About Sam Ford

Sam Ford is a preacher, planter, and pastor from the Pacific Northwest. He is currently pastoring Restoration Road Church in Snohomish, WA.
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Church Planting Lesson #29: Train Wreck Sermons

2011-03-15T11:28:33+00:00By |Random Thoughts|

Church Planting Lesson #29:  Train Wrecks are sometimes unavoidable. There is a lot of pressure preaching every week.   It feels like everyone is waiting for the preacher to either "feed" them something they consider good enough to come back for another meal, or give something to will justify their reasons for leaving.  It's rather disturbing to watch and hear the "feeding" of the flock play out on a given Sunday. I have seen it all, the rolling eyes at the mispronunciation of a Greek Word, the feverish flipping of pages (sure sign of a brewing debate over context), or my personal favorite, the you're" putting me to sleep-teary-eyed-try to hold my yawn in-grimace.   Of course, we won't even mention the people whose bladder-control is completely lost as they go to the restroom 25 times, not to be confused with the "bad back bandit" who has to get up and [...]

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The “Danger” in Teaching your Kids Scripture

2021-07-04T18:07:36+00:00By |Church Plant Lessons 101, Re:Sermon|

Deuteronomy 6 records, among other things, some important commandments to parents in raising children.   These sacred verses are not the "how to's" of perfect parenting as much as they are a charges from a Father committed to preserving the Word of God as central to the identity of His people.  Moses writes:  "Hear, O Israel:  The LORD our God, the LORD is one.  You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.  And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.  You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.  You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes.  You shall write them [...]

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Weak Excuses Reveal the Heart

2011-02-28T16:24:49+00:00By |Note to Self...and Others, Random Thoughts|

By Pastor Jim F This week at Damascus Road Church we tackled two chapters, Joshua 16 and 17. These two chapters lay out the portion of land given to the people of Joseph, the descendants of Ephraim and Manasseh. They are not content with their portion. As a matter of fact, their discontentment leads them to voicing a complaint with Joshua, and ultimately with God. The root of their complaint is being more comfortable with their own limited perspective than that of God. Joshua is not swayed by their justification of their unhappiness, and tasks them with using their many blessings to act toward the possession of the land. Joshua calls them to do what God has commanded them to do (and promised that He will show them success in): purify and subdue their inheritance. He is calling them to be stewards, but specifically to steward as God has commanded. [...]

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God-made vs. Man-Made Boundaries

2021-07-04T18:07:27+00:00By |Church Plant Lessons 101, Re:Sermon|

I haven't found too many sermon series based on the entire book of Joshua.  That could be because, after Joshua 10, most of the narrative reads like 2,500 year old land survey recording the dividing and distribution of the promised land (not the most invigorating of devotional content).   Joshua 15 is no exception. Joshua 15 describes the boundaries surrounding the inheritance allotted to Judah. Within the first 12 verses, the word "boundary" is used 19 times.  Though we may find reading Joshua 15 tedious, the people of Judah listened carefully every precious word as this was the physical description of God's gift to them--every mountain, river, hill, city, was special.  For us, as I preached in Joshua 13, we are again reminded that not only are the portions given by God, but their exact shape and size is determined by God. In other words, we’re not talking about boundaries in [...]

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Without promise, without guarantee (Josh. 14)

2011-02-17T11:42:17+00:00By |Random Thoughts, Re:Sermon|

Caleb is one of the studliest men in Scripture.  There is not a ton dedicated to Caleb, but the short narratives in Numbers 13/14 and Joshua 14 provide a convicting picture of faith for any Christian.  If Joshua is the example of a faithful General and leader, Caleb provides us an example of a faithful soldier and disciple.  SOME OF US will be called to be Joshua’s, but ALL OF US are called to be Caleb's. We first read about Caleb well before he was a battle-hardened 85 year old; when he was a young sprite of 40 in the wilderness on the edge Canaan.  He was among the 12 men chosen by Moses, representing the 12 tribes, to spy out the Promised Land for 40 days.  He represented the tribe of Judah.  Joshua also went to represent the tribe of Ephraim.  When the group returned, a faithless majority reported that, [...]

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When God Holds His Breath

2021-07-04T18:07:17+00:00By |Re:Sermon, Theology 101|

I recently preached on Joshua 11. Tucked into the last chapter detailing the violent warfare in Joshua, is an obscure couple of verses describing God's sovereignty.  In describing why the Canaanite armies fought against Joshua, the Bible says: 18 Joshua made war a long time with all those kings. 19 There was not a city that made peace with the people of Israel except the Hivites, the inhabitants of Gibeon. They took them all in battle. 20 For it was the Lord’s doing to harden their hearts that they should come against Israel in battle, in order that they should be devoted to destruction and should receive no mercy but be destroyed, just as the Lord commanded Moses.  Joshua 11:18-20 Without doubt, the passage is disturbing.  If it isn't, we either don't understand what is said or we don't believe it.  Scripture teaches time and time again, that God is [...]

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Jesus would play Halo

2021-07-04T18:07:06+00:00By |Culture and Christ|

I got an X-Box for Christmas from my in-laws.   My bride despises video games because it seems to have the power to bring out the worst in my two boys.  There is some truth to this.  When we got a Wii a few years go, our oldest son quickly became known as the "Wii-wolf" because of the darkness of his video game playing persona.  So despite my bride's protests and my son's history of outbursts, we received an X-box.  One might think the new fangled "Kinect" would be the hit of the party.  No, the real draw for me and my two warriors, is HALO. HALO is your typical shoot-em up, kill everything, kind of game.  Mom wasn't real happy about the violence, believing that much like food--you are what you eat.  I had seen my sons pour out violence after playing Super Mario brothers.   The truth is, boys are [...]

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Sin silent isn’t sin conquered

2021-07-04T18:08:08+00:00By |Note to Self...and Others, Re:Sermon|

I recently preached the second half of Joshua 10. The text is one of those that preachers might be tempted to ignore and hearers tempted to dismiss. On the surface, these verses amount to little more than a war report.   Personally, I don't believe that God waste words and whether it is obscure laws about donkeys, war reports, or genealogy, all Scripture was breathed out by God to strengthen our faith in God (2Tim 3.16; Rom. 15.4). Knowing that, verse 33 in chapter 10 is very interesting. In the middle of this list of battles is a city named Gezer, just West of Gibeon.  Apparently, the King of Gezer decided to help Lachish.  And though there is an account of the defeat of the King and his army, there is not ever an account of Israel taking the city.  33 Then Horam king of Gezer came up to help [...]

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How to pray or not…

2011-01-06T08:52:19+00:00By |Note to Self...and Others, Random Thoughts|

I preached Joshua 9 last week about how Israel was deceived by the Gibeonites into signing a treaty.  Joshua and his leaders asked all the right questions, but they failed to ask the right person.  Verse 14 identifies their mistake not as a failure to test, but a failure to pray: 14 So the men took some of their provisions, but did not ask counsel from the Lord. I often forget to pray. It seems that my default mode is to assume that sin hasn't really impacted my intellect, emotions, even perceptions of experiences.  My gut is deceptive though it is the best friend I depend on most.  He's a bit unreliable and his advice can easily be confused with bad Thai food.   My flesh can't be trusted, as a cursory examination of the last 30+ years of decision-making would prove.  Alas, perhaps short-term memory is also the result of [...]

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