Sermon and Worship Resources

Antonyms: keep, claim, continue, stick by, self-control, power through, achieve, defend, bear, hope, acquire, quick visit, adopt, continue along, adhere, remain, pursue, support, take up, keep up, reuse, advocate, stay, persevere, cherish, keep going, carry on

Showing 326 to 350 of 606 results

326. Christmas 1

Psalm 148:1-14, Isaiah 63:7-9, Matthew 2:13-18, Hebrews 2:10-18

Bulletin Aid

Amy C. Schifrin

... thanks for the gifts of inquisitive minds and thoughtful actions. We give you thanks for hearts that seek your wisdom. Bless our sons and daughters during their academic journeys that their days of study may be filled with your joy, and the knowledge they acquire may be put to service in your kingdom through Jesus Christ, our Lord. All: Amen. Intercessory Prayers Leader: Sisters and brothers, let us pray for the lives of the young: Silence Leader: Gracious God, may your birth in our lives empower us to seek ...

327. A Power Higher Than I

Matthew 2:13-23

Illustration

William B. Kincaid, III

... what you have," Shelly told Martha, "I want what you have." Shelly wanted the compassion and depth and hope which Martha knew, but she may not have realized fully how Martha came to know those things. Martha learned compassion from a time of deep personal suffering. She acquired spiritual depth from hours of praying when there was nowhere else to turn. She discovered hope by taking one step at a time because "one day at a time" was too much to be expected. Shelly said, "I want what you have. Where do I get ...

328. Fishing Takes Practice

Matthew 4:18-22

Illustration

Samuel G. Candler

... , some folks can cast a long way, but their accuracy is awful. There may be fish on the right, but they know only how to cast the line to the left. There may be fish on the left, but they keep casting to the right. Casting, like discipleship, is an acquired habit. It rewards practice.

329. Big "J" and Little "j"

Romans 8:1-17

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... every amount of money imaginable. She has spent half a lifetime on touring the sights and galleries of the world’s greatest art. And she has now become bored and weary. Then she meets a Frenchman who has no money but a love for beauty and a self-acquired knowledge of art. And in his company, with the two of them traveling together, suddenly things became different. In her words, “I never knew what things were like until you taught me how to look at them.” Life is like that when we little j’s look at ...

330. When The Baker Becomes the Bread!

John 6:51-58

Sermon

Robert Leslie Holmes

... are "from God." Jesus is not just like God, he is God. This "living bread" is Jesus who made all things, came down from heaven to do his Father's will and to enable us to live forever for free! The baker truly did become the bread! How Do We Acquire This Living Bread? The answer is in today's scripture reading: "If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever." We have seen that it is not by works but simply by eating it. It is already paid for on the cross. Not only did the baker become the ...

331. What a Way to Start a Church!

Acts 2:1-21

Sermon

William J. Carl, III

What a way to start a church! It's certainly not the typical format for new church development. Where is the planning committee, the fund-raising, the arm twisting, the real estate deal acquiring the land, the faithful few who volunteer from other churches to give the whole thing its initial push? Not everyone has the personality to start a church from scratch, but Paul did. "I planted, Apollos watered," says Paul (1 Corinthians 3:6). Some preachers are just good at planting churches ...

332. Why We Drank

Illustration

Staff

... miserable. We drank for sociability and became argumentative. We drank for sophistication and became obnoxious. We drank for friendship and made enemies. We drank for sleep and awakened without rest. We drank for strength and felt weak. We drank "medicinally" and acquired health problems. We drank for relaxation and got the shakes. We drank for bravery and became afraid. We drank for confidence and became doubtful. We drank to make conversation easier and slurred our speech. We drank to feel heavenly and ...

333. Building In Bondage

Hebrews 2:15

Illustration

Sarah Winchester's husband had acquired a fortune by manufacturing and selling rifles. After he died of influenza in 1918, she moved to San Jose, California. Because of her grief and her long time interest in spiritism, Sarah sought out a medium to contact her dead husband. The medium told her, "As long as you keep ...

334. A New Way of Life

Illustration

Charles Swindoll

... ropes. John Baker is considered by many to be the best of the hard men. He has free-soloed some of the most difficult rock faces in the U.S. with no safety rope and no climbing equipment of any kind. His skill has not come easily. It has been acquired through commitment, dedication and training. His wife says she can't believe his dedication. When John isn't climbing, he's often to be found in his California home hanging by his fingertips to strengthen his arms and hands.

335. Limited Good

Illustration

Bernie May

... people. For instance, the people seldom wish someone well. Not only that, they are hesitant to teach one another or to share the gospel with each other. If asked, "Who taught you to bake bread?" the village baker answers, "I just know," meaning he has acquired the knowledge without anyone's help. Eunice said this odd behavior stems from the Indian's concept of "limited good." They believe there is only so much good, so much knowledge, so much love to go around. To teach another means you might drain ...

336. Immortality: Quality vs. Quantity

Illustration

Gary R. Habermas & J.P. Moreland

... that, for Jesus and his Jewish contemporaries, immortality was synonymous with resurrection (Jesus and the Future Life, p. 209). Murray Harris holds that, while the two terms are distinct, they are also inseparable, for the resurrection inevitably involves the acquiring of immortality. They are interdependent sides of the same truth. See his volume, Raised Immortal: Resurrection and Immortality in the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1983), pp. 199-201, 209-214, 232-236, for a stimulating and ...

337. Work for the Love of Work

Illustration

When the company founded by Andrew Carnegie was taken over by the U.S. Steel Corporation in 1901 it acquired as one of its obligations a contract to pay the top Carnegie executive, Charles M. Schwab, the then unheard of minimum sum of $1,000,000. J.P. Morgan of U.S. Steel was in a quandary about it. The highest salary on record was then $100,000. He met ...

338. A Pocket Prayer

Illustration

... the prisoners to give up their clothes. "I had to surrender my clothes and in turn inherited the worn-out rags of an inmate who had been sent to the gas chamber," said Frankl. "Instead of the many pages of my manuscript, I found in the pocket of the newly acquired coat a single page torn out of a Hebrew prayer book, which contained the main Jewish prayer, Shema Yisrael (Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is one God. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all ...

339. The Light of Christmas

Luke 2:1-7

Sermon

King Duncan

... with his mother. He had been doing extra chores and saving up his allowance in order to buy a Christmas present, a pocket compass, for his best friend, Kenny. Kenny was being raised by a single mom and life for their family was a daily struggle just to acquire the most basic of needs of food and clothing. Diane knew that Kenny’s mom was a very proud woman. Diane doubted that Kenny’s mom would allow Kenny to accept a gift if he couldn’t give one in return. Marty argued with his mother and finally ...

340. If the Key Doesn't Fit…

Humor Illustration

If you do something stupid, tell it. The audience will identify with you and respond accordingly! Author Sidney Sheldon tells a memorable story about an embarrassing event that occurred to him years ago. He had acquired a lovely blue Rolls-Royce. A few days later he parked in front of a shop in Beverly Hills. He went inside, did his shopping, returned to his car, and got behind the driver's seat of the Rolls. An arm reached through the window and grabbed his shoulder, and ...

341. Responsible Living

Exodus 20:1-21

Sermon

King Duncan

... nuts and chews. Being a chocolate lover, Jeanie was in heaven! As she was oohing and aahing over the box her daughter, Jennifer, joined in the excitement. This was a bad sign. If Jennifer was excited, it was because she expected to share in Jeanie’s newly acquired bounty. Clearly the only way Jeanie could get rid of her was to share some of her precious chocolate, so she gave Jennifer a piece and sent her to bed. Then she had “just a few” pieces for herself, and went to bed. Later that night, there ...

342. Do You Know How to Listen?

Mark 9:2-13

Sermon

King Duncan

... him or his parents . . .” (8) In her book called The Listeners, Taylor Caldwell says, “Man does not need to go to the moon or other solar systems. He does not require bigger and better bombs and missiles. His basic needs are few, and it takes little to acquire them . . . he can survive on a small amount of bread in the meanest shelter. But his real need, his most terrible need, is for someone to listen to him . . .” We all need someone to listen to us. But we also need to listen. We need to listen ...

343. The Simplex Faith of 3:16

John 3:1-21

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... equations. Being transported by the beauty of art or the sounds of music. All those “first loves” are special, yet simple. Later, when we’ve studied mechanical design or chemical engineering, mastered culinary skills, wrestled reality into numerical logic systems, or acquired technical skills in art or music, we may still have great passion for a chosen field. But it is a love complicated by complexity, nuanced by knowledge. The simplicity of our “first love” is over-ridden by all the knowledge ...

344. PUNography

Humor Illustration

Johnny Dean

... think I was indecisive, but now I'm not so sure. Be kind to your dentist. He has fillings, too. Never fall in love with a tennis player because to a tennis player, love means nothing. The fattest knight at King Arthur's round table was Sir Cumference. He acquired his size from too much pi. I thought I saw an eye doctor on an Alaskan island, but it turned out to be an optical Aleutian .. She was only a whiskey maker, but he loved her still. A rubber band pistol was confiscated from algebra class, because it ...

345. Adopted

Ephesians 1:1-14

Sermon

King Duncan

... , “holier than thou.” Nobody today wants to be called “holier than thou.” That indicates that we look down on others, that we revel in a sense of moral superiority. Because of the unfortunate connotations that the word “holy” has acquired, we might want to substitute the word “excellent.” That is, Christians are called to live an excellent life excelling in faithfulness, excelling in generosity, and most importantly, excelling in love. When we seek after excellence in these things, we do ...

346. Low-Carb Christians

John 21:1-19

Sermon

Frank Ramirez

... Jesus was all spirit and no flesh, that he only appeared to die on the cross, and that the resurrected Jesus was Spirit only. Our own best destiny, therefore, is to renounce the physical things of this world and embrace the spiritual, in part by acquiring strange and arcane knowledge. Spirit is good. Body is bad. To combat this elitism, the resurrection stories of the gospels make it clear that Jesus was resurrected with a physical body. That's why he ate with his disciples, to dispel this picture of a ...

347. Don’t Be Afraid

Luke 12:32-40

Sermon

... have told us to not be afraid, to give away what we have, and rely on the Father for everything. You had to know that this would be a difficult commandment for us, especially those of us who have trusted mainly in ourselves and the money and possessions we've acquired through our own hard work. We sometimes find it difficult to say, "All things come of thee, O Lord, and of thine own have we given thee." Help us not to dismiss your words as naive or as a message meant for others but instead help us to see ...

348. Open the Window, Aunt Minnie, Here It Comes!

Jeremiah 33:1-26

Sermon

King Duncan

... to give up their clothes. In place of his own clothes Frankl inherited the worn-out rags of an inmate who had been sent to the gas chamber. Instead of the many pages of his manuscript which were now lost, he found in the pocket of his newly acquired coat a single page torn out of a Hebrew prayer book. Only a single page of that prayer book remained yet on that page were words that turned Victor Frankl’s life around. That single page contained the most holy prayer of the Jews, the Shema Yisrael what ...

349. For All the Saints

Colossians 1:1-14

Sermon

April Yamasaki

... to as "saints," which means "holy ones." Just as God is called the "holy one" in the scriptures, those who live as God's people through faith in Jesus are called the "holy ones." It's very similar to the way the early believers acquired the name Christian — not because they were perfectly Christlike, but because they followed Christ. In the same way, the believers were called the saints, the "holy ones" — not because they were perfectly holy, but because they were the people of God, set apart to ...

350. The Things Close to Your Heart

Mark 13:1-31

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... amount of money imaginable. This woman has spent half a lifetime on touring the sights and galleries of the world’s greatest art. And she has now become bored and weary. Then she meets a Frenchman who has no money but a love for beauty and a self-acquired knowledge of art. And in his company, suddenly things became different. In her words, “I never knew what things were like until you taught me how to look at them.” Life in Christ is like that. When we see life in the light of Jesus’ light, we hear ...

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