The Seven Virtues – St. Stephen Presbyterian Church

The Virtues: Justice

by revfritz
07/28/2013

To Listen to this Sermon, click here -> http://sermon.net/ststphnfw/sermonid/1200072559

Psalm 85

In Plato’s Republic, the philosopher Socrates tells the story of the negotiations between the powerful Athenians and the weak Melians in the Peloponnesian War. The embittered Melians say angrily that “If we refused to submit to these negotiations, if we insisted on our rights and refused to submit to your rule, you’d only wage war with us, conquer us, and make us your slaves.” Shockingly, the Athenians agree. “We won’t insult your intelligence by telling you that we deserve to rule you because we are morally right and that you are morally wrong,” the Athenian negotiators tell the Melians. “You know as well as we do that right, as the world goes, is only a question between equals in power, where the stronger do whatever they can and the weaker suffer whatever they must.”

The Virtues: Love

by sarah
07/14/2013

Luke 10: 21-36

This is the second of a series on the virtues.

The other day someone asked me, “What is love?” It’s an important question. The Bible teaches from beginning to end, “Love your neighbor,” so “what is love?” is a crucial question.

It’s not the one that the lawyer asks Jesus.

Instead he asks, “Who is my neighbor?”Read More »The Virtues: Love

The Virtues, Part I: Humility

by revfritz
07/07/2013

To Listen to this Sermon, click here -> http://sermon.net/ststphnfw/sermonid/1200068295

2 Kings 5: 1-14

This is the first of a series on the virtues.

“Pride makes us artificial and humility makes us real.” Thomas Merton

This past week we heard about the tragic deaths of nineteen Granite Mountain Hot-shots, top firefighters who were killed in a forest fire in Arizona. We are all moved by their bravery and by their sacrifice. These are men who demonstrate arête, the Greek virtue of excellence—they strived and succeeded at being the best of the best, part of a world-wide elite of firefighters. They died doing what they believed in and what they trained for, and so, according to the Greek heroic tradition, they died a good death, and therefore lived a good life.