Sermon and Worship Resources

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Showing 4501 to 4525 of 4944 results

4501. We Know Where You Came From

John 6:41-51

Sermon

King Duncan

Have you ever noticed that it is very difficult to escape your reputation? Once people have an image of you in their minds, it is very difficult to change their perception. Back in the 1940s, a highly popular advertising jingle for Chiquita Bananas ended with the line: "Bananas like the climate of the very, very tropical equator, so you should never put bananas in the refrigerator. No. No. No. No." We're told that the only reason the word REFRIGERATOR was mentioned in the jingle was that it rhymed with ...

4502. Light

Isaiah 2:1-5

Sermon

King Duncan

A man was sitting at the breakfast table reading his newspaper when his wife breezed through the kitchen, gave him a light kiss on the cheek and said matter-of-factly, "I'll bet you've forgotten what day this is." The husband answered defensively, "I have not!" He went back to reading the paper while she rushed upstairs to finish getting ready. All the way to work it bugged him, "What day is this?" He knew she was very sensitive about his forgetting Valentine's Day, anniversaries, and other special ...

4503. Mustard Seed Faith

Mark 4:30-34

Sermon

King Duncan

Mackie Shilstone is 5'8" and weighs only 137 pounds, but he trains some of the largest professional athletes in the countryfor example, pro basketball player Ralph Sampson, St. Louis shortstop Ozzie Smith, Will Clark of the Giants, Billy Hobbley of the Harlem Globetrotters. Mackie is not content just to train athletes physically. He wants to help change their lifestyles and ways of thinking as well. "I tell my athletes that they do have control over what their attitude will be about life. Their positive ...

4504. Get Your Third Class Tickets Here!

Acts 1:1-11

Sermon

King Duncan

In one of his books author James Moore takes us back to the old West when the major means of transportation was the stagecoach. We’ve seen persons riding in stagecoaches in western movies. What we might not know is that the stagecoach had three different kinds of tickets--first class, second class, and third class. If you had a first-class ticket that meant you could remain seated during the entire trip no matter what happened. If the stagecoach got stuck in the mud, or had trouble making it up a steep ...

4505. Strength Through Weakness

2 Corinthians 12:1-10

Sermon

King Duncan

When Benjamin Franklin was the ambassador to France for the newly-independent United States of America, his quick wit and well-thought wisdom opened many doors for him and his new country. At one dinner in 1781 where the guest list included the powers of that day, the French foreign secretary began the dinner with a toast to King Louis, "To His Majesty, King Louis, the Sun, whose shining presence radiates the earth of France." To which the British ambassador rose with the toast, "To King George the Third, ...

4506. Straight Backs And Rekindled Dreams

Luke 13:10-17

Sermon

King Duncan

What's it like to live without hope? What's it like to finally decide that your dreams are beyond your abilities and to resign yourself to living without any prospect that things will get better? The closest thing I could find to a picture of a person totally without hope comes from a book by Dr. David Jeremiah titled The Power of Encouragement. Dr. Jeremiah tells about an old Alfred Hitchcock show which featured the story of an evil woman jailed for committing a murder. The woman soon realizes that her ...

4507. Standing Tall

Mark 10:46-52

Sermon

King Duncan

A few years back, Jim Stovall decided to become a stock broker. Even though he is blind, Jim has a determination and commitment to hard work that has helped him to transcend his disability. Jim also has a wife, Crystal, who supports and encourages him in everything he does. Jim and Crystal studied hard to get through the broker exams, then went through training sessions together. Most of the other students in the training sessions were better educated and better trained than Jim. They had no handicap to ...

4508. An Unforgettable Day

Luke 2:41-52

Sermon

King Duncan

The September 2002 issue of More magazine carried an article titled, "The Day I'll Never Forget." It was an interview with prominent people about where they were and what they remember from the most momentous events in American history. Janice Aldrin recalled the giant, rocket-shaped cake her family and friends ate to celebrate the day when her dad, astronaut Buzz Aldrin, first set foot on the moon. Former Olympic track star Madeline Manning Mims remembered the terror she and her teammates felt at the 1972 ...

4509. Needed: A Radiator Cap Solution

Philippians 2:1-11

Sermon

King Duncan

Passion/Palm Sunday Everybody loves a parade or a celebration. Everyone loves to be part of something big and exciting. Early in Frank Sinatra's career, George Evans, his publicist, used some slick tricks to get Sinatra extra publicity. Evans hired teenage girls to hang around outside the club where Sinatra was singing. They were paid to scream out his name and "swoon." He even arranged for an ambulance to park outside the club. The faked hysterics worked; crowds packed the club to hear this fabulous new ...

4510. Lord, What A Bountiful God!

John 6:1-15

Sermon

King Duncan

An old prospector came into a saloon in frontier California and ordered a glass of milk with a shot of whiskey in it. While the bartender was fixing his drink, the old prospector wandered over to speak to some of his friends. Before he came back, a man came in wearing a black threadbare coat. He walked up to the bartender and timidly said, "Sir, I'm a poor traveling Methodist circuit rider. I've just made it across the desert. I'm bone dry. Could you let me have that foamy glass of milk I see you've just ...

4511. God's Witness Security Program

1 John 3:1-3

Sermon

King Duncan

If you could create a whole new identity for yourself, who would you be? What would be your new name or occupation? Where would you live? Would you change your name to Rosco and run away with the circus? Would you become a dance instructor in Florida or a pastry chef in Seattle? For those people who enter the Federal Witness Security Program, these questions are not just idle musings. The Federal Witness Security Program was set up in 1970 to provide new identities for witnesses who risk their lives to ...

4512. Palm Sunday (Prologue)

Matthew 21:1-11

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

Once upon a time, before television, there was radio. You know what radio is—television without pictures. Well, before television, one of the most popular daytime radio programs was called “Queen for a Day.” If I remember it correct-ly (and it was a long time ago!), each day four or five women from the studio audience would tell the host what they would like to have and do if they could be “Queen for a Day.” And then, on the basis of applause, one woman was chosen, and insofar as they were able, the ...

4513. Waiting and Witnessing

Luke 2:21-40

Sermon

Paul E. Flesner

My message this morning is about two biblical senior citizens and what we can learn from them about the nature of faith. The setting for today's Gospel jumps from the stable in Bethlehem to the temple in Jerusalem where Mary and Joseph had brought Jesus to be "presented to the Lord." It was there that they met Simeon and Anna. Their reactions to Jesus suggest a question that I have for you this morning: "What are you going to do about Jesus now that Christmas is over?" These two biblical members of " ...

4514. Grace in the Midst of Hopelessness

Romans 8:18-27

Sermon

Glenn McDonald

Submarine accidents are rare. Successful submarine rescues, unfortunately, are rarer still. The complex variables of depth, pressure, temperature, and time conspire to doom most trapped sailors. During one celebrated rescue attempt a message could be heard reverberating through the hull of a downed sub. It was tapped out in code from the inside, metal clanging against metal: Is there any hope? At the beginning of the twenty-first century the world is waiting for an answer to that question. Opinion guru ...

4515. Lift High the Tree

John 12:20-36

Sermon

George Bass

Suddenly, we are a week ahead of our Lenten schedule. This story belongs to the Week of the Passion of our Lord, because it occurs sometime between the days we call Palm Sunday and Maundy Thursday. It was during that interval that a group of Gentiles, who were simply called Greeks, approached Philip with the request to see Jesus. Jesus must have been in some sort of seclusion pondering, no doubt, what was about to happen to him. His retort to Philip and Andrew, when he heard the request, certainly suggests ...

4516. In the Wrong Place At the Right Time

Mark 15:21-32

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

Back in early December, Jerry and I were in Jerusalem for a meeting of the presidents of the World Methodist Council. We deliberately chose to meet in Jerusalem because we wanted to identify the world Wesleyan family with that small, often- persecuted and almost always forgotten Christian community in that land our Lord made holy. It disturbs me greatly that of all the millions of Christians who visit that land, very few seek out the Christians there and hear their story. A Christian should not go to ...

4517. Message from a Cloud

Acts 1:1-11

Sermon

King Duncan

Many of you probably went to a university where one of the hot issues among students was, if the professor’s late, how long do we have to wait? At one university custom dictated that if a professor was ten minutes late, class was canceled. Well, a professor arrived early one morning for a 9:00 a.m. lecture. He placed his hat on his desk, and went to the faculty room. Before he knew it, it was 9:10. By the time he got back to his classroom, it was empty. The next day, he let his students have it. “When my ...

4518. He's Here Somewhere

John 1:6-8, 19-28

Sermon

Mark Trotter

To understand the gospels you must remember that they were written some generations after the Resurrection, and written to answer the questions being raised in that generation. In the case of the Gospel of John, which is the lesson for the sermon this morning, it was written at least sixty years after the Resurrection, three or four generations after. So the question being asked in our text is, "Where is he?" "If he has been resurrected, then where is he?" It is a particularly critical question for that ...

4519. Honoring the Fathers

Hebrews 11:17-22

Sermon

Mark Trotter

4520. Scandalous News

Luke 4:16-30

Sermon

Mark Trotter

Much to my surprise the title of this sermon, "Scandalous News," has caused a lot of people this past week to take notice. They would ask me, "What are you going to say?" I said, "I don't do previews." I did say, though, "It's not what you think, but it's probably much better than you could ever imagine." Titles can be misleading, but I have to put something out there on the billboard that will catch the attention of people who are traveling 70 miles an hour. But I do have some standards, I want you to ...

4521. This Is Not the Race I Entered

Mark 8:27-38

Sermon

Mark Trotter

The scripture lesson for this morning comes from the Gospel of Mark, right in the mid-point of the story. It is the hinge on which the plot turns. Mark has a wonderful symmetry to his gospel. The turning point comes in the exact middle of the narrative. There are sixteen chapters in the Gospel of Mark, and this scene comes in the eighth chapter. Behind us in the first seven chapters are the halcyon days in Galilee, those three years in which he gathered his disciples and taught them. Ahead of us now are ...

4522. You Will Never Walk Alone

Luke 24:13-20, 25-26, 28-35

Sermon

Mark Trotter

Summer is not far away now. It is a time when many people travel. If you are going abroad, I am sure you have already made plans to do so. If you have told anybody about your plans, I am sure you have gotten a lot of advice on where to stay, where to eat, and what to see. Through the generosity of many of you in this church, Jean and I were able to take a trip to Germany last summer. We had a wonderful time, made so in large part because of the advice that some of you gave us who had been there. The best ...

4523. In the Darkness of Despair, There Is the Light of Hope

Isaiah 9:1-7

Sermon

Thomas A. Pilgrim

A student at The University of Georgia got a job as a disc jockey at a little radio station in Commerce, Georgia. He also got a room at a hotel in town and commuted to school, which was not far away. Sometimes at night, he would crawl out of his window and sit on the roof of the hotel. He would look out over that little town. One night when he was up there, he wrote a song called “City Lights.” The rest is country music history. His name was Bill Anderson. An Episcopalian minister in Boston worked himself ...

4524. The Real Dish Network

John 10:1-21

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

When do you have enough TV channels to choose from? According to the satellite TV industry, there is no such thing as enough. Every year more and more households are sticking out their own little satellite downloading system and beaming in anywhere from 100-600 channels of entertainment and information. Our overwhelming desire for this kind of electronic-overload is played for laughs in the commercials aired by DISH Network and Direct TV. In one series of ads the satellite installer has the stuffing hugged ...

4525. Be Kind

Ephesians 4:17--5:21

Sermon

James McCormick

Since before I can remember, I went to Vacation Bible School every summer. I loved Vacation Bible School and I have many fond memories of my experiences there. I remember rousing games of “Red Rover” in which the boys tried to impress the girls. I remember making first century houses out of clay. There were times when we dressed up in bath robes and re-enacted Biblical dramas. I remember spatter painting – I loved spatter painting! We would get a leaf or a flower or some other object and put it on a piece ...

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