Sermon Illustration: A Warning Against Greed

In J. K. Rowling's now famous novel Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone there is a warning engraved on the doors of the bank: Enter stranger, but take heed - Of what awaits the sin of greed - For those who take, but do not earn - Must pay most dearly in their turn. It is good advice for anyone anytime, but it is...

Giving

Our word pittance has come to mean a very tiny gift, but that was not its original meaning. In the Middle Ages the term referred to a very substantial sum, given "out of piety and pity." Often the interest from the fund was used to provide a splendid dinner for the monks in the monastery. But as time went on and inflation took its...

Creation

The Finno-Ugrians were the ancient ancestors of both the people of Finland and the people of Hungary. They regarded the wild duck as a sacred animal. This was because they held that the world came into being from a duck egg! An ancient Norse myth says that Adumla the magic cow licked the ice until gradually man...

Bible

It has been centuries since the world saw a new illuminated Bible; that is, a Bible copied by hand and decorated with pictures and colorful symbols. But there is such a manuscript now in progress. It will be called The St. John's Bible, named for a University in Collegeville, Minnesota. Leading the effort is Donald Jackson. He was...

Cross

In the heyday of British rule it used to be said that the sun never set on the British Empire. Because the British flag consists of three crosses, superimposed one on another, the sun also never set on the cross! The British Empire is gone, but it is still true that the sun never sets on the cross. The day begins on the island of...

Christian

At the first exhibition of modern art a critic said negatively, "These are nothing but impressions." The criticism became, unintentionally, the definitive description of one kind of art, and today impressionistic art is well known and appreciated. Some think the name Christian came about in a similar way. They think it was coined by the...

Word Of God

The biggest gold nugget ever found was uncovered in Australia. It was one and one half meters long, weighed 300 kilograms and yielded 93 kilograms of pure gold. That one lump of gold would be worth one million Australian dollars today. Historically, South America was the world's biggest gold producing region, followed by...

Time

In 1752 England went from the old Julian calendar to the new Gregorian calendar. In order to make it fit, eleven days had to be removed from the calendar. People went to bed on September 2nd, and when they awoke the next morning it was September 14th. There were riots in the streets. People said the government had...

New Jerusalem

Recently an American archaeologist, Arthur Demerest, was in Guatemala walking across what he thought was a hill. He fell through the heavy vegetation and nearly fell in to the courtyard of an ancient Mayan palace covering 26,000 square yards -- the size of two football fields. The ruins are littered with jade, and there is...

King Of Kings

Recently the body of Ethiopia's King Haile Selassie was reburied. He had claimed to be descended from King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. He was revered as a god by the Rastafarian sect. During his lifetime he was called The King of Kings! A few years ago the Shah of Iran Was deposed in a revolution and shortly...