Sermon and Worship Resources

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Showing 3401 to 3425 of 4963 results

3401. Be Happy!

Mark 10:46-52

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... happy. Being happy "in Jesus" calls for an entirely different "soul-set." Whereas the pop song's happiness comes from blocking out all signs of need and care, Christian happiness begins when we recognize our handicaps, our heartaches, and cry out for help. Bartimaeus might have remained a blind beggar for the rest of his life if he had not called out so persistently to Jesus as he passed by. The obstacle to Bartimaeus' happiness was obvious - as a poor blind man he had nothing to look forward to but a life ...

3402. Yellow Wind

Mark 13:1-31

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... . Some of these Palestinians were dishwashers, others street vendors, others rock-throwers. But all of them showed anger in their eyes, all of them felt like "asses that anyone can ride," and all of them demonstrated the mind-set, as one expressed it, of "We will remain before you like a curse cast in cement" (9). Rih asfar is called by local Arabs "a hot and terrible east wind [only pleasant, cool winds come from the gates of Paradise] which... sets the world afire, and people seek shelter from its heat in ...

3403. Uh-Huh!

John 18:33-37

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... affirms that "everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice" (vs. 37). But disciples are not automatically assigned a high moral character. Nor do they automatically receive a heightened sense of truth, integrity or rightness when they join the church. The struggle to hear Jesus' voice of truth remains one which takes our full attention for the entire duration of our discipleship. Jesus is the right stuff! Jesus did the right thing! You got the right one, baby? Uh-Huh!

3404. Gutsy Joy

Nehemiah 8:1-4a, 5-6, 8-10

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... of judgment and on to an open-mouthed, awe-stricken, exuberant sense of joy. Acknowledging this joy reveals the total picture of humanity. We are not half-empty, but half-full. While it is true that we are flawed and fractured and thus may never be able to remain filled and satisfied for very long, we can nevertheless return again and again and again to the well of God's love and joy and draw from it all that we need to refill our strength of will and soundness of heart. While Nehemiah and Ezra proclaimed ...

3405. A Lovehope Faith

1 Corinthians 13:1-13

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... and lost on the battlefield of the blood. So it is for Paul and love. Emil Brunner's classic discussion of the intersection between the love that Paul so ardently underscores, and the two other "abiding" virtues, faith and hope, still remains an outstanding guide to our understanding. (See Emil Brunner, Faith, Hope, and Love [Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1956].) Brunner insists that the relationship between faith and love is quite simple for, "...faith is the hand by which we receive love, the way ...

3406. Thunder in the Mountains, Silence in the Soul

1 Kings 19:9-18

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... of self. The Super-Ego shames us into doing right, for it knows all our insecurities and fears. While the textual snarls in this week's Old Testament story entice biblical scholars to try detangling the early and later strands of the tradition, the fact remains that the final redactors preserved this repetitious, mixed up mess because it spoke to a larger truth. Elijah's first exchange with God in vv.9b-10 allows the prophet to vent his anxiety and fears and his Super-Ego's moral outrage at the injustices ...

3407. Help Wanted: Only Shunammites Need Apply

2 Kings 4:8-37

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... doing the Lord's work. Like the Shunammite woman's rooftop chamber, this small space would provide the weary with warmth and privacy - a place to refresh their bodies with sleep, their minds with study and their souls with prayer. The Shunammite tradition remained a familiar phenomenon in American culture long after the days of the saddle-sore preacher had passed. If you have congregants who grew up on farms during the Depression, they undoubtedly recall that the barn and a heap of fresh hay were offered ...

3408. From a Distance

Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-19

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... as though God has always had a tendency to deal with humans once they finally become hyperopic. Ever wonder why Abraham was not contacted by the Lord until he was 75 years old? Perhaps it was because that in order for Abraham to remain faithful to the covenant, he needed to have the ability to keep focused on the promise from a distance. Yale psychologist Robert J. Sternberg has revealed a fascinating and frustrating tendency in human interpersonal relationships in his book The Triangle of Love: Intimacy ...

3409. Doorkeepers, Lampkeepers and Wisdomkeepers

Luke 13:22-30

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... leather boots. But he also carried with him a bronze axe and a small fire-making kit that contained kindling and sticks. Those Christian leaders who have made the biggest advances for God and the gospel in history have been those who remained faithful to the tradition while being open to innovation and technology - Luther, Wesley, Moody, Fuller, Sheen, Graham. Third, Glacier Man was prepared for the unexpected and was ready to both adopt and adapt when confronted with new challenges. Glacier Man carried ...

3410. Speak Up for Forgiveness

Hebrews 13:1-8

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... in last week's sermon ideas, the marriage covenant is sealed in freshness and finality through the culturally dubious virtue of faithfulness, that is still only half the story. In order for one weak, struggling, stumbling, sinful human being to remain faithful to another similarly hamstrung human being, there needs to be an enormous flow of forgiveness between the two. Faithfulness coupled with forgiveness is the best any human relationship can hope to achieve. Few old saws have been more used, and ...

3411. The Problem of Unanswered Prayer

2 Timothy 3:14-4:5

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... true prayer causes the pray-er to make a new prayer. True prayer convinces the one who is praying that what was once desired is no longer desirable. Prayer makes a new person out of the pray-er. No one can feel the power of God's love and remain the same or make the same request. Once God has touched us, our concern becomes more to convey unbinding love than to receive it. Real prayer forces us to face who we are and to tell the truth about ourselves, which changes our prayers. Have you ever noticed, as ...

3412. Give Us a Break

2 Thessalonians 2:1-17

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... p.j.'s. There was a comforting distinction between the programming and the commercials during those good old, three-network, primetime days. No longer. Now the dizzying number of channels and the ease of the remote control unit make skipping over any remaining traditional commercials a breeze. Of course, we can also turn on channels that are nothing but advertising: These are the "home shopping networks," the product demonstration shows, or even, as the FCC finally ruled, Saturday morning cartoons. Yet the ...

3413. The Cost of Non-Discipleship

Luke 21:5-38

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... you will gain your souls" (v.19). Only those who practice non-discipleship, who live their lives for their own sakes, need fear the Day of the Lord. For them, physically surviving these political and natural upheavals is of no consequence. Their souls remain in mortal danger as long as they continue to invest only in things and keep trying to buy God's pardon with gifts. The cost of non-discipleship, ultimately, is death. The modern media provide us with innumerable portraits of non-discipleship. In ...

3414. Welcome Home, Joseph

Matthew 1:18-25

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... him throughout the duration of her pregnancy, during this time he did not try to make her take on the intimate duties of a wife, or exercise his own "conjugal rights." Joseph's obedience to the divine message meant he had to see to it that Mary remained sexually pure: a virgin. Joseph's dedication to Mary was so complete that when he traveled to Bethlehem for the ordered census - as recorded in Luke's Gospel - he took her along. She was his family now, no matter what her condition or how her pregnancy had ...

3415. 1 Thessalonians 5:16-24

1 Thessalonians 5:12-28

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... message for a particular Christian community. Strong echoes of both Philippians and Romans are heard in Paul’s general words. But as the apostle trims and tailors his reasoning to fit the needs of these particular disciples, Paul cautions the Thessalonian church to remain open to the words and work of the Spirit. This week’s text opens with three emphatic directives. But it is the adverbial construction that gives new force and flavor to Paul’s words. The adverbs emphasize the “how” as well as the ...

3416. Five Steps to Takeoff

Mark 1:14-20

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... -more-than-their-weight-in-gold jets sit on even bigger, more expensive ships. In order for both pieces of equipment to function without disaster, a bond of complete trust and genuine teamwork must be established between those who fly and those who remain grounded. Those trained to pilot the most powerful and sophisticated aircraft in the world must rely upon and wait for a series of "go-ahead" hand signals from their always-grounded "airboss." Each step must be carried out in proper sequence before the ...

3417. I Love You, Man... And I Don't Want Your Beer

John 15:9-17

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... of being touched, his friend sees right through the flood of tears. "That's great, man," he agrees, "but you still aren't getting my Budweiser!" The only reason for the first guy's confession of love was a pitifully transparent ploy to filch the last remaining beer from his buddy. Love as a way to get a free beer that is the Madison Avenue pitch. While it seems like bald-faced idiocy, this ad campaign has obviously struck a funny bone with the public. The fastest selling gift items in the new "Budweiser ...

3418. The Hand, the Lamb and the Dove

John 3:1-17

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... the essential qualities of a Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Here is another attempt at understanding the Trinity that you might wish to use with your people. Remember playing with mercury when you were in grade school? Mercury is an unusual metal because it remains in liquid form at room temperature. This makes it both highly useful and potentially quite dangerous. In elementary school there was a period of time when some of us started bringing small pill bottles to school with a few drops of liquid mercury ...

3419. Parable Power

Mark 4:26-34

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... " and "The Gospel According to John," the church has almost 2,000 years' worth of other gospel books to celebrate. "The Gospel of Augustine," "The Gospel of Martin Luther," "The Gospel of Thomas Merton," "The Gospel of John Wesley." All these "gospels" have remained vital parts of our tradition because of their eternally rechargeable parable power. Other gospels may not be quite so well-known, but they work just as persuasively in our lives. How many of you know that the personal parable stories making up ...

3420. Take an Ember Day

Mark 4:35-41

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... when do we finally draw the line and declare: "It is time for a rest"? "Resting" goes against our grain. Resting is "laziness," "sloth," "wasteful," "non-productive," "idleness." If you want to get ahead, be successful, stay afloat, keep your edge, or remain competitive, there is no such thing as "rest," "time off," "vacation," "hiatus" or "down time." Sometimes there isn't even anything known as "sleep." Wearing ourselves thin, wearing ourselves out, has become a status symbol in itself. Rest is no longer ...

3421. Soulistic Health

Mark 5:21-43

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... that blessing with a common Hellenistic saying. This Greek blessing is usually literally translated as "be healed of your disease." But a more colloquial rendition of this text could justifiably have Jesus reminding this woman to "take care of yourself so that you remain healthy." Jesus is not bestowing some mystical healing verse on this woman. He is urging her to stay healthy, to be whole. Jesus is calling each one of us to "stay healthy," to "stay whole." But what does wholeness mean? To be healthy ...

3422. When Too Much Can Be Too Little

Mark 10:17-31

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society of London issued a joint appeal to the world community. Here's the opening of the statement: If current predictions of population growth prove accurate, and patterns of human activity on the planet remain unchanged, science and technology may not be able to prevent the irreversible degradation of the environment or continued poverty for much of the world. The closing words of the document are even gloomier: Global policies are urgently needed to promote more ...

3423. The World's Fittest Human

Mark 12:28-34

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... offers all of us a way toward complete and genuine "godliness." Shema training builds up the heart, soul, mind and strength. No element of human existence is excluded from this training in faith. The exercises of the Shema allow no parts of our being to remain flabby or unattended. Does love of God overwhelm and overcome your heart, making every heartbeat keep pace with God's love for you? Does love of God inform your mind, making love the mainspring of all your thoughts? Does love of God penetrate your ...

3424. A Concert of Prayer

1 Corinthians 1:10-18

Drama

Leonard Sweet

... Christians prayed, they changed their posture. We knelt, we stood, we bowed our heads (tilting them toward the left, thereby symbolically acknowledging the supremacy of the heart to the head). It was not until the 1960s that American Christians deemed it acceptable to remain in the same posture and position when going into a prayer mode. Before you pray with your prayer partner one last time, change your posture as you are able (stand up, kneel, bow your head) and hold hands as you begin your prayer ...

3425. Give me a C...

1 Corinthians 1:18-31

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... enemy or a persecutor. These are "foolish" cheers. But they are the genuine response of a community that recognizes God's greatest strength was revealed in a supreme act of weakness and sacrifice. To a world that can only recognize brute strength as power, the church and her cheers will remain a foolish-sounding proposition - "but to us who are being saved it is the power of God" (1 Corinthians 1:18).

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