MTP Sermon Resources

Proverbs 3:13-14; Philippians 4:10-20 October 25, 2015 • Mount Pleasant UMC In the year 312, Constantine, the emperor of the Roman Empire, was on his way to war, to a decisive battle, when he had a dream of an image of the Christian cross in the sky along with the words “By this sign you will conquer.” In that moment, he determined God had spoken to him, so he took the cross as his standard and headed into the battle—a battle which he did win. After that victory, Constantine issued what has been called an “edict of toleration,” in which Christians, who had been a persecuted minority up to that point, now were “tolerated” within the Empire. Eventually, not only were they tolerated, but the Christian faith eventually became the official faith of the Roman Empire, and Constantine himself even had a hand in shaping and unifying Christian theology (Yates, The Expansion of Christianity , pos 18-19). There is a story (which may be more legend than fact) of the time when Constanti

Colossians 2:6-7; Luke 10:38-42 October 4, 2015 (World Communion) • Mount Pleasant UMC We have a 7-year-old lovable mutt named Hershey who is spoiled rotten. We got her when she was six weeks old, so she has been part of our family most of her life, and she is most definitely Cathy’s dog. In fact, she puts up with me all week, but when Cathy comes home on Thursday nights, she gets really excited. She knows nothing about a calendar, but she does know when it’s Thursday and she starts hanging out around the garage door, waiting for Cathy to come home. When she was about 3 months old, Rachel and I took her to obedience training. It was a mixed success, though because I took her to the class, she does tend to pay more attention to commands I give than the ones Cathy gives. She knows Cathy is the “soft touch!” Anyway, one of the hardest things for her to do, still, is responding to the command, “Stay!” The way they taught us to train her in obedience class was to get Hershey to