Sermon and Worship Resources

Showing 1 to 25 of 72 results

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

J. Will Ormond

You are middle-aged or older if you remember when the movie Seven Brides for Seven Brothers was first released. It was an exuberant, fast-paced musical about seven brothers on the frontier of the United States who were all looking for brides. Such "commodities" were rare in their part of the world. But, of course, in the end each brother got his bride. The story in our lectionary passage for today...

2. Our Living Hope

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

Theodore F. Schneider

Not every question requires an answer. Sometimes the hope is that there will be no answer. Questioning can be "posturing," that is, taking a position rather than soliciting information. By the questions raised, information is given as well as asked. Often playing to the audience of listeners or bystanders, questions are intended to manipulate others while vindicating the posture of the speaker. On...

3. Big Changes

Luke 20:27-40

Children's Sermon

Brett Blair

Exegetical Aim: As we grow in life and as we grow with God, we will always have to deal with changes. Sometimes it means letting go of the old and accepting the new. Heaven will bring about the biggest of these changes. Props: A diaper, wipes, a baby bottle (or a jar of baby food and a baby spoon), and a pacifier. Lesson: I have something this morning I think you need. Hold up the diaper. Okay, wh...

4. The Seven Last Words of the Church

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

Johnny Dean

Tradition – what a concept! What do you think of when you hear the word tradition? Exactly what is tradition? Mr. Webster’s dictionary defines the word tradition as "the transmission of knowledge, opinions, customs, doctrines, and practices from generation to generation, originally by word of mouth and personal example." We have all inherited traditions from our ancestors, which we will in turn pa...

5. Two Testing Questions

Luke 20:27-40, Luke 20:20-26

Teach the Text

R.T. France

Big Idea: In response to two questions designed to trap Jesus, he gives replies that not only avoid the traps but also convey important teaching. Understanding the Text Once Jesus has reached Jerusalem, he has set himself up as a regular teacher in the court of the Gentiles (19:47; 20:1). This has quickly provoked the temple-based leadership into challenging his authority (20:1–8), to which Jesu...

6. The Resurrection and Marriage

Luke 20:27-40

One Volume

Gary M. Burge

Jesus has given a deft answer to a controversial political question. Now Jesus is faced with a question about the resurrection from the Sadducees (20:27–40). The Sadducees were an aristocratic group who were the most powerful political faction in Palestine. They rejected both the oral tradition of the law, to which the Pharisees adhered, and belief in the resurrection and angels (cf. Acts 23:8). T...

7. The Importance Of Asking The Right Questions

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

Larry R. Kalajainen

A certain minister has made it a policy for many years to refer "six-year-old theology questions" to his wife. Since she has taught very young children for many years, he says, she has a much better grasp than he does of how to address the questions which little kids ask. The other day, a first-grader brought a drawing of a skeleton into class where she teaches English as a second language. The ti...

8. The Resurrection and Marriage

Luke 20:27-40

Understanding Series

Craig A. Evans

20:27–40 The third question put to Jesus concerns the teaching of the resurrection. The Sadducees (see note below), who do not believe in the resurrection, ask Jesus a rather ridiculous question, one designed to show the incompatability of the law of Moses and belief in the resurrection. The Sadducees allude to Deut. 25:5 and Gen. 38:8, where the laws of what would eventually be called “levirate m...

9. Putting Eternity to the Test

Luke 20:27-38

Sermon

John Wayne Clarke

Today's Gospel Lesson is one that is troubling if you care about fairness. By that, I mean, would you deliberately try to fool someone just to see if you could get that person in trouble? I am not talking about getting a brother or sister in trouble, because that is almost part of growing up. I mean really getting someone in hot water. Would you do that? Our reading presents us with the Sadducees...

10. But Wait! There's More!

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

King Duncan

Recently I heard about a man who had spent his life in the Air Force. One of his friends suggested that the family play the Air Force theme song at his funeral. His wife vetoed that idea. With a laugh, she said, “At your father’s funeral, we are not going to play a song that begins, ‘Off we go into the wild blue yonder!’” Arthur Schiff died last year at the age of 66. You may not recognize the na...

11. Whose Wife Will She Be?

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

King Duncan

A little girl walked into a pet shop. She went up to the shopkeeper and asked in a sweet little lisp, “Excuthe me, mithter, do you have any wittle wabbits?” The shopkeeper bent way down and put his hands on his knees so he would be on her level, and asked, “Do you want a wittle white wabbit or a wittle bwack wabbit? Or maybe that cute wittle bwown wabbit over there?” The little girl thought for ...

12. A Faith that Will Bring You Alive

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

King Duncan

Brian Rice of Maple Grove, Minnesota writes that recently his wife asked the question men most dread: “Honey, do you think I look fat in my new dress?” Brian was up to the test. Pointing to what he was wearing, he replied, “Do I look stupid in this shirt?” (1) It’s not easy to be married. Comedian Wendy Liebman says she went through a messy divorce. She says, “My divorce was messy because there...

13. Damaged In Transit, But Deliverable

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

King Duncan

Author Barbara Johnson, in her book, Fresh Elastic for Stretched Out Moms, tells about a package she once received that was marked DAMAGED IN TRANSIT, BUT DELIVERABLE. There was a space at the top that said either DELIVERABLE or UNDELIVERABLE, and a big black crayon marked this package as DELIVERABLE! The string was hanging off it, the label was torn off, and tapes were hanging out of one corner, ...

14. Setting The Record Straight

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

King Duncan

The Hollywood version of life after death is portrayed in Albert Brooks' movie, "Defending Your Life." Brooks plays the part of Daniel Miller, an advertising man who is killed by a bus. He finds himself in Judgment City along with many other people. They are ushered into the city with all the efficiency of a bus tour. Newly arrived persons are taken to what appears to be hotels and told to sleep b...

15. Is This Life All There Is?

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

The film "Amadeus" ends showing the funeral of the great musician Mozart. He was taken to his grave in a blizzard. There was a trap door in the end of his coffin. They dumped his body through that trap door into a giant hole in which there were several other bodies. The film takes several liberties with history, including the account of his death. Scholars have found that the weather reports for ...

16. Are There Any Questions?

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

Today our good year in the company of Dr. Luke, the author of the Gospel that had been in focus through these months, begins to wind down toward the end. Are there any questions? If you have a question, and I suspect we have a few in mind, line up in the center aisle and wait your turn. Jesus has been teaching in the temple at Jerusalem, his disciples are at hand, and in the crowd his enemies as w...

17. New Help on an Old Question

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

There came to him some Sadducees, those who say that there is no resurrection, and they asked him a question, saying, "Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, having a wife but no children, the man must take the wife and raise up children for his brother. Now there were seven brothers; the first took a wife, and died without children, and the second and the third took her, and li...

18. The God Of The Living

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

King Duncan

Jewelry salesman Alexander Makowski was devastated. Just three weeks before, in Phoenix, his sample case had been stolen. Now he had returned to the parking lot of the San Diego hotel where he was staying to find that his car and jewelry worth $100,000 were missing. Alexander could take no more. He climbed to the balcony over the hotel atrium lobby, lifted himself over the railing, and plunged fiv...

19. Marriage In Heaven? No. Heaven In Marriage? Yes.

Luke 20:27-40

Sermon

King Duncan

Some Sadducees tried to trip Jesus up. They posed a question about a woman who married seven brothers one right after the other and was widowed by each. Whose wife, they asked, will she be in the resurrection? We know they were attempting to cause Jesus to say something damaging because the Sadducees did not even believe in a resurrection. Jesus' answer was that there is no marriage in heaven. Tec...

20. Thy Will Be Done

Luke 20:27-38

Sermon

Molly F. James

Recently, I was in a bit of a hurry to get something done (which I am slowly discovering is rarely a good idea). I was moving things around at home, and I broke the lamp in my husband’s study. I felt very badly about what I had done, and I wanted to remedy the situation. I offered to go right out and buy him a new lamp. He said not to worry; it wasn’t his favorite lamp anyway, and we could go and ...

21. A Child of the Resurrection

Luke 20:27-38

Sermon

King Duncan

I want to test how awake you are this morning. I’ve got a riddle for you: What question can you never answer “Yes” to? Are you ready for the answer? The answer is, “Are you asleep?” (1) It’s tough starting the morning with a riddle, isn’t it? Especially a groaner like that one. It reminds me of the story of a game show contestant, Bob, who’d made it to the final round, and he just had to answer...

22. God Of The Living

Luke 20:27-40

Bulletin Aid

H. Burnham Kirkland

Call To Worship Leader: Sing for joy to the Lord, all the earth! People: Praise him with songs and shouts of joy! Leader: Sing praises to the Lord! Play music on the harps! People: Blow trumpets and horns, and shout for joy to the Lord, our king! Leader: Come, let us worship! Collect Almighty God, we thank you for the assurance that you are a living God who dwells among us. Our hearts are filled ...

23. God of the Living

Luke 20:27-40

Bulletin Aid

James Wilson

Call to Worship Leader: We are called together this day by the living Lord God Almighty: People: God Who is with us in our coming and our going; Leader: God Who is with us in our good times and our times of trouble; People: God Who is with us in both the days and the nights of life. Leader: Let us give praise to our gracious, merciful and loving God. All: Blessed be the name of the Lord! Collect ...

24. The Life after Death

Luke 20:27-40

Bulletin Aid

Carl Hoefler

Call to Worship Pastor: The hope of the Christian faith is the assurance of life after death. People: We believe in God's power over death and look forward to living with him. Pastor: There are many things we do not know about eternity; but we do know God is a God of the living, and we shall live with him. People: Praise God for his Son, Jesus, who has shown us the way through death into life eter...

25. Proper 27

Luke 20:27-40

Bulletin Aid

Dennis Koch

Gospel Note Jesus' response here to the resurrection-denying Sadducees underscores the limitations of their collective religious imagination, which simply failed (1) to comprehend the radically different character of the new age that Jesus was announcing and (2) to discern the logical (and eschatological!) implications for believers in the "God of the living." Liturgical Color Green Suggested Hy...

Showing 1 to 25 of 72 results