Dictionary: Face
Synonyms: countenance, physiognomy, profile, features, expression, facial expression, look, appearance, air, manner, bearing, guise, cast, aspect, impression, grimace, scowl, wry face, wince, frown, glower, smirk, pout, moue, side, flank, vertical, surface, plane, facet, wall, elevation, dial, display, (outward) appearance, nature, image, front, show, act, false front, facade, exterior, mask, masquerade, pretence, charade, pose, illusion, smokescreen, veneer, camouflage, respect, honour, esteem, regard, admiration, approbation, acclaim, approval, favour, appreciation, popularity, estimation, veneration, awe, reverence, deference, recognition, prestige, standing, status, dignity, glory, kudos, cachet, effrontery, audacity, nerve, gall, brazenness, brashness, shamelessness, look out on, front on to, look towards, be facing, have/afford/command a view of, look over/across, open out over, look on to, overlook, give on to, give over, be opposite (to), accept, come to accept, become reconciled to, reconcile oneself to, reach an acceptance (of), get used to, become accustomed to, adjust to, accommodate oneself to, acclimatize oneself to, be confronted by, be faced with, encounter, experience, come into contact with, run into, come across, meet, come up against, be forced to contend with, beset, worry, distress, cause trouble to, trouble, bother, confront, burden, brave, face up to, meet head-on, dare, defy, oppose, resist, withstand, cover, clad, skin, overlay, dress, pave, put a facing on, laminate, inlay, plate, coat, line
Antonyms: dodge, fear, back, give way, back down, dodge, avoid, throw in the towel, withdraw, cave in, retreat, succumb to, lay down one's arms, throw in the sponge, defer, submit, escape, bashfulness, shun, evade, elude
Showing 3426 to 3450 of 3569 results
Sermon
Maxie Dunnam
In 1883 half of the Island of Krakatoa, between Indonesia and Australia, blew up in a great volcanic eruption. The other half of the Island was covered with volcanic ash. They say that in some places, that ash was 100 feet thick and blew on the winds as far as Madagascar across the Indian Ocean. It was the most violent volcanic explosion in the history of man. That beautiful island was destroyed. All the life, both human and animal, was killed. Yet ten years later, Krakatoa was once again green and ...
3427. Back to School Good Behavior
Luke 12:35-48
Illustration
Mark Richardson
Teachers, students, and school personnel across the country are getting ready for another academic year. Lutheran pastor Larry Henning tells a humorous story about when he was in the fourth grade. He writes: Our teacher, Mrs. Cannon, would periodically leave the room and say, I'll be back in a few minutes. Just work quietly at your desks on your math worksheets. Now, my friends and I tried hard to figure out just when Mrs. Cannon was coming back. We would take turns going to the door to see if she was ...
Sermon
King Duncan
Dr. Thomas Lane Butts tells about a World Series baseball game that took place on October 13, 1963, between the New York Yankees and the Los Angeles Dodgers. Sandy Koufax was pitching for the Dodgers before a record crowd of 69,000 in Yankee Stadium. It was a crucial game, and Koufax was one strike-out short of breaking the record of 14 strike-outs in a World Series game. Koufax later said it was not only a challenge but an inspiration to know that among the spectators that day was former Dodger pitcher ...
Sermon
Wayne Brouwer
Yogi Berra, the great baseball player of an earlier age, was known for his unusual and creative use of the English language. In giving directions to his home, for example, he often told people, "When you come to the fork in the road, take it." His formula for success, as some heard it, was this: "Ninety percent perspiration, and the rest mostly just plain hard work." Then there was the time he went to a restaurant by himself and ordered a large pizza. The waitress asked if he would like it cut into four or ...
3430. Forward March
Joshua 3:1-17
Sermon
Timothy J. Smith
It was truly a day of new beginnings as the people prepared to make the long-anticipated entry into the promised land. After the Israelites had spent forty years journeying through the desert, they had finally arrived at this pivotal point in time. To say that there were problems or even setbacks along the way would be an understatement. The people complained about not having enough food and water. Along the way there were some who desired to return to the land of slavery — where life was not great but at ...
Sermon
John N. Brittain
I am so old that I can actually remember when there was a difference between the number of "shopping days" until Christmas and the number of calendar days. They always ran a little box with that magical number on the front page of the Cleveland Press, itself now a faded memory. (For those of you under a certain age, this was because in the day most stores were not open for business on Sunday. Can you believe it?) I am, however, not too old to recall worries that the central message of Christmas was being ...
3432. For Example
Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
Sermon
David O. Bales
If you're going to study a subject or learn a profession, a good strategy is to investigate one of the earliest theoreticians or practitioners. If you study physics, you might start with Albert Einstein. There were others, but he's a good beginning. If you're interested in drama, you could turn to William Shakespeare. Other playwrights are around, but he'll give you a good start. If you're considering nursing, you could read up on Florence Nightingale. The work of other early nurses would benefit you, but ...
Sermon
Steven E. Albertin
Trinity Sunday begins the second half of the church year. The first half of the church year beginning with Advent and ending with Pentecost focused on the life of Christ. We call this second half ordinary time but there is nothing ordinary about it. It is an extraordinary time of the year when we focus on the church's life and mission. Some have called Trinity Sunday the "great hinge" of the church year. Others have called it the "great pain"! Why? Because as the only Sunday of the church year that focuses ...
Sermon
Larry Lange
The blizzard was kind enough to have shown up on Friday evening, so that when it had finished rattling our windows and dumping about ten inches of perfectly packable snow, we were not in school and had an entire day to enjoy it. By Saturday afternoon, we had shoveled our own driveway and sidewalk. Our neighbor, Mr. Schmidt, had finished hours before, because he apparently made enough money to afford a snowblower. His was the first snowblower on our street. Mr. Schmidt felt he needed a snowblower, because ...
Sweet
Leonard Sweet
This lectionary year the unforgettable, dramatic “Prodigal Son” parable is not read. Instead we read the two parables told just previous to the Prodigal Son narrative, stories that offer the same message of rejoicing and celebrating when something lost is found again. All three of these “lost and found” stories are Jesus’ response to criticism. The “Pharisees and scribes” were “grumbling (“diagonguzo”)” while the “tax collectors and sinners” were listening to Jesus’ message about the kingdom. The term “ ...
3436. One of the Family
Hebrews 1:1-4; 2:5-18
Sermon
Billy D. Strayhorn
I read about a preacher whose daughter keeps a daily notebook. On one page she had drawn a picture of her father and written carefully his name and address. When asked why, she explained. She had been watching a movie about amnesia. And then she said, "If I ever forget who I am, I want everybody to know who I belong to." Belonging is very important. And knowing who we belong is even more important. This morning the author of the letter to the Hebrews talks about Belonging and our relationship with God. Let ...
3437. You're Not Home Yet
Illustration
Ray C. Stedman
How revealing is that story of the old missionary couple who had been working in Africa for years in the days when Teddy Roosevelt was President of the United States. They were returning from Africa to New York City to retire. They had no pension for they belonged to no missionary board. Their health was broken, they were defeated, discouraged, and afraid. When they went down to the wharf to board the ship they discovered to their amazement that they were booked on the same ship with Teddy Roosevelt, who ...
3438. Are You Going to Fish?
Luke 19:1-10
Illustration
Bob Younts
There's an old story about a fisherman who was very successful. Every morning he went out on the lake in a small boat and when he returned a couple of hours later, his boat was loaded down with fish. He never failed. People wondered how he did it, even when others were not catching anything at all. He always came in with his boat just overflowing with fish. One morning a stranger showed up with his fishing tackle and said, "Mind if I go fishing with you this morning?" "No," said the fisherman. "Just hop in ...
3439. Endurance
Illustration
Mickey Anders
There was a little country schoolhouse that was heated by an old-fashioned, potbellied coal stove. A little boy named Glenn had the job of coming to school early each day and starting the fire to warm up the building. One morning the teacher arrived only to find the building engulfed in flames. Misatking gasoline for karosene Glenn and his brother Floyd has ignited an inferno. The teacher who just arrived, along with other students, got Glenn out in time but his brother didn't make it. Glenn had major ...
3440. Matthew 1:18-25
Matthew 1:18-25
Sweet
Leonard Sweet
The development of online resources for genealogical research has been nothing short of explosive. There is now a thriving forest of family trees for anyone trying to discover who they are and where they came from. At some point in everyone’s grade school journey a teacher assigns us the project of tracing our ancestors. As a nation of immigrants, our lines of lineage often crisscross and loop around to create “family trees” with wide stretching branches and roots that reach across continents and oceans. ...
3441. Dream Power
Matthew 2:13-18
Sermon
Leonard Sweet
One-third of our lives is spent not having any idea what we are doing. All right, admittedly many of us spend even greater percentages of our lifetimes clueless. But officially, we all have one-third of our lives basically unaccounted for. Why? Because we are sleeping. Sleeping is required by every creature with even the most rudimentary or remedial brain stem. Yet we really don’t understand why we sleep or what sleep is for. All we really know about sleep is that if deprived of it for just ten days, we’re ...
3442. God on The Run!
Matthew 2:13-23
Illustration
John Thomas Randolph
My copy of the Bible entitles this sub-section of Scripture, "The Flight into Egypt." Cruel Herod the king had been threatened by the birth of Jesus, apparently fearing that Jesus would become a competitor for his own crown. Since that was an intolerable possibility to him, and since he could not be absolutely sure which baby boy was Jesus, he ordered that all the male children in and around Bethlehem who were two-years old or under be killed. Thus it was that an angel of the Lord directed Joseph to take ...
Sermon
Leonard Sweet
How many of your New Year’s Resolutions have made it intact through the first full week of 2011? Have you missed a day of exercise yet? Have you stuck to your diet? Are you texting less, talking more, always telling the truth? Most “resolutions” we make are self-directed: get thinner, work smarter, be stronger, take control of your life. We want to make changes that will help us, improve us, and bring us good feelings about ourselves. Jesus said to be “in” the world but not to be “of” the world. So let’s ...
3444. Carbon Pure and Perfect
1 Corinthians 1:10-17
Sermon
Leonard Sweet
Jesus is our diamond. Jesus is the carbon based incarnation of the divine transformed by the steady pressure of God’s endless love into the brightest Morning Star Diamond ever created. Jesus is our diamond. Jesus is Carbon Pure and Perfect, the pure and perfect way to the Father, our only eternal security. But there are many ways to look at Jesus, just as there are many ways to look at a diamond. This is what Paul was getting at in our epistle reading for this morning. Paul is urging the Corinthian ...
Sermon
Leonard Sweet
Who are the pillars of the church? If others look to you as a “pillar of the church,” what kind of pillar are you? Jesus answers that question in our gospel reading for this morning, but to get to his answer we’ve got to exercise the discipline of historical context. We’ve got to put his words and images in the context of the culture of his day. So here we go . . . Anyone who has ever had a class on Greek and Roman culture has had to recall and recognize the three distinctive types of architectural columns ...
Sermon
Leonard Sweet
When you were a child, how many times did you beg your mom or dad “Please give me another list of rules and regulations.” Right. I thought so. Never. But how often did you try to put off bedtime by begging to hear “Just one more story. Please!?” What do we do at family reunions and holiday celebrations? We trot out the same old stories, initiating each new generation in the stories of the ancestors. In their telling and re-telling, we make them living history, not just dead facts. Stories are how we learn ...
3447. Before I Build a Wall…
John 4:1-26
Illustration
J. Howard Olds
Robert Frost was a great poet. One of his best poems is "Mending Wall." It's the story of two New England farmers who go out each spring to mend the rock fences that have fallen down over the winter. They do it every spring, under the belief that "good fences make good neighbors." But this particular spring, one farmer is beginning to question that long held assumption. As they work their respective sides of the fence, wearing their fingers raw with the rocks, he begins to reason. "He is all pine and I am ...
Sermon
Leonard Sweet
I call the world we are living in TGIF. Anyone know what TGIF stands for? That’s right: “Thank God It’s Friday” But I’ve re-acronymed TGIF as “Twitter, Google, iPhone, Facebook.” So let me begin this morning with some TGIF questions: Do you blog? If you do, do you blog with people on your block? Are any of your immediate neighbors your Facebook “friends” or Twitter “followers?” Do you connect with more people digitally than you do physically? If the answer is “no” to the first two and “yes” to the third, ...
3449. Sharing the Love
John 14:15-21
Illustration
Billy D. Strayhorn
I ran across a story this week about a seven-year-old granddaughter who said to her grandfather, "In this family we are kind of serious about God, aren't we?" Grandpa said, "Yes, we sure are." And the little girl asked, "Why?" Grandpa wrapped the little girl in his arms, hugged her real close and said, "So that I can hug you and tickle you and try to tell you how much I love you and how glad I am that God gave you to us." The little girl grinned and said, "That's cool." I'm not sure that hugging and ...
3450. Wrong!
Acts 2:1-13
Sermon
Leonard Sweet
Today is Pentecost, the birthday of the church. The symbols of the Pentecost gift are wind and fire. Every birthday is accompanied by a cake over which there is the ritual of wind and fire. But in the course of blowing out candles in your lifetime, have you ever missed one? Ever miscalculate the amount of wind needed to get it 100% right? [To make your sermon more EPIC, you might want to showcase a birthday cake, and blow out some candles. You could even have some fun and include some gag (magic re- ...
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