Sermon and Worship Resources

Synonyms: thirstiness, dryness, parched, craving, strong desire, longing, yearning, avidity, hunger, voracity, keenness, eagerness, lust, appetite, passion, love, crave, want, covet, desire, hunger for/after, lust for/after, hanker for/after, have one's heart set on

Antonyms: aversion, distaste, apathy, dislike, hatred, antipathy, disgust, disregard, abhorrence, acrimony, wet, animosity, animus, antagonism, bad feeling, bitterness, be averse to, detestation

Showing 1 to 25 of 215 results

1. Apathy Toward God

Illustration

Unknown

I looked upon a farm one day, that once I used to own; the barn had fallen to the ground, the fields were overgrown. The house in which my children grew, where we had lived for years … I turned to see it broked down, and brushed aside the tears. I looked upon my soul one day to find it too had grown, with thorns and nettles everywhere, the seeds neglect had sown. The years had passed while I had cared for things of lesser worth. The things of heaven I let go while minding things of earth. To Christ I ...

2. Don’t Compromise Your Beliefs

Galatians 1:1-10

Sermon

Richard Gribble

... his beliefs; lack of popularity, negative reactions, or political defeat were not important to him. He never counted the cost of his discipleship. We live in a world today where Christians are constantly challenged by outside forces. These challenges come in two basic ways: apathy and indifference. How often have we heard a person say, "It's not my responsibility, not my concern. I don't want to get involved; other people can worry about it"? The challenge that this comment, so often heard by us or even one ...

3. The Empty Tomb

John 20:1-9, John 20:10-18

Sermon

Mark Ellingsen

... he had when he only heard the stories of Jesus' resurrection. He needed to see the Risen Lord himself before he could really be excited in his faith (John 20:24-29). When the story of the empty tomb is proclaimed, the usual reaction is disbelief, confusion or apathy. In some cases, the hearers decide to keep the news as a secret (Mark 16:8; cf. John 20:10). Or, as in our gospel lesson for today, Jesus' followers fail to understand (John 20:9), react apathetically (John 20:10), or despair (John 20:11). It is ...

4. From Laziness to Passion

Psalm 51:1-12

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... never start something that has the risk of failure. Sloth says let George do it. Sloth says just don't get involved in it. Acedia is apathy, the sin of not caring. So the angel of the Lord says to the Church of Laodicea "I know your deeds, that you are neither ... going to be moved by worship today. I'm just not going to care about anything you say. We complain about it among voters. Voter apathy we call it. The great freedom of America and we don't even care enough to go to the polls and exercise our freedom ...

5. The Explosive Power Of Pentecost

Acts 2:1-13

Sermon

King Duncan

... not bothered by poverty and hunger, war and drugs, what are you worried about?" Tommy replied, ".... I'm worried about apathy."(1) A bumper sticker bore the sign, "America's Greatest Problem is Apathy-But Who Cares?" George Carlin said a few years ago: "Scientists have just discovered a cure for apathy. However, no one has shown the slightest interest." Today we celebrate God's answer to apathy-the explosive power of the Holy Spirit. There is much about this power we may not understand. There is a terrible ...

6. The Power Of The Resurrection

Revelation 1:4-8

Sermon

Mark Ellingsen

... and hell. This is the message of our second lesson. It says that he has freed us by his blood (v.5). That’s what Martin Luther says, we’ve noticed. This is the antidote that Revelation and Luther’s version of it offer for our doubts, our apathy, our lack of enthusiasm and commitment to our faith. The formula is a very simple one here: You need encounters with the risen Lord; you need to experience the risen and victorious Christ in order to be assured of his resurrection and in order to be nurtured in ...

7. Advent 1

Luke 21:5-38, 1 Thessalonians 3:6-13, Jeremiah 33:1-26, Psalm 25:1-22

Sermon Aid

William E. Keeney

... assail faith and practice. A. Traps of the Flesh. The grosser and more evident sins of lust, gluttony, and similar sins arising from the appetites. B. Traps of the Mind. The subtle sins of pride, prudence, and similar sins of reason. C. Traps of the Will. The sins of apathy, lack of courage, anger, hate, and similar sins that undermine love of other persons. 5. Are You on Guard? (v. 34) Is the church on guard or is it acting as though it is asleep by its failure to be active for the kingdom of God? A. Signs ...

8. The Good Samaritan

Luke 10:25-37

Sermon

Brett Blair

... of Jesus' story of the Good Samaritan. George says that he never heard of that one. Truth is, the law isn't new. It's as old as the tablets Moses brought down from Mount Sinai. There’s nothing NEW about it. The story of the Good Samaritan underscores our apathy. It reminds us how unwilling we are to stop. Stop what we are doing and help someone who is in need. But don’t let this lull you into believing that Jesus is talking about being friendly to everyone. The point to the story has a bit more bite to ...

9. In the Cross

Zechariah 9:9-13

Sermon

... these: "What difference does it make?" "God doesn't need me to sing hymns." "My kids will have plenty of opportunity to learn religion on their own. (After all, in the movie 'The Exorcist' they used a crucifix, didn't they?)" A rejection of God because of apathy toward God. Manana, later, luke warm, caring less. To hell with you, God! [Be careful of course with the use of this line] - Crucify Him. And a rejection of God then, 2,000 years ago, and God today - because of excuses. "This Christ," says the crowd ...

10. A Man Whose Dreams Came True

Genesis 37:1-11

Sermon

R. Blaine Detrick

... kind of a prisoner that he could be. He tried to be happy, useful, content, cooperative, kind. Finally, the rulers of the prison gave him a little responsibility, then a bit more, until he was actually watching over some of the other prisoners. Dreams vs. Apathy Two of his fellow-prisoners were from the court of Pharaoh, the chief butler and the chief baker. They had displeased Pharaoh, and had been tossed into prison. They were placed in the same section with Joseph, who was friendly with them. One night ...

11. The Temptation To Pass By On The Other Side

Luke 10:25-37

Sermon

Brett Blair

12. Blessing, Testing, Response

Matthew 25:31-46

Sermon

King Duncan

... me . . . but not for Thee. To many, the church is to serve me . . . to meet my needs . . . a place to seek my salvation . . . to worship my God. That's Meology. It is not concerned about the needs of others. (It is the people of God rotting with apathy.) That is the very same problem the prophet Amos saw in Israel: "Woe to you; who are complacent in Zion . . . You lie on beds inlaid with ivory and lounge on your couches. You dine on choice lambs and fattened calves . . . you drink wine by the bowlful and ...

13. The Competitor

Genesis 25:19-34

Sermon

King Duncan

... to someone who has sold his birthright for a bowl of stew. So neither brother really measured up to their inheritance--one with an excess of ambition, the other with an excess of apathy. And that just may be why God chose Jacob instead of Esau to carry on the covenant relationship. Between ambition and apathy, most of the time, apathy is the more deadly spiritually. Who can forget those scorching words that the Spirit speaks to the church in Laodicea: "I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I ...

14. Stick to the Knitting

John 1:43-51

Sermon

Mark Trotter

... Christ reconciling the world unto himself." It was "foolishness to the Greeks," because the Greeks believed the gods are detached, removed and distant from us. There was one word that they used to describe the gods: "apatheia," the source of our word, "apathy." Apathy means "without feeling." To be divine, the Greeks believed, meant that you couldn't have any feeling, you couldn't participate in the pain, sorrow and disappointment of human life. You were apathetic. You lived on Mt. Olympus, removed from the ...

15. The Empire Strikes Back

Jude 1:14-15

Sermon

James Merritt

... everywhere. There is a great lesson we can learn here about the day and age in which we live from the days of Enoch. Whenever a nation falls into spiritual apathy, they will fall into social apathy. When people get to a point where they do not care about the coming of the Savior, they won’t care about the character of the President. II. The Factual Promise of The Second Coming Enoch’s message was this: “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints.” ( ...

16. Style: Some Distinctive Marks of a Methodist

Galatians 5:1-15

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... , and the fellowship - the larger group. The Methodist movement was born in England and soon began to burn with a fire of love across that land in large part because of two big problems in the established church. One, spiritual apathy. Deism had flavored the intellectual and religious climate. God had become a benevolent ruler of the universe, removed from personal experience. In the arrogant rationalism that pervaded the day, everything had to be utterly reasonable. The second thing that had happened ...

Some people confuse acceptance with apathy, but there's all the difference in the world. Apathy fails to distinguish between what can and what cannot be helped; acceptance makes that distinction. Apathy paralyzes the will-to-action; acceptance frees it by relieving it of impossible burdens.

Arthur Gordon

18. Prepared Or Not?

Matthew 25:1-13

Sermon Aid

William E. Keeney

... . So often we can rise to meet a crisis. It is during the time when nothing seems to be happening that we become lax and succumb to temptation. Our fears of anticipation may also be worse than the consequence of the event itself. 2. Apathy. A great enemy of the church is apathy. Many churches have a lot of so-called dead wood. They are people who are on the membership list but do not attend except possibly on the high holy days of Christmas and Easter, or for such events as weddings, baptisms and funerals ...

19. Choosing Your Spirituality

Sermon

Charles R. Leary

... positive statement! I call that an ideology of helplessness and hopelessness. Failure to appreciate human life legitimizes violence, indifference, apathy, fatalism. It makes one feel that he or she can no longer effect a difference in the world. Many blame movies, hard ... rock music, pornography and drugs for violence, apathy and suicide. There may be some truth in that, but it still stands that negative, judgmental religion itself is one ...

20. What Happens When We Can't Believe It?

John 20:24-31

Sermon

Mark Ellingsen

... need to put in it. "Prove it to me, God! Prove it to me." That is what I am really saying in those moments of apathy and hopelessness. "Make my life good; give me peace, then I will believe and love you, God." Does it sound familiar? Do you hear a ... feeling joy in life, feeling loved by God, and excited about it, then it is just a bit easier for me to fight my feelings of apathy, sadness and my weak faith. Being with people who are excited, feel God's love, and are happy about it, makes God a lot more real ...

21. The Road To The Cross

Matthew 27:11-26

Sermon

Mark Ellingsen

... to be using the story of Jesus' condemnation as a way of condemning social sin. Let us consider the story in more detail. Social sin; the lust for power; the determination to maintain control and to remain in power, no matter what compromises we need to make; apathy - the kind of apathy that leads us to go along with the crowd and with our leaders, even if they are not doing the right thing. We are all guilty of such sin. Pilate was also guilty, as were the chief priests and the elders and the crowd. We all ...

22. Don't Just Stand There! - Get Involved!

Luke 3:1-20, Matthew 6:19-24

Sermon

Dr. John Thompson Peters

... has been 200 years. These nations progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith, From spiritual faith to great courage, From courage to liberty, From liberty to abundance, From abundance to selfishness, From selfishness to complacency, From complacency to apathy, From apathy to dependency, From dependency back into bondage. A modern preacher has reminded us that: "Hot blood flows in the veins of man; strong fires burn within his soul. This is God's gift to him, part of the image of ...

23. Responding to Christ's Birth

Matthew 2:1-12

Sermon

... is missing, the powers to resist evil are paralyzed. Therefore, it we want to live today, we must consciously will life. We must learn to love life with such a passion that we no longer become accustomed to the powers of destruction. We must overcome our own apathy and be seized by the passion for life. To follow as a disciple means to share in both the joy and the suffering of humanity. Christ's people are concerned about the joy and the hurt of life, but neither one to the exclusion of the other. Good ...

24. BE DIFFERENT!

Illustration

John H. Krahn

... on anything, and makes no contributions of any kind to anything. Does that sound like something you would like? Forget it! If you are interested, that shows you are not qualified for membership. Some people lead a life worthy of an organization like this. But the Apathy Club is not a viable choice for the Christian. Those who are willing to put their hand in the hand of the Man from Galilee must also be willing to get involved in the Father’s world. Jesus’ message was profoundly simple. If you have two ...

25. It’s Not So Bad To Be A Beggar

Acts 3:1-10

Sermon

Barbara Brokhoff

... it, and if a cure is ever found for this "addiction" I shall refuse it. I even like "bad" church. By that I mean that I’ve gone to church, as you have, when the attendance was very low, the choir sang off key, the congregation sang with blasphemous apathy, and the preaching was dull (and we preachers can be dull). My preacher-John says "Some people are so dull they cannot possibly be that way without Divine help," and I have seen preaching so dull it would give an Excedrin a headache! But bad as that kind ...

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