Sermon and Worship Resources

Showing 226 to 250 of 662 results

Sermon

William Luoma

... things come first in our lives. Remind us again of the urgency of what we are about. Let this congregation be a real light in the community, and let our love for one another be genuine. Forgive us for calling ourselves Christians when we are only poor imitations. Have mercy on us when we let other things crowd out the example of your Son, Jesus Christ. We pray about the problems facing our world. Bless those who are trying to help the homeless, so that people do not have to suffer. For those places where ...

227. Rest

Matthew 11:25-30

Children's Sermon

Brett Blair

... ? (response) We are going to pretend like we are all sleeping. Everyone lay your head down. Let them rest for a few seconds. Ring, ring, ring. Look at your watch. Well, good morning it’s 7:00 and time to get up. Ok, everyone get up. Imitate the motions for them. Let’s Stretch. Everybody stretch. (stretching motion) Make your bed. Everybody make your bed. (response) 7:20 Pick up the room. (response) 7:30 time to eat breakfast. (response) 7:40 time to get dressed. Put on your shirt, pants, socks, shoes ...

228. Counterfeit Faith

Acts 14:8-20

Sermon

Carl Hoefler

... . The bill that he had used to copy his counterfeit twenty was itself a counterfeit. Our text this morning is about counterfeit faith - the counterfeit faith which Paul confronted in Lystra. According to the dictionary, the word "counterfeit" is defined as something made in imitation of something else. It is, a fake or copy made to resemble the real or the genuine article. It is exactly that kind of faith that Paul and Barnabas experienced in the pagan city of Lystra. Paul and Barnabas were on a missionary ...

229. Seeking What Matters

Matthew 13:44-46

Sermon

... able to make some discerning judgments because they knew. When it comes to the values that impinge upon our human life, you and I need to cultivate the art of knowing a pearl when we see one, and, of course, to develop an insight for seeing the gaudy imitation for what it is. Otherwise, as we make our pilgrimage across the years, we might possibly somewhere come upon a treasure and never know it, or we might be obsessed by some ornate bauble that is worse than worthless. Many a person, on the moral side of ...

230. Born Naked With A Cross

Sermon

... says, "Receive the sign of the Holy Cross, in token that henceforth thou shalt know the Lord, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings". The newborn Christian begins a new life living under the sign of the cross with the purpose of imitating Christ. Get to Know Him Free from the filthy clothes of the past, a Christian starts out with the goal of knowing Jesus. In our text Paul says, "that I may know him." To "know" him is more than knowing about him: where he was born, who ...

231. Proper 20

Lk 16:1-13 · 1 Tim 2:1-8 · Amos 8:4-7 · Hos 11:1-11

Sermon Aid

... God. C. Be honest in handling money - v. 10. D. Make money a servant of God - v. 13. 2. What You Can Learn from a Crook. 16.8. Need: Jesus used a crook, the unjust steward, to teach us a lesson about money. He, of course, did not suggest we imitate the crook, but he points to a principle involved. The crook was prudent and shrewd in using money to get security. Jesus is asking Christians to be as wise as "the sons of the world." Outline: A crook says, Be shrewd A. In spending your money: 1. Don't waste ...

232. Proper 25

Lk 18:9-14 · 2 Tim 4:9-18 · Sirach 35:12-18 · Deut 10:12-22 · Zeph 3:1-9

Sermon Aid

... 's who God is that matters A. God cares for all who are members of his family: baptized, marked with his love, there is no distinction B. If push comes to shove, God will side with the hurting (the prosperous can better take care of themselves) 3. We need to imitate God's style A. No favoritism in the Christian community! B. Let us not forget the unfortunate beyond our gates Lesson 2: 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18 1. At the Crossroads of Life. 4:6-8. Need: There will come a time when we will stand at life ...

233. Epiphany 7

Lk 6:27-38 · 1 Cor 15:45-49 · 1 Sam 26:1-25 · Gen 45:3-11, 15

Sermon Aid

John R. Brokhoff

... gets credit only for going the second mile. 3. Give (v. 38). The problem is, how do we get to the point of not retaliating and doing more good than is expected? In verses 36-38, we find a twofold answer. On the one hand, we are to reflect and imitate God who is loving and merciful even to "the ungrateful and the selfish." (v. 35) On the other hand, we will receive what we give. The power to be and to do what we ought comes from the example of God. Then as we judge not, condemn not, forgive, and ...

234. The Call to be Holy in Love

Leviticus 19:1-37

Sermon

... us, our care, our love, is our neighbor. In today's Gospel from Matthew, Jesus even further broadens our understanding of who is our neighbor. The Lord says we are to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. In loving our enemies we then imitate God's gracious love and fulfill the command of our Lord to be perfect as God is perfect. Perfection in this sense is the perfection of love for all, excluding no person. To be perfect is to be undivided, whole-hearted. To love all who need our love ...

235. He Lights Up My Life!

Exodus 33:12-23

Sermon

... other things are that simply made do until we are together again! Angels which stand-in as an understudy for God himself are far from satisfactory. That's true of most replacements for the real thing. You don't want margarine if you can get butter, You don't want imitation powder if you can get cream, You don't want instant if you can get brewed coffee, You don't want Pepsi if you can get Coke (excuse me, if you think it should be the other way around), - and you don't want angels when you've been used ...

236. Talents and Trust

Matthew 25:14-30

Sermon

... dominion over all the earth. But that is not all, because that is not enough. Given that enormous responsibility, he knows that we will either exploit it and hopelessly abuse it or become so anxious over the enormity of the task that we will imitate the one talent man, retreat into self-defensive non-action, and let things go to rack and ruin. Therefore, as Redeemer, God breaks into our lives with forgiveness. Forgiveness both for wrong action and for inaction. That sort of forgiveness is precisely what it ...

237. An Intimate Conversation and an Exclusive Covenant

Exodus 19:1-25

Sermon

... , Dublin, where he served boldly and faithfully as dean. A plaque was placed on the wall over his tomb: Here is laid the Body of JONATHAN SWIFT, Doctor of Divinity, Dean of this Cathedral Church, Where savage indignation can no longer Rend his heart. Go traveller, and imitate, if you can, This earnest and dedicated Champion of liberty. He died on the 19th day of October, 1745 A.D. aged 78 years. Moses is worthy of that sort of acclaim, but in lieu of a plaque the Holy Bible testifies that Moses had earned ...

238. The Christian Life Children of Light

Ephesians 4:17--5:21

Bulletin Aid

... all bitterness, rage, hatred and malice. Women: Make our mouths clean vessels, holding the pure words of truth and wisdom. Cleanse our hearts that our mouths may remain clean. Leader: Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving one another just like in Christ God forgave you. All: Make us imitators of God. Help us to live a life of love - love as it is shown in this Scripture.

239. The Master Has Come - To Build His Church

Mark 16:1-20

Sermon

... disciples that he would build his church on the affirmation of the rock-man, Simon Peter, and that "the powers of death will not prevail against it." The church has a Master - someone who builds, inspires, and leads the church, someone whom the church worships, serves, and imitates. Jesus the Christ is Master of his church. We must remember not only the message, but also the Master. If we do not remember who the Master is, the message gets lost. We forget it, warp it, twist it, or make it into some old or ...

240. The Ministry of Refreshing

2 Timothy 1:1-2:13

Sermon

Various Authors

... May the Lord grant mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, for he often refreshed me; he was not ashamed of my chains ... (v. 16) Meet Onesiphorus. Onesiphorus was a friend of Saint Paul’s. We ought to think about him. We ought to imitate him. Saint Paul writes about Onesiphorus in his second letter to Timothy. Paul’s letters make up about a third of the entire New Testament. They are theological treasuries. For sublime thought, for spiritual energy, for powerful theology, they are probably without equal ...

Luke 17:1-10

There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

242. Advent 3

Isaiah 35:1-10, Psalm 146:1-10, James 5:7-12, Matthew 11:1-19

Sermon Aid

... destiny when they die. The climax of the story: When Jesus preached John's "funeral sermon" he emphasized, in his reply, that service to God and people was a sign that he was the Messiah. Service is also the nature of the life that believers are to live in imitation of their Lord. Serving people in the name of Jesus the Christ is the only way to find full favor with God; it is the secret of genuine greatness in the eyes of God; it does not win eternal life for anyone - that comes through the grace of God ...

243. Epiphany 8

Matthew 5:38-42

Bulletin Aid

... Leader: Let us worship the God of Creation! People: LET US WORSHIP THE GOD OF LOVE! Leader: May God's blessings be upon us this day! People: MAY GOD'S LOVE - AND OURS - FLOW TO ALL PEOPLE! Collect God of absolute justice, you have called us to imitate your own righteousness in our dealings with one another. Help us again to hear and heed that vocation: that, laying aside our selfish motives and self-serving ways, we may become truly worthy citizens of your coming Reign in Christ Jesus, in whose name we pray ...

244. A Glory Revealed in Grace and Love

John 13:1-17

Sermon

... are obligated to love one another.4 Let us pray: Lord Jesus, reveal your glory among us as we love one another. We want to love others as you loved us. But it is hard, and we fail so often. Give us a glimpse of your glory that we may imitate it and glorify you, and draw everyone to you. Amen 1. Isaiah 52:13 (LXX). 2. See Luke 22:25. 3. See Luke 7:36-50. 4. See 1 John 4:7-11 in Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland, eds. (Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelstiftung, 1979, ed. 26), pp. 621f. The text ...

245. Security: Deeply Personal

Ezekiel 34:1-31

Sermon

... Christ from the dead and to an inheritance which is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading kept in heaven for you." What security! If there is something (Someone) better than that, let us lose no time bringing it to humankind. Coming from Of the Imitation of Christ, by Thomas A’Kempis is the straightforward, simple gem: "When Jesus speaks not inwardly to us, all other comfort is nothing worth; but if Jesus speak but one word, we feel great consolation." This points to the almost unbelievable insecurity ...

246. Faith, Love, and Fakers at Ephesus

Acts 18:18-28

Sermon Aid

CSS

... baptism. How can you be sure that it "took?" 3. Paul became a tourist attraction at Ephesus. This had its good side because visitors came long distances to hear him preach and teach, but also a bad side when he was exploited by imitators and by opportunists who sold souvenirs. How do we draw a line between healthy promotion of our church (and our preacher) and ruthless exploitation like that practiced by some television evangelists? Questions 1. What followers of John the Baptizer became prominent in the ...

247. It Isn’t Fair!

Matthew 20:1-16

Sermon

... t come with justice and "fair treatment." Rather, it arrived with grace abounding, grace in all its radicality - an uncompromising, earnest, sweeping, earthshaking and tomb-rending embrace, given in spite of earth’s deserving. That’s the pattern we are called to imitate. We’re beyond payoffs, rewards, incentives, bonuses. Leave subtle bribery of that sort to those who haven’t met the Master yet, or who don’t like his style. We have the promises - the gifts, the Spirit, and the Kingdom. Who cares ...

248. Faith isn’t Easy - But it Works!

Genesis 12:1-8

Sermon

Barbara Brokhoff

... the name of Mrs. Harriet Hudson. She didn’t have many material things, but she did own six precious things, until a tornado roared through her tiny, crudely built house. She had a coat, which had been given to her by her now deceased husband. It was only imitation fur, but it was a Christmas gift and very precious to her. Another of her treasures was a stove, which was destroyed when the chimney fell on it. She’d cooked many a meal on it, and she loved that " ‘namel wood range." Then there was a faded ...

249. A Tale to be Told

Matthew 23:1-39

Sermon

George Bass

... - statements. First, he prayed to Christ, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit," and, second, echoing Jesus’ own words as he hung dying on the cross, "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit." Stephen was ready to die with his Lord - not merely in imitation of Christ - but simply because he believed that Christ’s resurrection had been accomplished on the third day and completed when he ascended to heaven on the fortieth day after the resurrection. He could face death in any form - no matter how painful ...

250. I Knew You’d Come

John 6:16-24

Sermon

Richard Hoefler

... Where you set your jaw and double up your fists and say, "I can do it." Now this is an admirable virtue in many areas of life, but in the realm of faith, it is appallingly inadequate. This view of faith is frequently promoted by the "Imitation of Christ" theology. Our Lord is presented as the perfect example that we should resolutely strive to follow. We are encouraged to take scissors of determination and human initiative and cut our lives into the patterned shape of Christ’s perfection. If we just have ...

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