9/8/2024 Worship Service and Sermon: Jehu Kills Joram, Ahaziah, and Jezebel - 2 Kings 9

9/8/2024 Worship Service & Sermon from Brick Lane Community Church in Elverson, PA

Worship Leader: Steve Boyer
Sermon: Steve Estes
Scripture: 2 Kings 9
Title: Jehu Kills Joram, Ahaziah, and Jezebel

Notes:

1. Previously on The Northern Kingdom...
A. Elijah flees
B. Jehovah replies
C. God's plan to topple Baal in Israel

2. Jehu anointed as king
A. Elisha sends a young prophet on a mission
B. Reaction of Jehu's lieutenants

3. Jehu kills two Baal-worshiping kings
A. Killing Joram of Israel
B. Killing Ahaziah of Judah

4. Killing Jezebel
A. Jezebel prepares to die in style
B. Jehu has Jezebel thrown out the window
C. Jehu feasts while Jezebel is feasted on

5. Lessons
A. Rebellion against God is fanned into flame by those we associate with
B. Rebels vs. God are gradually storing up wrath for themselves
C. God avenges His suffering people
D. Is God's wrath so gory and terrible?

#jehu #joram #ahaziah #jezebel

9/1/2024 Worship Service & Sermon: Joram’s Last Chance for Grace - 2 Kings 8:1-6

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9/1/2024 Worship Service & Sermon from Brick Lane Community Church in Elverson, PA

Worship Leader: Matt Carter
Sermon: Steve Estes
Scripture: 2 Kings 8:1-6
Title: Joram's Last Chance for Grace

Now Elisha had said to the woman whose son he had restored to life, "Go away with your family and stay for a while wherever you can, because the LORD has decreed a famine in the land that will last seven years." The woman proceeded to do as the man of God said. She and her family went away and stayed in the land of the Philistines seven years. At the end of the seven years she came back from the land of the Philistines and went to the king to beg for her house and land. The king was talking to Gehazi, the servant of the man of God, and had said, "Tell me about all the great things Elisha has done." Just as Gehazi was telling the king how Elisha had restored the dead to life, the woman whose son Elisha had brought back to life came to beg the king for her house and land. Gehazi said, "This is the woman, my lord the king, and this is her son whom Elisha restored to life." The king asked the woman about it, and she told him. Then he assigned an official to her case and said to him, "Give back everything that belonged to her, including all the income from her land from the day she left the country until now."

Notes:

1. Background to today's text (2 Kings 4 for reference)

2. King Joram had already seen God's divine kindness through Elisha
A. Aramean ambushes foiled
B. Aramean army delivered into Joram's hands
C. Northern kingdom's capital relieved of starvation

3. King Joram asks to hear more about Elisha's great works
A. The widow in debt
B. Death in the stew
C. Feeding one hundred
D. A borrowed ax
E. The Shunammite woman's son

4. Lessons
A. See how God cares for His own people
B. See how important our response to accounts of God's mercies are

Background for next week's sermon

2 Kings 8:7-14 NIV - Hazael Murders Ben-Hadad
2 Kings 8:25-29 NIV - Ahaziah King of Judah

#Joram #Shunammite #Gehazi

8/25/24 Worship Service & Sermon: Who, then, Is This? - Mark 4:35-41

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8/25/2024 Worship Service & Sermon from Brick Lane Community Church in Elverson, PA

Worship Leader: Randy Hepler
Speaker: Wendell Stoltzfus
Scripture: Mark 4:35-41
Title: Who, then, Is This?

On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, "Let us go across to the other side." And leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. And other boats were with him. And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, "Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?" And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, "Peace! Be still!" And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. He said to them, "Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?" And they were filled with great fear and said to one another, "Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?"

Notes:

1. The fisherman and the sea
A. Simon Peter
B. Sea of Galilee

2. Jesus in the boat
A. He had been teaching all day
B. He still had a lesson to teach that night

3. The storm
A. More than experienced fishermen could handle
B. Eventually, the disciples ask Jesus to help
C. Jesus rebukes the storm, then rebukes His disciples

4. The disciples' reaction
A. "Who then is this?"
B. These sinful men realize they're in the presence of the Holy One
C. Jesus' lesson for His disciples

5. The storms we encounter
A. What makes us afraid?
B. "Why are you so afraid?"

8/18/2024 Worship Service & Sermon: Saints, When Absent from the Body, Are Present with the Lord - 2 Corinthians 5:8

8/18/2024 Worship Service & Sermon from Brick Lane Community Church in Elverson, PA

Worship Leader: Randy Hepler
Speaker: Jonathan Edwards (modified by Steve Estes)
Scripture: 2 Corinthians 5:8
Title: Saints, When Absent from the Body, Are Present with the Lord

2 Corinthians 5:8--We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord.

Notes:

1. Departed saints live in the same wonderful place as Christ
A. Christ in Heaven still has a human nature
B. Heaven is a place
C. Angels are in Heaven
D. Departed saints are in Heaven
E. We who are saved will be in Heaven

2. The souls of saints in Heaven have an unhindered sight of Jesus Christ
A. When absent from friends, we can only think about them
B. "But then we shall see Him face to face"
C. Those in Heaven see Him "as He is"

3. Departed saints become perfectly like Him by seeing Him

4. Departed saints enjoy a glorious and immediate closeness with Him
A. Departed saints are present with the Lord
B. But His glorious state won't intimidate them
C. Reasons with His majesty won't intimidate them

8/11/2024 Worship Service & Sermon: Elisha’s Fiery Horses & Chariots - 2 Kings 6:8-23

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8/11/2024 Worship Service & Sermon from Brick Lane Community Church in Elverson, PA

Worship Leader: Dawson Estes
Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: 2 Kings 6:8-23
Title: Elisha's Fiery Horses and Chariots

Notes:

1. Intro: Secrets are sometimes hard to keep.
A. Aramean king's secrets are being leaked.
B. The new prophet on the block

2. The Aramean king sends an army to capture Elisha.

3. God is with His people, even when they cannot see it.
A. First of three prayers
B. Picture the fiery beings.
C. Think of their number.
D. Think what the actual miracle was.

4. How God protected Elisha and his servant
A. Who made the first move?
B. Second of three prayers
C. Last of three prayers

5. God protects His people so that unbelievers may find that same protection in Him.
A. How Israel treated the captured Arameans
B. What do we learn about God from this?

6. Lessons

#elisha #benhadad

8/4/2024 Worship Service & Sermon: Elijah, Elisha and Chariots of Fire - 2 Kings 2

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8/4/2024 Worship Service & Sermon from Brick Lane Community Church in Elverson, PA

Worship Leader: Luke Stoltzfus
Speaker: Steve Estes
Scripture: 2 Kings 2
Title: Elijah, Elisha, and Chariots of Fire

Notes:

1. Vexation at Elijah's departure
A. Anxiety at coming change
B. The prophets go to Bethel
C. The prophets go to Jericho

2. The prophets go to the Jordan
A. Elijah's last miracle
B. Elijah asks his protege what he can do for him
C. God takes Elijah away in style
D. Elisha's reaction

3. God reveals Elijah's successor
A. Elisha mourns, then gets to work
B. Elisha is recognized as Elijah's successor

4. Three short episodes to start Elisha's ministry
A. Episode 1: Ordinary ministry with Jericho's prophets
B. Episode 2: Ministry of God's grace at Jericho
C. Episode 3: Ministry of God's judgment at Bethel

#elijah #elisha #chariotsoffire

7/28/2024 Worship Service & Sermon: Ahaziah’s Death-Bed Unrepentance and God’s Stubborn Holiness - 1 Kings 22:51-53 and 2 Kings 1:18

7/28/2024 Worship Service & Sermon from Brick Lane Community Church in Elverson, PA

Scripture: 1 Kings 22:51-53 and 2 Kings 1:18
Title: Ahaziah's Death-Bed Unrepentance and God's Stubborn Holiness
Worship Leader: Dave Stoltzfus
Speaker: Steve Estes

Ahaziah son of Ahab became king of Israel in Samaria in the seventeenth year of Jehoshaphat king of Judah, and he reigned over Israel two years. He did evil in the eyes of the LORD, because he walked in the ways of his father and mother and in the ways of Jeroboam son of Nebat, who caused Israel to sin. He served and worshiped Baal and provoked the LORD, the God of Israel, to anger, just as his father had done.

Notes:

1. Ahaziah's disappointments
A. Disappointments over money
B. Disappointments over his country
C. Disappointments over physical trauma
D. Disappointments from a shortened life span

2. In his disappointments, Ahaziah sought relief in idols
A. The lord of the flies
B. The insanity of idolatry
C. How people "consult idols" today

3. God refused to tolerate Ahaziah's idols
A. Elijah intercepts, Ahaziah responds
B. The ethics of the fire from heaven
C. Ahaziah's final attempt to arrest Elijah

4. God gives grace to the humble
A. Humility grows from proper fear
B. The Lamb of God bore God's wrath for those who would believe

#ahaziah #Elijah

7/21/2024 Worship Service & Sermon: The Death of Ahab - 1 Kings 22

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7/21/2024 Worship Service & Sermon from Brick Lane Community Church in Elverson, PA

Scripture: 1 Kings 22
Title: The Death of Ahab
Worship Leader: TJ Waldy
Speaker: Steve Estes

Notes:

1. A meeting between Ahab and Jehoshaphat
A. The significance of Gilead
B. Ahab proposes to retake Ramoth Gilead
C. Jehoshaphat's request

2. Pressure on Micaiah
A. The pressure in general
B. One pressure in particular

3. Micaiah speaks the truth
A. Micaiah's sarcastic sycophantic answer
B. Micaiah's serious, truthful answer
C. Micaiah recounts his vision

4. Micaiah is punished for speaking the truth
A. Zedekiah slaps Micaiah
B. Ahab incarcerates Micaiah

5. Ahab dies in battle
A. The battle proper
B. God's sovereignty in the battle
C. Ahab's burial
D. A summary of Ahab's life

6. A final word

#ahab #jehoshaphat #micaiah #God

7/14/2024 Worship Service & Sermon: Naboth’s Vineyard - 1 Kings 21:1-29

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7/14/2024 Worship Service & Sermon from Brick Lane Community Church in Elverson, PA

Scripture: 1 Kings 21:1-29
Title: Naboth's Vineyard
Worship Leader: Matt Griffith
Pastor: Steve Estes

Notes:

1. The exchange between Ahab and Naboth
A. Ahab's offer
B. Naboth's refusal

2. Back at the palace
A. Ahab sulks in his room
B. Jezebel promises a solution

3. Jezebel's murderous scheme
A. The letters
B. Who was blasphemed: Jehovah or Baal?
C. The trial and the verdict
D. Ahab takes possession

4. The exchange between Elijah and Ahab
A. Elijah confronts Ahab in the vineyard
B. Jehovah's verdict on Ahab and Jezebel

5. God's amazing grace
A. Ahab's change

6. Lessons
A. Naboth is a picture of the lot of God's people
B. Such injustice is often inflicted by the government
C. God's servants must be prepared to pay a price for standing for justice
D. God will intervene to bring justice to His wronged people
E. God delights to exercise mercy while imposing His justice

#ahab #elijah #naboth

7/72024 Worship Service & Sermon: Ahab vs. Ben-Hadad - 1 Kings 20

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7/7/2024 Worship Service & Sermon from Brick Lane Community Church in Elverson, PA

Scripture: 1 Kings 20
Title: Ahab vs. Ben-Hadad
Worship Leader: Matt Lambert
Sermon: Pastor Steve Estes

Notes:

1. The thread
A. Ben Hadad's invasion
B. Israel's desperate condition
C. Ben Hadad's intimidating demands

2. The first battle
A. An unnamed prophet advises Ahab
B. An Israelite victory stuns Ben Hadad

3. The second battle
A. Both sides regroup
B. Arameans march to Aphek the following year
C. Why does Ahab pardon Ben Hadad?

4. A prophet condemns Ahab
A. The story
B. What was Ahab's sin?

5. Getting clear about God
A. Getting clear about God's grace
B. Getting clear about God's power
C. Getting clear about God's judgment

#ahab #benhadad #God