A Thinking Person's Guide to Faith

"Freedom and Faith"

July 4, 2021 • Bob Henderson

For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. The Nature of Christian Freedom 2 Listen! I, Paul, am telling you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no benefit to you. 3 Once again I testify to every man who lets himself be circumcised that he is obliged to obey the entire law. 4 You who want to be justified by the law have cut yourselves off from Christ; you have fallen away from grace. 5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. 6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything; the only thing that counts is faith working[a] through love. 13 For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters;[a] only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence,[b] but through love become slaves to one another.

“How Long? God and Suffering”

June 27, 2021 • Katherine Kerr

The song “40” by the band U2 has long been one of my favorite songs. Before I knew that it was a rendition of Psalm 40, I loved its soothing melody and refrain of “how long?” I remember joining my voice with thousands of other voices at a U2 concert in singing those words. Little did I know then, but I was participating in a time-honored tradition that goes back at least to the writing of the Psalms, if not before. Individual and community lament are a vital part of the life of faith, and in the Psalms we find some of the most poignant examples of humans crying out to God for relief from pain and sorrow. As we continue our summer sermon series “A Thinking Person’s Guide to Faith” this Sunday, we will take on the question of how we are to think about God and Suffering. We will do so through the lens of Psalm 13, a classic example of an individual psalm of lament. It’s not the easiest topic to discuss, for sure, but it’s vitally important. All of us will know sorrow and pain at some point in this life, and each of us may wonder where God is and how God acts in the midst of it. So I hope you will join us on Sunday morning as together we wrestle with one of the fundamental questions of our faith.

“Trying to Make Sense of the Bible”

June 20, 2021 • Bob Henderson

All scripture is inspired by God and is[a] useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.

“Science and Religion: Conflict or Complement?”

June 13, 2021 • Bob Henderson

Six Days of Creation and the Sabbath 1 In the beginning when God created[a] the heavens and the earth, 2 the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God[b] swept over the face of the waters. 3 Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. 4 And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.

Covenant Presbyterian Church - Charlotte, NC

June 13-July 4 Sermon Series