength they need to be witnesses.
    We are witnesses of Jesus too.  Each of us has read the gospels, or been in a class about one of them, or had listened to Mike preach out of Matthew.  Thru all this we become witnesses too.  We also have a commission to preach but we need the Holy Spirit to give us the strength courage and power to be witnesses.  We are witnesses to the life, death and resurrection of our LORD Jesus Christ!


--
gmail
from
josh byrd
youth minister
@ the church of Christ in falls church, va.

zoom in all the way!

if you zoom in all the way on google moon you discover what the moon is really made of just click the link and see http://moon.google.com/

--
gmail
from
josh byrd
youth minister
@ the church of Christ in falls church, va.

the angel tyler

skipped meal: unclean hands

The Heart of the Matter.
Mark 7.1-.23

The Sunday Morning of Power House (back at the beginning of november) I was sitting in the auditorium of the Fairfax Church of Christ worshiping when Bruce Black got up to preach. His sermon was on being clean and holy as one of God's people. As the text was read I realized that I had missed a meal. I am not talking about breakfast but about one of the Meals of Jesus I have been writing about. So today I am going to explore a missed meal.

The story begins with some Pharisees and Teachers of the Law come down from Jerusalem and are gathered around Jesus. They notice that Jesus disciples are eating with unclean hands. Not that they didn't wash the dirt of their hands but that their hands were not ceremonially clean. Concerned about this they go to Jesus and ask him two questions. First they ask him why his disciples eat with unclean hands? Secondly they ask him why they don't keep the traditions of the elders.

Jesus turns to them and instead of answering the questions they ask he goes to the issue under the questions. Their concern for ceremonial cleaness and traditions is a sympton of the fact that the Pharisees and Teachers of the Law have set aside the commands of God for the traditions of men. He says “You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions!”

He confronts them about their hypocrisy of worrying about the disciples keeping a tradition of men. While they ignore God's direct command for children to honor their parents. In doing so he tells them that they are nullifying the word of God by their traditions.

All churches have traditions. They are the forms in which the commands and teachings of the LORD and his son Jesus Christ give us. The traditions are not the commands but the forms we give them in our churches. For instance, it is our tradition to serve the LORD's Supper on trays with men carrying them down the aisle to everyone. Other churches have people come up to a central table and take the elements for themselves. While other churches have you go to a station and have the LORD's Supper their. Which of these is commanded by God? None of them and all of them at the same time. The forms are not commanded but the act of taking the LORD's Supper is commanded.

Each of us has our own traditions based on the commands and teachings of our God and his Son Jesus Christ. For instance we are commanded to be holy but how do we live that holiness out? Somethings are taught to us but somethings we have to figure out for ourselves. So have creat our own form and tradition. So some of us abstain from seeing rated r movies, some don't read romance novels, some of us only listen to Christian musice and some of us don't watch any tv. Are these specifically commanded for us to do? No, but they are forms we use to be holy.

One of the things Jesus is teaching us in this passage is that we need to keep perspective. The commands of God are paramount over the traditions we use as a church and as individuals.

sparkyphilms!

if you are looking for my video blog it has moved. i am going to use this blog to do "traditional" blogging and use the other site as my vlog.

so if you want to see my vlog got to sparkyphilms.blogspot.com and check out my first vlog of 2006

Fwd:

From: Josh Byrd
Date: Jan 24, 2006 3:57 PM
Subject: phun @ the apple store in tyson's corner



phun @ the apple store in tyson's corner

--
gmail
from
josh byrd
youth minister
@ the church of Christ in falls church, va.

The Meals of Jesus: The Road to Emmaus

here is my sermon on the meal that happens at the end of the journey to emmaus by two disciples and unknow to them Jesus. enjoy!

(Quick note these articles were adapted from the weekly article I write for my church's bulletin.)

The Meals of Jesus
Passover Supper with the Disciples Part Two
Matthew 26.1 - .30
Mark 14.12 - .26
Luke 22.1 - .38
John 13 – 17
1 Corinthians 10.14-.22
I Corinthians 11.17 - .34

Yesterday we explored what we traditionally call the Last Supper. Jesus takes elements from the Passover Meal and makes them new. He takes the symbol unleavened bread and makes it represent his body broken for us. He takes the wine and changes it to represent his blood poured out for us to seal the new covenant. As I mentioned then this is a meal that we still eat today. Instead of calling it the Last Supper, we call it Eucharist, or Communion or the LORD's Supper. You are either about to participate in this meal or you already have depending on when you read the Family Life on Sunday. The big question is why did Jesus want us to keep eating this meal? Here are three of the reasons I see for his desire for us to eat it.

One reason is remembrance. On the night Jesus was betrayed he began the meal and we are to eat it to remember his life, crucifixion and resurrection (Luke 22.19 & 1 Corinthians 11.24-.25). He tell us to eat the bread and drink the vine to remember because we are forgetful. We forget things all the time. Where we put our keys, what our anniversary date is and even what our phone number is. We need a reminder so we have daytimes and palm pilots to help us remember. Jesus institutes the Lord's Supper to remind us what he did for us and what we need to do for him because of it. Every time we eat Communion together we proclaim the LORD' s death and his returning (1 Corinthians 11.26).

Another reason is anticipation. The night the meal started Jesus tells those present that he had anticipated eating the Passover meal that night with them and that he will not eat it again until the Kingdom of God comes (Matthew 26.29, Mark 14.25 and Luke 22.14-.16). He wants to eat it again not just with the small group gathered that night but with all of his people. We are also anticipating eating it with him in what some call the great Messianic Banquet. Some day off in the future we will all sit down with our LORD and he will break the bread and hand it to us. He will pass the cup and we will drink it with him a new in the Father's Kingdom.

The next reason is participation. When we eat the bread and drink from the cup we participate in the body and blood of Jesus (1 Corinthians 10.14-.17). In eating the bread we participate in the life, death and resurrection of our Lord's body. When we drink from the cup we participate in the blood that was poured out for us. In addition to participating in the LORD's life we also become one as a community. From the one loaf we all become on body and that body is the church (1 Corinthians 10.17). When we eat the bread and drink from the cup we remember the life death and resurrection of our LORD. When we eat and drink, we are anticipating and proclaiming the coming of our LORD. When we eat and drink we are participating in the life, death and resurrection of our LORD.

This article and the last one about the LORD's Supper are incomplete explorations
of this meal. These are my reflections and thoughts compressed into a one page format. So if I missed something important it is because I don't have the space in this format.

The Meals of Jesus
Passover Supper with the Disciples Part One
Matthew 26.1 - .30
Mark 14.12 - .26
Luke 22.1 - .38
John 13 – 17
I Corinthians 11.17 - .34

Everything that happens today, right now, changes everything that will happen in the future. The choices we make this moment change and shape our future in dramatic and minute ways. Some events and choices are more life altering than others. For instance the shirt you are wearing is a choice that will have less impact on your life than the wife you choose. In the meals of Jesus this is also true. All of his meals impact us but today's meal is huge! In fact we are still eating this meal. No other meal impacts the future of our world as the Passover Meal he eats with is disciples on the night he was betrayed. We traditionally call this the “Last Supper” but I don't think that is a good name for this meal. Following this meal Jesus eats at least 4 more times with his disciples.

This meal begins with Jesus showing his disciples that he is in control of what is happening. He sends Peter and John into town to find to make preparation for the passover. (Luke 22.8) He sends then with specific instructions on how to find the room for the passover meal. They are to look for a man carrying a water jug and follow him.

They find things just as he said. (Matthew 26.18 & .19, Mark 14.13 - .15 and Luke 22.10-.12) The Lord has provided the place for the meal. When they all arrive in the upper room and begin to eat Jesus sets the mode with a terrible announcement that one of them will betray him. They all begin to question who this might be and to deny that it is them. (Matthew 26.20 - . 25, Mark 14.17 - .21 and Luke 22.21 - 23) This betrayal is key to understanding this meal. When Paul rebukes the Corinthian church for the way it celebrates the Lord's Supper he describes it as the meal Jesus ate the night he was betrayed. (1 Corinthians 11.23)

At the beginning of this Passover meal Jesus takes the unleavened bread they were to eat to remind them of their forefather's hasty escape from Egypt and changes the meaning. Now it is his body! He tells them to take and eat the bread that is his body
which is for you. Jesus body is no longer for himself but now it is for all of us. (Matthew 26.26, Mark 14.22, Luke 22.19 and 1 Corinthians 11.24) The betrayal will lead to his body being offered as a sacrifice.

Then towards the end of the traditional passover meal he take the cup of wine and changes it too. Now it represents his blood of the new covenant which is going to be poured for us. The blood is the life of the body. The blood is sacred. The Old Covenant between the Israelites and the Lord was cemented thru the sacrifice of lambs, goats and bulls. Now this New Covenant we live under is brought about by the blood sacrifice of God's only and unique Son. (Matthew 26.27 - .29, Mark 14.23 - .25, Luke 22.17 - .18 & .20 - .22 and 1 Corinthians 11.25)

The betrayal that happens much later that night is another history changing event. Those who had been looking for away to stop Jesus had their opportunity to put him on trial and kill him. They failed! His arrest, trial and crucifiction were all part of his plan to save us all by creating a New Covenant between humanity and the LORD. Jesus was in control the entire time. He provided the place for the meal and now he provides the sacrifice for the Covenant that brings forgiveness and salvation to all.
This is just a short examination of this meal. We will look at it again next week to examine why it is a meal that we still eat. This is the only meal of Jesus that we actually take part in.

harvest festival 2005

Every Fall here at the Church of Christ in Falls Church, we do a big restock of our Food Pantry, we maintain, distributing food to those who walk up with need. Click here to watch this years Harvest Festival.