Understanding the Jesus of the Gospels

Sermons from the Gospels

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Tag: bible

  • “I”, “my”, and “myself”

    Mel Prestamo, Elder PCUSA Taken from Luke 12: 13-21, offered on August 3, 2025, at Hilltop Presbytery Church, Mendham, NJ The Story of the Greedy Farmer [I am providing the text from the Message – of particular interest is the transcription of verse 21] 13 Someone out of the crowd said, “Teacher, order my brother to…

  • Jesus is Tested in the Wilderness

    Mel Prestamo, Elder PCUSA This message was delivered at a Vesper’s service back in 2014. My reference and commentary resources were from William Barclay’s writings on the Gospel of Mark. This is quite a turnaround, isn’t it? Just two weeks ago, we were celebrating Jesus’ victory over death and God’s great gifts of mercy and…

  • Lord, Teach Us to Pray – Luke 11: 1-13

    Mel Prestamo, Elder PCUSA First, let me begin by admitting that a lot of this message below comes from out of my studies of the commentaries of William Barclay on the Gospels and the in specific here of the Lord’s Prayer. So, if I spark interest on your part to discover more, I recommend Barclay’s…

  • Sending Workers into the Harvest

    Luke 10: 1-11, 16-20 Mel Prestamo, Elder PCUSA In this passage in Luke this morning, we see Jesus considering the task he has at hand. Jesus is looking ahead at the many opportunities and possibilities that lie before him in his ministry. “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.” At the same time,…

  • Don’t Let the Trees Block Your Vision of the Forest

    Luke 8: 26-39 Mel Prestamo, Elder PCUSA This passage in Luke’s Gospel this morning is a difficult one to preach on. To phrase it succinctly, there are two issues that we modern day readers come up against here that make it difficult to see the forest for a couple of trees that get in our…