Founder's Day Sermon Notes - 11/02/2008

Zion United Methodist Church was founded in 1877 – It was a post Civil War congregation.

The airplane had not been invented yet. There were no telephones, no telephone poles; the first World War had not yet been considered as even a possibility.

There were no cars. Travel was done by horse or mule, by buggy or cart, or by foot. There were no paved roads. No highways. Dirt trails were everywhere…

Churches held services twice a month, when the horseback circuit rider was able to make it. Sometimes they held brush arbor revival meetings…but the intention for church services and revivals was to ask the question: WHERE DO YOU STAND WITH GOD?

This was before Political Correctness, when ministers of the Gospel were unconcerned with hurt feelings…nowadays it seems that some ministers are "avoiding stepping on people's toes" to the endangerment of their congregations eternal souls.

What were the concerns of the original congregation of Zion Church back in 1877? What would their hopes be for this current generation? Would not their question for us, as it was for them back then, be WHERE DO YOU STAND WITH GOD?

In modern times it seems everyone wants to go to Heaven, but hardly anyone wants to do anything to merit it. Fear of Hellfire and Eternal Damnation has become a laughing stock, as has the concept of a moral absolute, Hardly anyone talks about SIN anymore, or the importance of REPENTANCE, and turning from one's sin, even though the Word of God is plain when God states in it, "If my people who are called by My name would HUMBLE THEMSELVES and PRAY, and seek My face, and TURN FROM THEIR WICKED WAYS, then would I hear from Heaven, and heal their land..."

Jesus Christ himself spoke of Hell FOUR TIMES MORE than he spoke of Heaven.

If your neighbor's house was on fire, would you not shout out a warning to them, even if you didn't know them very well, or like them very much? Why, then, are we letting friends and family slip away into eternity, without telling them that we're concerned about their eternal souls?

If we can be certain of anything about the founders of Zion Church, we can rest assured that they were concerned about the souls of others - and so should we be in 2008, 131 years later.