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Showing posts with the label Luke 17:5-10

A Wee Bit of Faith

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This is the sermon I preached on 10/2 at St. Timothy Lutheran Church . The text was Luke 17:5-10.   Well, what can be said? This passage from Luke’s gospel is another doozie! I had to really do my homework to get my mind around this. Is Jesus reprimanding the apostles for their lack of faith? Is Jesus supporting the system of slavery? That can’t be our Jesus, can it? Let’s look at the context. First, we’re missing the preceding verses, 1-4, in our text for today. Those verses help us understand why the apostles were so worked up. The first few verses are about forgiveness, even when someone has sinned against you multiple times in a day. Jesus said, “If you see your friend going wrong, correct him. If he responds, forgive him. Even if it’s personal against you and repeated seven times through the day, and seven times he says, ‘I’m sorry, I won’t do it again,’ forgive him” (vv. 3-4). This seemed so impossible. No wonder they wanted more faith.  We usually think of faith as ideas we bel