Sermon and Worship Resources

Synonyms: touch, feel, sense of touch, tactile sense, tactility, contact, using one's hands, sensation, sense, suspicion, sneaking suspicion, notion, inkling, hunch, fancy, apprehension, presentiment, premonition, foreboding, love, care, affection, fondness, tenderness, warmth, warmness, emotion, sentiment, emotional state, compassion, sympathy, empathy, fellow feeling, understanding, concern, solicitude, solicitousness, tender-heartedness, brotherly love, sensibilities, sensitivities, self-esteem, ego, pride, opinion, belief, view, impression, intuition, instinct, estimation, guess, theory, hypothesis, thought, way of thinking, point of view, atmosphere, ambience, aura, air, mood, climate, character, overtone, undertone, tenor, spirit, quality, flavour, colour, aptitude, knack, flair, bent, talent, gift, skill, art, trick, faculty, ability, propensity, inclination, sensitive, warm, warm-hearted, tender, tender-hearted, caring, soft-hearted, sympathetic, compassionate, empathetic, responsive, receptive, intuitive, thoughtful

Antonyms: bad feeling, acrimony, animosity, animus, antagonism, antipathy, aversion, bitterness, detestation, disgust, dislike, disrelish, enmity, friction, grievances, grudges, hatred, hostility, loathing, malevolence, malice

Showing 1 to 25 of 323 results

1. Parable of a Good Climate

Luke 12:54-59

Illustration

... . Home is the place where your loved ones are and where the people you live with bring the most contentment and satisfaction. There can be real cause to smile in sunshine and in rain, if love and friendship bring the right spiritual climate. Some people seem able to laugh and face adversity with cheerful faith and courage. Some are busy in service of others and difficult times bring greater opportunities to be useful. "It makes me feel good," said Bill, "to note something special in each season and to ...

2. The Warmest Climate

Humor

"Your mother-in-law needs a warm climate." said the doctor. "How about Florida?" suggested the son-in-law. "Not warm enough." "How about Death Valley?" "Not warm enough," muttered the physician. For a moment the son-in-law looked at the doctor in silence, and then left the room. In about a minute he was back with a pistol in his hand. He handed it to the doctor. "You shoot her, doctor. I can't."

3. We Need Another Miracle

Mark 1:21-28

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... humanity with a stewardship responsibility toward the earth (Genesis 1:28-31). We have no right to ignore that. We spoke of Greta Thunberg earlier. In September of 2019, now at the ripe old age of sixteen (can you say driver’s license?), Greta addressed the Climate Action Summit at the beginning of the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York City. She was exceedingly blunt. She said, “My message is that we’ll be watching you. This is all wrong. I shouldn’t be up here. I should be back in ...

4. Stand by Me

Mark 4:35-41

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... the biggest and earliest direct revealing of his claim to divinity. No one controls the winds; no one calms the waves; no one calms the weather, except the one who created them all, the Lord God, the Creator of the universe. Because Jesus could keep climates in the palm of his hand, he had no fear of the forces of nature. Among the twelve disciples there were four professional fishermen. Everyone else had grown up and lived alongside the Sea of Galilee. Yet here they were, all fearful of the deep, unknown ...

5. Respect

1 Corinthians 12:12-31

Sermon

Harold Warlick

... of very wealthy residents. In fact, Michael Jordan, the basketball legend, had lived next door to them. But Michael had stopped visiting the home after his father died. Roland and Elizabeth had moved south a few years earlier to escape the harsh climate of western New York, near Buffalo. When they finally moved into their posh dream house, they noticed something unusual. They missed one of the very things they had taken for granted: neighbors. Virtually all the homes around them were expensive second homes ...

6. Love and Obey the Lord

Deuteronomy 11:1-32

Understanding Series

Christopher J. H. Wright

... does in so many other ways, the priority of divine grace and the necessity of human obedient response. 11:10–12 Yahweh being God of all the earth, it is hardly surprising that Deuteronomy can happily draw theology out of meteorology! The geographical and climatic differences between Egypt and Canaan are described here as a prelude to the lessons of verses 13–17. Egypt, a land of scarce rainfall, is dependent on the humanly devised and humanly operated schemes of irrigation from the waters of the Nile (v ...

7. The Window Of Time Is Closing

2 Peter 3:8-15a

Sermon

Ronald Love

... ’s happening in the world, the mess that we’ve made and the fact that unless we all get together to help the environment we all share, then it may be too late. The window of time is closing. And it’s not enough just to wave placards and say, ‘Climate change!’ The point is to take actual action. To do your bit.” The window of time is closing. The message of 2 Peter is that the window of time for the second coming is quickly closing. There is a scholarly debate if Peter is the actual author of the ...

8. Who Are We, Really?

1 Peter 2:4-12

Sermon

King Duncan

... ate were frozen out and the dinosaurs starved. Others suggest it was a giant meteorite that caused a great change in the temperature and dinosaurs could not adapt and survive in the cold. Nonetheless,” explained his mother, “it was the result of tremendous climate change that humans were able to build cities and children were able to play outside, not the result of a successful hunting campaign.” This leader went on to suggest that in similar fashion the task of the church is not necessarily to slay ...

9. True Colors

John 14:15-31, Psalm 66:1-20

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... have a firm opinion of their own about anything. At least it’s impossible to tell what they really think, because they will agree with whomever they are with. Put them into a room with climate change advocates, and they will passionate advocate for climate change. In the next hour, put them into a room with climate change protestors, and before you can say “flip,” they’ve taken up a sign and have begun protesting along with their peers. You probably also know people who do this same flip-flop when ...

10. A Faith, A Farm And A Family

Ruth 1:1-22

Sermon

John P. Rossing

... the dead and with me. The Lord grant that you may find security, each of you in the house of your husband!" Naomi's prayer creates a climate of expectation in which the rest of the story plays out: and the rest of the way through the book we're waiting to see if Naomi ... is fulfilling Naomi's hope, even though the writer of the story doesn't feel the need to keep telling us so. That climate of expectation is faith. Faith is an attitude more than a belief or a doctrine: It's an assumption we carry through life ...

11. Service Beset by "What’s the Use?"

Isaiah 49:1-7

Sermon

Donald Macleod

... . Note in the first verse how he puts it: "From my birth God had made mention of my name." Is not this a missing note in much of our thinking today? Constantly we are told to safeguard the worth of other individuals - and rightly so - but the climate and conditions of our age should persuade us to see also the worth of ourselves. Too many people are inclined to treat themselves as non-entities, as mere statistics in the human struggle, and forget to believe and see that they are members of God’s great ...

12. God Sometimes Changes His Mind

Jonah 3:1-10

Sermon

King Duncan

... she start giving God thanks for her husband and to restrict her prayer to the things for which she was grateful. When she did that, a change started to occur in their marriage-first with the wife and then the husband. There was a different climate in the home. Resentment was changed to acceptance. Her acceptance and love helped the husband get his drinking problem under control. The woman's husband changed when her prayer changed from a prayer of petition to a prayer of thanksgiving. So often, though, when ...

13. A Most Successful Sermon

Acts 2:14a, 36-41

Sermon

King Duncan

... us as well. There are many of us who feel that repentance is for others. We are like the six-year-old girl who said to her mother, “The number one problem in the United States is climate change. I read that in my Weekly Reader. Everybody,” she continued, “knows that the number one problem in the United States is climate change--everybody but our preacher. He thinks that it is sin. I feel that is just because he is a preacher.” Could I say that if there is a man-made component to a heating earth, sin ...

14. A Love For All Seasons (ii) (communion Meditation)

1 Corinthians 13:1-13

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... . It may give people license to take what ought to be steps of last resort, long before they have reached the time of last resort. It may encourage actions which provoke more retaliation than dialogue. It may raise the stakes of the conflict and escalate the climate for violence. In short, it may (if misused) focus too much on the word "tough", and too little on the word "love."" (Ritter, Ibid.) So, we're back to this amazing affirmation of Paul. Love endures all things -- nothing can happen to break love's ...

15. The Privilege and the Price

Matthew 5:13-16

Sermon

Phil Thrailkill

... high road to heaven because you showed them the way. If you are known as a man or woman who prays and is not embarrassed about it, people will seek you out and open their hearts. I have seen it happen; one word of courageous witness can change the climate of wherever you are. Truth has a way of verifying itself, and where the name of Jesus is invoked with honor, there you will find the light of the Holy Spirit. You will be grabbed up without warning by the Holy Spirit and poured out onto a needy situation ...

16. Oh, You'd Better Watch Out!

Mark 13:32-37

Sermon

King Duncan

... Day. We are awaiting the return of our Lord. We need to put Christ’s words into perspective, however. Many well-meaning followers of Christ have abused Christ’s teachings about the day of his return. First of all, Jesus was insistent nobody knows when this climatic event will occur. The angels in heaven don’t know. Even Christ himself did not know. There is an amusing Hasidic story about a rabbi who crossed a village square every morning on his way to the temple to pray. One morning, a large Russian ...

17. Global Warming

Genesis 2:18-24

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... child. To make matters worse the United States has been one of the slowest nations to recognize the dangers of our punching holes in the ozone. On November 6, 1990, all of the industrial nations except the U.S. were represented at the Second World Climate Conference in Geneva, where they struggled with the fact that eight of the hottest years on record came during the 1980s. Since this nation has had the largest role in bringing about negative global warming, it is time we took a leadership role in making ...

18. A Very Different Top 10 List

Mark 1:21-28

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... needing to put on the extinct list: greed, jealousy, anger, hypocrisy, selfishness . . . . Go exorcize some demons this week. Make a list of things you want to go extinct in your life, and then stop feeding them. Change the climate in your home and in your heart. Make the climate in which you live inhospitable to hatred, a wasteland for bigotry, a desert for envy. [Alternative Beginning: Here is an alternative start to your sermon, which can be used to supplement or supplant the “list” beginning above ...

19. Job Is for Real

Job 1:1, 2:1-10

Sermon

Donna Schaper

... as the sand on Jones Beach. Now we see the universe as comprising the sand on all the beaches up and down the coast of Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. Precisely this sea change (forgive the metaphor) is needed as we look at the climate crisis that our generation faces. We need to reframe the issue. God reframed Job's suffering for him, using words that deserve repeating. Where were you when I planned the earth? Tell me if you are so wise, do you know who took its dimensions, measuring ...

20. Make Haste Slowly

Illustration

Joe Aldrich

... foot in the door). Furthermore, they are encouraged not to ask for a listing during this "get acquainted" time. Obviously, there would be exceptions to these restrictions, but they do illustrate an understanding of what it takes to create a favorable climate for selling real estate. After the initial year of regular contacts, the agent continues to communicate with the assigned families on a scheduled, systematic basis. Research reveals that if this pattern is followed consistently for one-year-and-a-half ...

21. Trials and Temptations

James 1:1-18, James 1:19-27

Understanding Series

Peter H. Davids

... 33 and in Pliny, Natural History 21, 1. It occurs in Ps. 103:15–16, which, along with Isa. 40:6, might be in James’ mind, and in Matt. 6:30 and Luke 12:28 (although with a different application). Though it is especially suited to Palestine, other warm climates would also find the expression meaningful. Some scholars have seen with scorching heat (kausoni) as indicating the sirocco, or hot desert wind, as in Job 27:21; Jer. 18:17; and Hos. 12:1. In fact, it may well be referred to in Ps. 103:16. But this ...

22. Abram and Lot Separate

Genesis 13:1-18

Understanding Series

John E. Hartley

... :18 After this word from Yahweh, Abram moved his tents and went to live near the great trees of Mamre, which were in the vicinity of Hebron. These lush oaks, which grow to a height of twenty to twenty-five feet, offer shade in a hot, windy climate. In recognition of Yahweh’s lordship and his trust in the promises, Abram built an altar to Yahweh. Abram’s kind dealings with Lot reveal that Yahweh had rightly chosen him as the vessel of his promise. Though he stumbled from time to time, Abram continued to ...

23. “The Lord Watches over the Way of the Righteous”

Psalm 1:1-6

Teach the Text

C. Hassell Bullock

... the congregation to understand the blessings of delighting and meditating upon the law of the Lord. In an arid, dry climate, such as existed in much of ancient Israel, trees desperately needed water in order to survive. A tree planted by a stream of water can access ... that water through its root system, and in Israel’s climate those roots have to be very deep. The result is a healthy tree that bears fruit. In the same way, when we choose ...

24. Listening and Doing

James 1:19-27, James 1:1-18

Understanding Series

Peter H. Davids

25. Get Ready

Mark 13:24-37

Sermon

King Duncan & Angela Akers

... of our lives. But they also report that the threat of another cold war with China or Russia, or both at the same time, may be in the cards. Scenarios for a war with China or Russia would certainly be a nightmare. Also of deep concern is climate change with the disappearance of much of our bio-diversity—did anyone get hot this past summer? They also predicted widespread flooding and water replacing oil as the most precious commodity on earth. (3) How much of this will occur? No one knows. But here’s what ...

Showing results