Sermon and Worship Resources

Synonyms: touch, feel, sense of touch, tactile sense, tactility, contact, using one's hands, sensation, sense, suspicion, sneaking suspicion, notion, inkling, hunch, fancy, apprehension, presentiment, premonition, foreboding, love, care, affection, fondness, tenderness, warmth, warmness, emotion, sentiment, emotional state, compassion, sympathy, empathy, fellow feeling, understanding, concern, solicitude, solicitousness, tender-heartedness, brotherly love, sensibilities, sensitivities, self-esteem, ego, pride, opinion, belief, view, impression, intuition, instinct, estimation, guess, theory, hypothesis, thought, way of thinking, point of view, atmosphere, ambience, aura, air, mood, climate, character, overtone, undertone, tenor, spirit, quality, flavour, colour, aptitude, knack, flair, bent, talent, gift, skill, art, trick, faculty, ability, propensity, inclination, sensitive, warm, warm-hearted, tender, tender-hearted, caring, soft-hearted, sympathetic, compassionate, empathetic, responsive, receptive, intuitive, thoughtful

Antonyms: bad feeling, acrimony, animosity, animus, antagonism, antipathy, aversion, bitterness, detestation, disgust, dislike, disrelish, enmity, friction, grievances, grudges, hatred, hostility, loathing, malevolence, malice

Showing 3901 to 3925 of 4947 results

3901. A Great Light (Sermon for Candlelight Service)

Matthew 4:12-17

Sermon

Brett Blair

... the most effective path. Yes, on that first Christmas, the mood was one of despair and resignation. And thus it was then and thus it is now. We too live in a world of darkness. There are wars and rumors of wars, hunger and unemployment, racism, loneliness, and a sense of emptiness. Perhaps the poet Robert Frost worded it best when he wrote: “I have been acquainted with the night. I have walked in the rain and out of the rain. I have been acquainted with the night.” I don't have to tell any of you about ...

3902. Altered Expectations

Matthew 1:18-25

Sermon

... trouble or disappointment for us. God stands with us in the face of all our altered expectations. Joseph’s strength, his compassion, his courage all flowed from his constant faith in God’s abiding presence. In this season of Advent, as wonder at Mary’s quiet sense of calm, as we admire the tenacity of the Wise Men on their journey, as we share the excitement of the shepherds, let us also look to the quiet figure of Joseph, the forgotten one. Let us learn from Joseph the lesson of unwavering trust that ...

3903. Strangers at the Manger

Matthew 2:1-12

Sermon

... get a little bent out of shape? Ask any teenager – including the one whose last name is the same as mine – how upset parents get when their authority is challenged. When those of us who are charged with the responsibility to create and maintain a sense of order feel threatened, it’s not a pretty sight! We don’t normally fly into murderous rages, but you really wouldn’t want to be there when it happens! Throughout history, kings have had sensitive noses for snooping out anyone who might challenge ...

3904. Dealing with the Devil

Matthew 4:1-11

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... that your stomach thinks your throat’s been cut! Why don’t you just turn these rocks into loaves of bread? You CAN do that, can’t you? What could it hurt?" And the testing comes to us as it first came to Jesus, through our senses, our appetites, our natural desires. Jesus had gone without food for an extended period of time, with perhaps only an occasional sip of water from a nearby stream. He must have been desperately hungry, and therefore most vulnerable at the point of his physical appetite. Satan ...

3905. See the Light, Be the Light

Matthew 5:13-16

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... of Jesus, "He must increase and I must decrease." If that was true for John the Baptist, it is also true of every prophet or preacher who has come along since then. The preacher has to rely on the power of God to make his or her pulpit ramblings make sense and touch lives, not on "lofty words of human wisdom." Every once in a while someone will say to me, "Johnny, I just don’t see how you do it! How can you stand in front of all those people, week after week, and preach? If that were me, I ...

3906. Sowing Seed Is Never A Waste of Time

Matthew 13:1-23

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... for a couple of hours on Sunday mornings, and I’ve heard that old joke about us ministers only working one day a week more times than I care to remember. But it is hard work sometimes. Now, I’m not talking about hard work in the same sense that farming or making furniture or clothing is hard work. Those are physically demanding jobs, and I have great admiration for those who are willing and able to do them. The demands of ministry are more mental and emotional than physical. For example, some of my old ...

3907. The Pop Quiz

Matthew 16:13-20

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... of the physical and spiritual aspects of their being. Holistic healing is not a new concept, you know. Jesus certainly believed in dealing with mental and spiritual ailments as well as physical aches and pains. But in spite of his apparent popularity, we get a sense that Jesus was troubled about something. He knew that he wasn’t exactly the kind of Messiah the people wanted and expected him to be. The very ones he had been sent to save totally misunderstood his purpose in coming. That’s not an uncommon ...

3908. Life on the Roller Coaster

Matthew 16:21-28

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... raised" (Matthew 16:21). His ministry would bring him into direct confrontation with the religious establishment of his day, and he would suffer and die at their hands, then be raised from death by God on the third day. Peter must have shook his head, as if to clear his senses from the emotional high he was on. "What did you just say, Lord? Did you just say that the Pharisees are going to win? Now what kind of attitude is that? That’s not part of the plan, Jesus. We’ve got it all worked out. How can you ...

3909. Reality Check

Matthew 17:1-13

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... routing, but he repeatedly led them where they had not expected – and often did not want – to go. "Behold, I make all things new," Jesus says. And suddenly the ages-old prejudices against Samaritans or children or women or any race or nation no longer make any sense, if they ever did. "Behold, I make all things new," says Jesus. And suddenly all our wonderful plans to earn our way into the kingdom of God are swept away with the promise of grace, the power of the cross, and the offer of salvation as a ...

3910. The Scariest Sound in the World

Matthew 25:1-13

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... why on earth would Matthew include both of these seemingly contradictory stories in his biography of the life and times of Jesus of Nazareth? I don’t know. Except maybe because life really is like that, the kingdom of God really is like that. In one sense there’s always time to accept the invitation. How many Sundays have you sat here in church and heard the gospel invitation? How many times have you heard these parables preached? How many times have you heard, "God is gracious, slow to anger, quick to ...

3911. Epiphanies and Training Wheels

Mark 1:9-13

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... up and outgrew the need for God and all that religious stuff. He had just completed a two-year term as Chairman of the Board and was looking forward to chairing – of all things – the Evangelism Committee. Who says God doesn’t have a sense of humor? How about you? Are your training wheels firmly in place today? Or did you take them off, thinking you didn’t need God any more? Have you had any epiphanies lately? Rev. Johnny Dean: Copyright © 1999 Sermon Illustrations. All rights reserved. Permission ...

3912. Been Fishin' Lately?

Mark 1:14-20

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... , that “We are Christians only, but not the only Christians.” In printed materials, we capitalize the letter “D” in “Disciples” to distinguish whether we’re talking about members of our denomination or about “little d” disciples, followers of Christ in the broader sense of the word. And it’s “little d” disciples that I want to talk about this morning. What does it mean to be a disciple of Jesus? In Greek, the word “disciple” means follower, or learner, or student. So what does it ...

3913. Lent 1

Sermon

Betty Lynn Schwab

... Youth: Let us pray. All: Holy God of the booths, help us to be sensitive this week to your presence everywhere. May we honor you in our home, our school, our places of work and in our times of relaxation. As we grow in our faith, help us to sense the sweet fragrance of a life lived in a healthy close relationship with you. May others see your beauty in our daily living and in our dying. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen. Lent 3 Minister: "The Lord spoke to Moses: ... you shall set up the tabernacle ... And the ...

3914. When You Least Expect It...

Luke 24:13-35

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... of the books we had to read during seminary were less than 400 pages in length. And I usually had to plod my way through them, reading 20 or 30 pages at a sitting, then re-reading the same 20 or 30 pages to see if I could make any sense out of it the second time through. Don’t get me wrong – seminary was a tremendously rewarding experience, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. But there were many occasions when I just wanted to pull my hair out and scream, "Don’t any of these people know how ...

3915. The Youth

Drama

William Grimbol

... he love everyone? JOLIE: I don't know. That is another miracle. He made all of us feel loved. Didn't you? SUE: I don't know ... about love ... but I sure felt genuinely cared about. JOLIE: Everything he said was remarkably simple, but it made such good sense. It somehow fit so much together for me. SUE: Loving, forgiving, praying, believing ... that all sounds simple, but it sure isn't easy to do. JOLIE: True. It isn't easy to lead a good life ... especially with all the temptations we face. SUE: It is hard ...

3916. Life is Messy

John 1:29-34

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... ability to change society with this or that conservative or liberal social/political agenda or with this or that evangelistic program is increasingly absurd in a disintegrating church that cannot solve its own problems, much less the problems of the world. The only gospel that makes sense and can help… is the good news of a God who loves enough to suffer with and for a suffering humanity. And the only believable church is one that is willing to bear witness to such a God by its willingness to do the same ...

3917. Have You Talked to Jesus Lately?

John 4:1-26

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... one of my local colleagues in ministry. "Guess who I just talked to?" I asked. Some of you may have come to church this morning hoping to meet Jesus – not some weirdo who claims to be Jesus, but the real thing. Maybe you came because you have a sense that something is missing in your life, that your life is somehow incomplete or lacking in purpose or direction or meaning. And you feel that if you can just find Jesus, that feeling of emptiness will go away. But you know what? Stories like this one we’re ...

3918. Easter is a Terrible Thing to Waste

Acts 1:1-11, Acts 1:12-26

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... days of Israel, during the reign of King David, Israel was a force to be reckoned with by her neighbors, even envied by them. Israel was respected back then, and yes, by golly, even FEARED! People took notice. The people of David’s day enjoyed a sense of supremacy that comes with high national status. And the people liked that. The more things change, the more they stay the same. The disciples of Jesus longed for a return to that golden era of yesterday. They wanted to feel good about themselves again, to ...

3919. Back to the Basics

Exodus 20:1-21

Sermon

Johnny Dean

... the Ten Commandments, to pay attention to the basics. The graduates and their parents gave him a standing ovation. The Ten Commandments are God’s basics for living. They confront us with our failures and remind us of our needs. They challenge us with their practical, common sense holiness and nurture us toward daily obedience to the will of God. Now, you may be able to go down the list of the Ten Commandments and check them off one at a time. "Have no other gods before God? I’m okay there. Don’t make ...

3920. Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock

Psalm 30:1-12

Sermon

... my sackcloth and clothed me with joy, that my heart may sing to you and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give you thanks forever." You see, this is a psalm of healing – not necessarily healing of some specific ailment or disease, but healing in the deeper sense, the healing that comes through a life of ever-deepening faith. All of us have little physical ailments we would like to be rid of, don’t we? I know I do. I suffer from an affliction that is fairly common to men in my age group. There is a ...

3921. The Clanking of Coins

Matthew 27:1-10

Sermon

Wallace H. Kirby

... Pilate and watching the governor fight for the life of the prisoner, that Judas suddenly saw what he had done. Perhaps then he realized that he had followed his greed and misplaced priorities to crucify Jesus. He hurried once again to the Temple. With a desperate sense of urgency, Judas wanted to give the money back to the priests, go back on his bargain, cancel the contract, undo the whole sorry business. It was too late. The priests told him it was none of their affair and refused to take over for him ...

3922. The Dripping of Water

John 13:1-17

Sermon

Wallace H. Kirby

... front of the class, rubbing her hands together over a pan of water. In the play, you will recall, Lady Macbeth tries to wash out an imaginary spot of blood on her hand. Because she has been instrumental in getting her husband to commit murder, she feels a sense of guilt, which she is trying to remove by washing her hands. As she scrubs, desperately she cries, "Out, out, out, damned spot, I say!" I know we must have giggled that day in class when Marion rubbed her long, bony hands together and cried out very ...

3923. It Dawned on Me

Sermon

Ron Lavin

... was crushing his lungs, forcing the air out of his body. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back and forth. For six, blood-red hours. The agony of it, coupled with the darkness which covered the place like a blanket though it was only noon, gave a horrifying sense to the bizarre death of this man who had saved me from my own selfishness. "What good does it do to believe in God now?" I asked as people made fun of him, saying, "He saved others, but he cannot save himself ... he trusts in God ... let God deliver ...

3924. The Dynamics of Doubt

Sermon

Ron Lavin

... I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe it." A Doubters' Sunday? Yes, not only because the Gospel is about St. Thomas, but also because in a very real sense, St. Thomas is the patron Saint of the twentieth century. There are many doubters outside and inside the church in our age. It is not my purpose today to encourage doubt. It is my purpose today to include the doubter. Jesus said to Thomas, "Stop doubting and believe ...

3925. The Demons and the Counselor

Sermon

Ron Lavin

... her own demons. Counseling people would be hard enough if the counselor were demon-free. But alas, the healer has demons too. Henry Nouwen speaks of "wounded healers." I really identify with that! Jesus was different. Yes, he was wounded too. In a special sense he was the ultimate wounded healer because of his suffering, but he had something that no other counselor has, the power of purity; the authority of perfect authenticity. "What authority!" the people said. "He isn't like anyone else we know. He gives ...

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