Sermon and Worship Resources

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Showing 3251 to 3275 of 4935 results

3251. The Last Parable

Mark 12:1-12

Sermon

James McCormick

It took place during that first Holy Week. For about three years Jesus had been teaching and healing and living among his followers. He had been preparing the disciples for the time when he would no longer be with them. He sensed that they were ready, so he went to Jerusalem to confront those who opposed him. On Sunday he made his entry into Jerusalem – that was Palm Sunday which we will celebrate next week. He did it in such a way that his claim to be the Messiah was unmistakable. He had ridden on a ...

3252. Penguins in Mission

Ephesians 1:1-14

Sermon

King Duncan

Real life is often funnier than fiction. I want to tell you a true story about a family in Knoxville, TN that decided to take a day-trip to visit the Chattanooga, TN Aquarium. They entered the aquarium and were fascinated by the many displays. However, about midway through their visit the young parents suddenly discovered that their four-year-old son was missing. He had been with them the moment before, but now he was gone. They began to panic, as you might imagine. When they could not find him on their ...

3253. Finish the Drill

Nehemiah 4:1-23

Sermon

James Merritt

I want you to complete this sentence: ". It's not how you start, it's how you finish that counts." I am convinced that is true because of an article someone sent to me that said the best way to achieve inner peace is to always finish things that you start.ed. This person that sent me the article said "it is definitely working for me. I now make a point of always finishing what I start and I am well on my way toward finding inner peace. Here are the things I have finished today:" Two bags of potato chips A ...

3254. You Can Know What to Do With Your Life

Proverbs 3:5-6

Sermon

James Merritt

Two hundred years ago, banks invented checks so they could transfer money between company accounts and between banks themselves without actually having to risk moving large sums of cash. Eventually, someone came up with the idea of allowing individuals to use checks so they, too, could forego carrying large amounts of cash on their person that they could either lose or someone could rob. People began to learn that you could take a check from one person to a bank and then the bank would redeem the check and ...

3255. Where Love Comes From

John 13:31-38

Sermon

King Duncan

A group of boys and girls, ages 4‑8 was asked, “What does love mean?” Here are some of their answers: “Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other.” Karl - age 5 “Love is when you kiss all the time. Then when you get tired of kissing, you still want to be together and you talk more. My Mommy and Daddy are like that. They look gross when they kiss.” Emily - age 8 “Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it every day.” ...

3256. Holiness of Heart and Life

Romans 2:21-23

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

At Stanford University there is a psychologist named Festinger who has a theory which he calls “cognitive dissonance.’ If you teach at a university like Stanford, you are supposed to use big words like that. As strange and new as it may sound, it’s very simple. It means that there is a big gap between my ideals and my actions, what I believe and what I do, my goals and my deeds. There is a difference between the image I have of myself and the image I try to project for other people and that discrepancy is ...

3257. Clear to the Better End - Parent Burnout

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

I’ve told you this story before I think, but it’s the most appropriate story with which we can begin the sermon today. A man had an awful day at work. Everything had gone wrong. There was one interruption after another, and he was never able to complete his work. When he entered the door at home that evening, he knew that his wife must have had a similar day. You could see it on her face. So, to set the process straight he began, “I’ve had the worst day of my life; it’s been bad news, bad news, bad news. I ...

3258. Doing Our Best

Romans 12: 1-13

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

Once to every man and nation Comes a moment to decide In the strife of truth with falsehood For the good or evil side. In the wake of worldwide terror, I have wondered aloud and pondered deeply what the leadership role of the church should be in a time such as this. Should we push forward or pull back? Should we unveil a new vision for this congregation or wait for a better day? I have asked many of you to give us some guidance. You have said to me without exception, “Howard, the Church is needed now more ...

3259. The Fundamentals of Family Ties

1 Corinthians 13:1

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

At the tender age of 18, I preached my first sermon on marriage and family. It was entitled “When Home is Heaven.” A few months later I got married and reality struck. After a few courses in psychology and shortly before our first son was born, I preached a sermon on the “Twelve Essential Elements of Effective Parenting.” Our children were normal preacher’s kids so I stopped giving advice on raising children. Now that my sons are grown and my wife is out of town, I thought I would end this series of ...

3260. Why Is God Unfair?

Matthew 20:1-16

Sermon

Wayne Brouwer

One of my favorite courses to teach is "Introduction to Biblical Literature." It is a 200-level course, and therefore only open to upperclassmen. These are college students who have already been around the block once or twice, and they know the rules of the game for getting good grades. Because the course is a biblical survey, there is a lot of material to cover, and little that can be pursued in depth. Yet, I want my students to think theologically, so I place before the group every year one question that ...

3261. Whosoever Will

Acts 2:1-21

Sermon

Stan Purdum

Pentecost is considered the birth date of the church universal. There was also planted that day, in the preaching of the apostle Peter, an important seed — the fruit of which was almost lost at one point in the church's history. That seed was in this statement by Peter: "Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved" (Acts 2:21). Actually, Peter wasn't being original with that statement. He was quoting Joel 2:32, but that ancient prophet was talking about the salvation of the people of ...

3262. Come with Me to the Mountain

Matthew 17:1-13

Sermon

King Duncan

Charles Swindoll in his book Day By Day tells the story of a mysterious event that occurred several years ago to a group of young guys from the church he pastored in Southern California. They were on a mountain climbing excursion, along with their youth leader. While taking in the breathtaking sights, the leader realized he had lost the trail. A heavy snowfall had completely covered the path, and he didn’t have a clue where they were or how they could get back to the main camp. Sundown was not far away, ...

3263. Christmas Is a God-Thing

Luke 1:26-38

Sermon

King Duncan

There was a story years ago in the Canadian version of the Reader’s Digest of a large moose that wandered into a residential area in Calgary, Canada. The moose ended up on the lawn of a lady named Lorna Cade. A Fish and Wildlife officer was dispatched to try to coax the magnificent animal back into the wild. After two hours of absolutely no progress, the officer finally shot the moose with a tranquilizer dart. The moose bolted down a lane and eventually collapsed on another nearby lawn. The reporters who ...

3264. When the Service was Interrupted

Mark 1:21-28

Sermon

King Duncan

“I don’t know why I remember the episode so vividly,” writes author King Duncan. “I remember so few instances from my childhood. But this one stands out. I couldn’t have been more than five. We were members of a tiny rural church. Our hymns came from a small paperback hymnal of Gospel songs [the Upper Room hymnal]. “Worship was a bit emotional; the preacher a little loud. There was no formal liturgy. The pews were hard. There was no air conditioning. The windows were open. It was a hot summer morning. A ...

3265. Keeping the Main Thing the Main Thing

Luke 9:51-62

Sermon

Arley K. Fadness

They were 5,000 feet in the air in a two-seat Cessna when suddenly the pilot slumped over. It happened not so long ago near Mount Hope, Indiana, to an 81-year-old passenger who was flying to Indianapolis for lunch. When his 52-year-old friend and pilot unexpectedly died, the elder passenger realized he knew nothing about flying and a lot less about landing! In the next twenty minutes you can bet he gave his total attention to the voices on the radio and the instructions given to him. Another pilot nearby ...

3266. Pet Peeves and Pet Pleasures

Luke 3:21-38

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

The weather is always a good source for small talk. In these dark and dreary days of January, that “small talk” is probably even smaller — meaner and more morose. Whether it’s chatting at the check-out stand with a cashier, or making conversation in the cramped quarters of a slow moving elevator, this time of year “weather talk” isn’t likely to be upbeat. “I hate the snow!” “Don’t you just love what the salt does to your shoes, your car, your clothes?” “Tornado warnings in January? Really!!” “It’s dark ...

3267. Ignite: Fire Extinguishers

Acts 15:1-21

Sermon

James Merritt

Five words and regardless of where you are on the political spectrum you would agree they became one of the most famous political slogans of any political candidate in the last 50 years, “Change We Can Believe In.” Regardless of what you think about the slogan or even the man, one thing we all can agree on is that change is difficult. The older you get the harder change is. There are a lot of people I know who are more comfortable with putting up with old problems than they are finding new solutions. They ...

3268. The Glory of the Cross

Galatians 6:11-18

Sermon

James Merritt

Off the coast of South China, on a high hill overlooking the harbor of Macao, is a huge wall. This wall is the only thing that remains from a massive cathedral that Portuguese settlers built on that hill hundreds of years ago. A typhoon hit that cathedral, literally reducing it to ruins. Everything except this front wall was totally leveled. High on top of that wall stands a huge bronze cross. In 1825, Sir John Bowring was sailing a ship off this same coast when a terrible storm hit, breaking his ship ...

3269. Supernatural: Taken By Storm

Mark 4:35-41

Sermon

James Merritt

One of the most life changing things you can ever do as a believer is to go on a mission trip. Not only do you get to share Jesus with people who are hungry for the gospel, see lives transformed by the power of Christ, you also get to see and experience a lot of things you wouldn’t otherwise. But, there is only one country in the world that I encourage everyone to visit whose very geographical landscape can change your life and that is the land of Israel. To know that you are walking where Jesus walked, to ...

3270. A Reminder to God...and to Us

Genesis 9:1-17

Sermon

King Duncan

Last April a 9-year-old African-American lad named Willie was kidnapped from his driveway in Atlanta, Georgia. After the man grabbed him, Willie explained later, and threw him in the back of his car, Willie just kept “praising God” with a song he learned in Sunday school. It was a song by Hezekiah Walker titled “Every Praise.” While he was singing, Willie said, his kidnapper yelled expletives at him. “He told me, shut up you [blankety-blank] boy,” said Willie. Willie, however, kept singing until his ...

3271. Life by the Spirit

Galatians 5:16-26

Understanding Series

L. Ann Jervis

5:16 Paul directs his readers to live by the Spirit. The Greek word translated “live” (peripateite) is literally “walk.” Paul uses this word elsewhere when speaking of living the new life in Christ (Rom. 6:4), a life that is conducted by means of the Spirit (Rom. 8:4). The word suggests continuance, progress, and daily attention. Paul commands his readers to avoid gratifying the desires of the sinful nature by means not of law observance but of living by the Spirit. The Greek for “sinful nature” is ...

3272. Justice and Mercy, Not Fasting

Zechariah 7:1-14

Understanding Series

Pamela J. Scalise

A Query about Commemorative Fasts (7:1-3): A question about mourning the destruction of the temple introduces a series of sayings that address the present spiritual condition of the community, review the divine judgment on its ancestors, and declare God’s promises of future blessings. A concentric literary framework holds these oracles together in a chronological and logical sequence that answers the practical question about religious observance and the underlying spiritual distress over the fulfillment of ...

3273. The New Heaven and New Earth

Revelation 21:1-27

Teach the Text

J. Scott Duvall

Big Idea: God will live with his people in the new creation. Understanding the Text The final vision of Revelation (21:1–22:5) highlights the primary goal and theme of the entire book and all of Scripture: God’s presence among his people in the new creation. From the time sin and death intruded upon God’s good creation, God purposed to defeat his enemies and live among his people in a new garden city. This final vision of Revelation represents the fulfillment of the promises to those who overcome (Rev. 2–3 ...

3274. “Your Sin Will Find You Out”: The Lord Confronts His Sinful Servant

2 Samuel 12:1-31

Teach the Text

Robert B. Chisholm Jr.

Big Idea: The Lord disciplines his sinful servants but also extends forgiveness and mercy. Understanding the Text Thanks to the help of Joab and the silence of Bathsheba, David appeared to get away with the murder of Uriah and even ended up adding Uriah’s beautiful wife to his harem. But the last words of chapter 11 suggest that the story will take a turn for the worse for David. Chapter 12 tells how the Lord confronts David with his sin. The Lord announces that he will severely punish David, and the rest ...

3275. Saul on the Rampage

1 Samuel 22:6-23

Teach the Text

Robert B. Chisholm Jr.

Big Idea: God regards as enemies those who oppose his chosen servants. Understanding the Text In this next episode the focus briefly shifts from David to Saul, and we see the tragic aftermath of David’s visit to Ahimelek (21:1–9). Saul accuses the priests of being traitors and murders them and their families. Only one, Abiathar, escapes. He goes to David, who welcomes him and promises him protection. The contrast between Saul and David cannot be sharper. While Saul is murdering the Lord’s priests, David is ...

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