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 4701 to 4725 of 4946 results

4701. Healing On The Sabbath

Luke 13:10-17

Bulletin Aid

H. Burnham Kirkland

Call To Worship Leader: Lord, because you are righteous, help me. People: Be my secure shelter and a strong fortress to protect me. Leader: My God, rescue me from wicked people. People: From the power of cruel and evil people, deliver me. Leader: Come, let us worship and rejoice at all the wonderful things that Christ has done and is doing still. Collect Ever-loving Father, on this day set aside to interrupt our daily routine, we come to worship you and to be sure that we make room in our lives to draw ...

4702. From Black Holes to Red Holes

Luke 18:18-30

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

Does anyone here know how to snowboard? Anyone here snowboard in cyberspace? Thanks to DVD technology, our eleven-year-old son Thane and his buddies go snowboarding in our living room almost every weekend. I love to eavesdrop while their electronic selves slip and slither down impossible snowboarding courses. It's always an education. The other day Thane started shouting, "How can this guy keep saying 'gravity is my friend!'?" For some reason the character Thane had chosen would perform astounding 720's, ...

4703. My Precious, My Precious

Luke 12:13-21

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

Who would have thought that a public television show about the junk, or, excuse me, family heirlooms cluttering up everyone's closets, attics, and basements would turn into one of the hottest TV shows going? What's the name of it? Anyone? It's my favorite TV show. That's right: Antiques Roadshow. Antiques Roadshow is now a classic treasure itself, having been public televisions' biggest audience grabber for over a decade. It's even spawned dozens of spin-offs and copycats, and made the Keno twins (Leigh ...

4704. The Christian's Wild Card

1 Corinthians 15:12-34

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

It was Easter Saturday, and Mommy was sitting at the kitchen table coloring Easter eggs with her small son and daughter. She told them about the true meaning of Easter, and taught them the traditional Easter morning greeting, "He is risen!" and the response, "He is risen indeed!" The children planned to surprise their father, a Presbyterian minister, with this greeting on Easter Sunday morning by saying, "He is risen!" as soon as he awoke. The next morning, bright and early, the little boy heard his father ...

4705. Inward, Upward, Outward

Romans 9:30--10:21

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

Stuck in an endless traffic snarl the other day I punched on the radio just to hear another voice. The news channel was just finishing up a long in-depth report on the nasty mad-cow threat. Mad cow meat. Cancer causing farm fish. Avian flu chicken. What's left to eat any more? Pretty soon they'll find deadly bacteria on broccoli. The radio news channel, staying on the theme of American eating habits, moved on to a special segment on obese kids. Because of obesity, "This may be the first generation of ...

4706. The World's Best Hearing Aid

Mark 9:2-13

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

Selective hearing. Anyone NOT been accused of that? Throughout the course of our lives we all develop a remarkable talent for selective hearing. Dale Carnegie said that hearing one's name is the most beautiful sound to the human ear (and he proved it personally with his gift of libraries, all of which bore his name). But that only applies when the one calling our name isn't a parent or spouse asking us to perform some chore. No matter what decibel level is used, kids can always fail to hear mom calling ...

4707. Are You Getting Hymns Out of Your Lions?

1 Corinthians 7:1-40

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

If there were one word everyone could agree on to describe twenty-first century living, it would surely be stressful. Anyone here this morning want to deny that we face a host of stress-inducing factors in this world? How about terrorism. How about war? How about avian flu? How about global warming, or diminishing resources, vanishing species, increasing Population, or WMD's? Not to mention the Islamic Republic of Iran with a head of state who's on record wanting to nuke Israel out of existence? And that's ...

4708. Easter 6

Psalm 66:1-20, Acts 17:16-34, 1 Peter 3:8-22, John 14:15-31

Sermon Aid

Marion L. Soards, Thomas B. Dozeman, Kendall McCabe

TEXTS FROM ACTS AND PSALMS If there is logic to the selection or combination of these texts, it is not readily discernible, even by stretching one's imagination. The sermon-speech by Paul in Acts works out a kind of "crisis-theology," which insists that necessary changes are currently demanded by the work of God in Jesus Christ. The psalm is a profound expression of piety, filled with vivid imagery and recalling the goodness of God both to Israel and to the psalmist. Acts 17:22-31 - "The Changing of the ...

4709. Fatal Attraction

Matthew 5:27-30

Sermon

James Merritt

A teacher was working with a grammar lesson and she said to one of her students, "Willie, what is it when I say ‘I love you, you love me, he loves me?'" Willie replied, "That's one of those triangles where somebody gets shot." Well, it used to be a situation where somebody would get shot—with a gun. Today it's a situation that gets shot with a television camera. Television refers to adultery, to sex outside of marriages, 13 times more frequently than it mentions intimacy between a husband and a wife. There ...

4710. Something’s Gotta Change

Ephesians 4:1-16, Psalm 34:1-22

Bulletin Aid

Frank Ramirez

Call To Worship O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt his name together. (Psalm 34:3) Collect Lord of all, we seek you in comfortable places and convenient moments, and wonder when it seems as if you are absent. Yet all along you are drawing us closer to you, to a spot and a time where those special ministries you have set apart for us push us past discomfort and inconvenience, toward victory and heaven. We thank you for these walls, these windows, these pews, these friendly faces, and we pray that ...

4711. The Necessary Book

Luke 16:1-13

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

Spiritual well-being is the ultimate "necessary" of life. In the not-so-distant past, modest men and polite women might find themselves needing to be excused from the family by pleading a trip to "the necessary," or even "the nessie." A "necessary," of course, was a discreet reference to the outhouse, the outdoor receptacle for the Sears and Roebuck catalog. In earlier days, when the term "necessary" appeared on a road sign, it served as a code-word for travelers, letting them know that the next town was ...

4712. UpTime

Mark 6:30-34, 53-56

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

Downtime is uptime if it's God's time. It's been a long time now since we marked the celebration of Easter on the church's calendar. It's an even longer time until the seasons of Advent and Christmas return. It seems that the hot, humid days of summer are the time of year we set aside not only to get a break from school or take a vacation from our job, but also as a time when we take a little "time off" from God. The fluidity of summertime schedules means that more families are out of town, and Sunday ...

4713. These Are a Few of My Favorite Things

Matthew 10:24-39

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

Let us proclaim and offer thanks for our "favorite things": "the beauty of the earth," the "bounty of creation" and the blessings of this life. When the time comes and all is revealed, Jesus announces in this week's text that we disciples are to shout from the rooftops that which Jesus has revealed to us in secret. What had Jesus made known to his first disciples? He was the Son of God. What had Jesus shared with his first disciples? The Good News of the gospel. What had Jesus revealed to his disciples? ...

4714. And Again I Say...Amen!

Luke 6:27-36

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

What are the marks of an Amen discipleship? How would a Yes spirit manifest itself? The second of a two-part sermon. When your car starts making bad noises _ banging, or whining, or knocking _ you take it in to get its carburetor, or timing, or fan belt adjusted. When some people feel achy or out-of-sorts, they get a chiropractic "adjustment." There are many Christians out there this morning who are also making whiny noises or creaking and cracking and causing pain to others around them. When Jesus urged ...

4715. Jesus' Bad Manners

Luke 19:1-10

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

Jesus didn't wait for an invitation. He came and got people, even people who were hiding like Zacchaeus, even people who were lost. Consider this scene that every parent has been confronted with at some time. You are busy in the kitchen getting dinner ready while your child and a neighbor friend are playing out back. Suddenly, two hopeful faces confront you, and you hear, "Mom/Dad, Jamie can stay for dinner can't he? Please, oh please!" Now, really! What are you supposed to do - throw poor, starving, ...

4716. Enemies of Promise

Matthew 3:1-12

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

What are the enemies of promise that keep us from becoming the persons God made us to be? Rob Reiner's film Stand By Me tells the story of a group of four boys on their last journey of childhood. They are four very different kids from very different circumstances, and yet, they are still young enough that these differences don't matter very much. But they sense their time is short. It is the summer before they will enter junior high - where our education system and adolescence work together to divide ...

4717. Acts 5:27-32

Acts 5:27-32

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

Today's text describes a head-on encounter the religious authorities have with Jesus' followers. The Sanhedrin's frustration is becoming acute. They have tried threats, orders and imprisonment but the apostles keep showing up and keep preaching. This last time, they have really pushed the limit. They not only escape from a well-guarded jail cell, but instead of fleeing for their safety, they immediately continue preaching their message right in the middle of the temple courtyard. Perhaps one of the most ...

4718. Matthew 24:36-44

Matthew 24:36-44

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

This Sunday marks the beginning of Advent, a season in the church calendar that, in similar fashion to Lent, is a time for spiritual preparations and reparations. It is in this spirit of preparation/reparation that Jesus admonishes his listeners to watch and be ready for the unexpected and unpredictable return of the Messiah. Jesus' immediate concern here, in what stands as one of his final discourses with his disciples, is to prepare them for the tumultuous events about to unfold in Jerusalem. The texts ...

4719. Remember Your Baptism

Acts 19:1-22

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

A new way of measuring the body’s “health” is being touted as the next “big thing.” It’s still not in use yet. But they tell us it’s coming soon to your home. Instead of taking your body’s temperature, the doctor or pretend-doctor “takes your breath away”— and then analyzes it. You exhale deeply into a device that measures every component of your breath, and that one breath reveals the health of your whole body. “The breath is a window into the blood,” says Joachim D. Pleill. Pretty soon we’ll be able to ...

4720. Proper 10

2 Samuel 6:1-23, Ephesians 1:1-14, Mark 6:14-29

Sermon Aid

John R. Brokhoff

COMMENTARY Old Testament: 2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19 David is situated in Jerusalem with his government and he defeated the Philistines. It is time for David to make his capital also the religious center of the nation. With his people he arranges to bring the ark of the covenant which is 10 miles away in Kirjath-jearim. On the way the oxen stumble. To prevent the ark from falling from the new cart, Uzzah steadies the ark and is killed by God. David becomes angry with Yahweh for killing Uzzah, and in fear of ...

4721. How to Fail Successfully - Sermon Starter

Mark 6:1-13

Illustration

Maxie Dunnam

It's amazing what we do with funny stories. We apply them to whomever we wish. For instance, you might hear one funny story with the legendary coach Bear Bryant as the primary actor. When you hear it again, the primary actor may be Johnny Majors. I heard a marvelous story sometime ago about Thomas Wheeler, Chief Executive Officer for the Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company in fact, he told the story on himself. Lately I've been hearing it about President Clinton. So the story goes with the new ...

4722. Proper 17

Psalm 81:1-16, Jeremiah 2:4-13, Luke 14:1-14, Hebrews 13:1-25

Bulletin Aid

B. David Hostetter

READINGS Psalter—Psalm 81:1, 10-16 First Lesson—The prophet scolds the people for making two sinful choices. Jeremiah 2:4-13 Second Lesson—The letter to the Hebrews ends with miscellaneous moral and spiritual admonitions. Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16 Gospel—Jesus teaches that humility is better than humiliation. Luke 14:1, 7-14 CALL TO WORSHIP Leader: The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. People: And also with you. Leader: Sing the praises of God; raise a psalm to the hallowed name. People: We will ...

4723. Proper 24

Psalm 119:1-176, Jeremiah 31:27-34, Luke 18:1-8, 2 Timothy 3:10--4:8

Bulletin Aid

B. David Hostetter

READINGS Psalter—Psalm 119:97-104 First Lesson—After all the gloom the prophet offers the hopeful promise of a new covenant. Jeremiah 31:27-34 Second Lesson—The apostle Paul encourages Timothy to continue in his studies of the Holy Scripture and remain faithful to its teaching in the face of opposition. 2 Timothy 3:14-4:5 Gospel—Perseverance in prayer is urged by a story of a persistent widow seeking justice before an ungodly judge. Luke 18:1-8 CALL TO WORSHIP Leader: The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be ...

4724. Proper 15

Genesis 45:1-28, Psalm 133:1-3, Matthew 15:1-20, Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32

Bulletin Aid

B. David Hostetter

READINGS Psalter - Psalms 133:1-3 First Lesson - Joseph forgoes vengeance for forgiveness and largesse. Genesis 45:1-15 Second Lesson - Paul praises the wideness of God's mercy. Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32 Gospel - Jesus teaches that purity has more to do with the heart than with the hands, with the spirit than with the external. Matthew 15:10-28 CALL TO WORSHIP Leader: The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. People: And also with you. Leader: Mark my teaching, O my people, listen to the words I am ...

4725. History Hangs in the Balance

Luke 23:1-49

Sermon

Donald Charles Lacy

One would be hard pressed to find a historical event with so many ramifications equal to these words from Saint Luke's Gospel. In fact, for the devout Christian there is no other! It is a moment when the universe seems to come to a standstill and the angels watch in troubled awe. You and I observe from afar, indeed, a great distance. Unless we figuratively or literally read the passage on our knees, we are not apt to catch this sublime, serious moment. Yes, and our appreciation may very well remain at ...

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