Sermon: "You’ll Never Walk Alone" by Louis Venden, PhD

Pastoral Welcome: Darold Retzer, MA, MDiv

University Welcome: Richard H. Hart, MD, DrPH

Student Feature: Sarah Jane Harebottle-Shearer, SD ’10

Student Feature: Ravinder Gupta, SD ’10

Student Feature: Katieanne George, DH ’10

Scripture Reading: John 14:15–18, 27, TNIV - Gregory D. Mitchell, DDS

Introduction to the Sermon 

The apostle Peter writes about the “exceeding great and precious promises” God has given us in His Word.  He declares that when we believe and trust our lives to God and His promises, God works a transformation in us, at the very center of who and what we are.  Peter goes so far as to say that through God’s promises we may “participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.”  2 Peter 1:4, TNIV.

Scripture promises almost beyond number give us words to encourage, direct, sustain, comfort and cheer for every situation we encounter.  Of course we have our favorites; those that brought just the help we needed at a specific time and circumstance.  But I’d like to suggest that all of God’s promises really cluster about and are anchored in one great central promise – the promise of His presence, “I will be with you…”

Think of the notable worthies we meet in Scripture and again and again we hear the echo of these words.  Moses protests “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?”  And God replies “I will be with you…” (Exodus 3:12)

Four decades later on the borders of the promised land God lays Moses to rest, then says to Joshua, “As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you.” (Joshua 1:5)   You get the picture.  Try ranging through the Good Book looking for the “with you” gems

But now it’s Thursday evening and we slip into a lamp lit upper room in Jerusalem.  A small group has gathered to celebrate God’s deliverance of their ancestors from bondage centuries ago.  At the center of their fellowship is one they have come to call Lord and Master.  But now they are devastated. He’s saying good-bye!  He’s abandoning them!

Then He speaks to anxious, troubled hearts.

What is it He promises?  What difference will it make -  To them?  To us? 

Louis Venden
Emeritus Professor of Religion
School of Religion
Loma Linda University

Meditation:

"There is no comforter like Christ, so tender and so true.  He is touched with the feeling of our infirmities.  His Spirit speaks to the heart…..Wherever we are, wherever we may go, He is always there. one given in Christ’s place, to act in His stead.  He is always at our right hand to speak soothing, gentle words, to support, sustain, uphold, and cheer.” -- Selected

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