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 451 to 475 of 1065 results

451. Cain's Sentence

Genesis 4:1-26

Drama

Jerry Eckert

Comment: The story of Cain and Abel tapped into experiences I had had with the criminal justice system in years past, and I set it into a rural Wisconsin county. I told it as a short story, but as I look at it now, I see it as something that could be readily dramatized with the help of individuals and with the help of the whole congregation at one point. The narrator can be an older person. Cain and Abel should be young adult men. The pastor can be him/herself as can some of the other participants such as ...

452. Proper 10

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

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

Theme: Unity through the Lordship and headship of Christ. COMMENTARY Old Testament: 2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19 David brings the Ark of the Covenant up from Kirjath-jearim to his new capital, Jerusalem. The ark is set on a new cart and David and his men dance and sing in procession. On the way, the ox pulling the cart stumbles and Uzzah reaches out to steady the ark and keep it from falling and is struck dead by the Lord for taking such liberties. David becomes angry with the Lord and also afraid. He leaves the ...

453. Ash Wednesday

Joel 2:1-2, 12-17, Matthew 6:1-4, Matthew 6:16-18, 2 Corinthians 5:11--6:2

Bulletin Aid

Russell F. Anderson

Theme: A call to repentance and renewal. The people are called to return to the Lord with acts of worship, giving and devotion that spring from the heart. COMMENTARY Old Testament: Joel 2:1-2, 12-17 We know little about the writer of this book and there are no historical markers by which to judge the period in which it was composed. Many scholars believe that Joel lived in the Persian period (559-331 B.C.). We do know that he had a keen interest in the temple and can surmise that he hails from priestly ...

454. A Continuing Presence

John 16:5-16

Sermon

Larry Powell

Clarence Macartney tells of a certain Canadian river which flows through a forbidding chasm. Looming on either side of the river are rugged, uninviting crags which bear the names "Eternity" and "Trinity." Macartney suggests that the opposing crags invite an analogy (you understand of course, that to a preacher, most everything invites analogy). "Inseparable from any true conception of God," he says, "are always the two doctrines of God's eternity and God's trinity ... The threefold experience of God the ...

455. Our God Delivers!

Daniel 3:1-30

Sermon

Erskine White

There is no other God who can deliver in this way. (Daniel 3:29) We live in an age of increasing religion and decreasing faith. On the one hand, the "business" of religion is booming. More and more best-selling books are being published in which people tell how religion has made them successful, or given them solutions to the problems in their lives. More and more religious programs fill the airwaves of television and radio. You can go to Christian stores and buy Christian products of every kind; you can ...

456. Small Church Communion

Acts 2:42-47

Sermon

Steven Burt

A while ago I attended a wedding at a Roman Catholic church on suburban Long Island. I had never been there before, and when I drove into the parking lot and saw the church, I was stunned. It was huge, almost twice as big as the high school I attended, where our graduating class consisted of 76 students. Inside it was more of the same. The sanctuary was like a small cathedral and it awed me. It could seat between 1,500 and 2,000 comfortably, and the 125 who came for the wedding were swallowed up in it. The ...

457. Playing By A Different Set Of Rules

Matthew 13:24-30, Matthew 13:36-43

Sermon

Larry Goodpaster

Obscenity, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. With words to that effect more than two decades ago the Supreme Court of the United States of America left the decisions regarding pornography in the hands of local communities. During the intervening years states and cities have struggled with the issue, desiring to uphold the basic rights of freedom of speech and expression, and at the same time attempting to establish and maintain what is decent and acceptable to the majority. The latest entry to ...

458. The Vine And The Branches

John 15:1-17

Sermon

Jerry L. Schmalemberger

Just outside Nazareth where Jesus grew up you can see them on both sides of the road. They grow everywhere out of that dry, rocky soil. They are the grapevines mentioned in John 15. When I stepped off the tourist bus to take pictures, I was amazed to see these short stumps of vines lying over close to the ground and propped up with a rock to keep them off the hot red soil. I had pictured in my mind all these years, grape arbors like grandpa’s that ran from the house to the garage in the backyard and which ...

459. The Shouting of the Crowd

Matthew 27:11-26

Sermon

Wallace H. Kirby

Spivey's Corner is a little town in Sampson County, North Carolina. I never heard of it until I lived in a nearby county. I passed through it numerous times on my way back and forth to Clinton and was aware of a terrible automobile accident there. A few years ago, Spivey's Corner became famous, featured on the nightly news, written about in news magazines, and visited by people who would never have thought of going there if it had not gained notoriety. That little community, really a mere crossroads, is ...

460. Jesus, Mary, Gustav Mahler, Brother Martin, and the Magi

Luke 20:9-19

Sermon

Carl Jech

The scribes and the chief priests ... perceived that he had told this parable against them. (Luke 20:19) No doubt you are wondering what Jesus, his mother, Mary, the composer, Gustav Mahler, Martin Luther and the three Wise Men (the Magi) have in common. The list sounds like it comes from one of Johnny Carson's "Carnak" bits, doesn't it? The simple answer is that all of these people were willing to take a new look at the traditions they had inherited. Like Tevye in Fiddler On The Roof, they could celebrate ...

461. The Ambiguity of Life, Deciding for Christ

John 10:22-42

Sermon

Carl Jech

I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish, and no one shall snatch them out of my hand. (John 10:28) I've seen it from both sides - from the side of the family with a difficult child and from the side of the mother who complained that one "rotten apple" in her son's third grade class was disrupting the learning environment for the whole group. Both sets of parents would no doubt prefer to live in a simple, unambiguous world in which everything rolled smoothly along like clockwork. The fact is, ...

462. Rejoice! It's Lent

Joel 2:1-11

Sermon

Carl Hoefler

Rejoice! It's Lent. Sounds strange doesn't it? Joy and Lent just do not seem to go together. Lent is the somber season. In popular practice Lent possesses all the marks of a six-week funeral. The paraments are the deep purple of a dowager's dress. Hallelujahs are silenced within the service of the liturgy. Social celebrations are cancelled - or at least curtailed. Our attention is focused exclusively on the crucified body of a young man dying in agony on a criminal's cross. Our emotions are moved to tears ...

463. Come From Anywhere

Matthew 15:21-28

Sermon

"... Great is your faith!" - Matthew 15:28 When Jesus walked with his disciples among the hills and valleys and towns of Palestine, he often led them in directions they had not expected to go. Traveling from Judea to Galilee, he chose to take his disciples through Samaria, although the Jewish people, who had no dealings with the Samaritans, normally went around another way. Although there was grave danger to them in Jerusalem at the time of that final Passover, and although his disciples objected ...

464. An Encounter With Two Old Friends

Luke 18:9-14

Sermon

We need to exercise our sensitivity today as we encounter two old friends, the Pharisee and the Publican. When I first learned this story in my childhood from the Bible storybook and when I told this story in the early years of ministry, the issue was already cut-and-dried. The righteous Pharisee became the scoundrel whom one loves to hate, while the Publican became the hero. Recently, however, in the tenor of the times, there has been a subtle shift of accent. The up-front Pharisee is getting better press ...

465. Loosed from the Pangs of Death

Acts 2:14-41

Sermon

Benjamin Franklin once said, "Nothing in this world is certain but death and taxes." This week we would not question the validity of what he said. The difference, however, is that April 15 and the time for paying our income taxes comes around once a year. Death comes only once in a lifetime to each of us as human beings. So we look at them and we deal with them differently. It seems to me that we also deal with death differently than we did when I was a child. Medical science was not as advanced then as it ...

466. "He Who Commands Is He Who Fulfills"

Matthew 22:34-40

Sermon

Some years ago, a parishioner gently offered his pastor a piece of criticism. It had to do with the way one of the rubrics in the weekly bulletin had for decades been phrased: an asterisk in the margin indicated those times when "the congregation reverently kneels." "You can command people to kneel," said this lay theologian, "but you can’t command that they be reverent about it." Interesting observation. On the one hand he had a point: some people kneel humbly and reverently; others kneel haughtily ( ...

467. The Beginning of a New Life

Ruth 2:1-23

Sermon

It had been over a decade since Elimelech, Naomi, and their two sons had left Bethlehem during a severe famine, but Naomi had not changed very much in that time. "The whole town was stirred" because Naomi had returned after this long absence and had a young woman with her. The women of Bethlehem, who had known her before she left, called her by name; "Do not call me Naomi," she told them. "Call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went away full, and the Lord has brought me back ...

468. Which Jesus? This Jesus!

Acts 17:1-9

Sermon

Barbara Brokhoff

"... This Jesus whom I preach to you is the Christ." A conductor said to the Lt. Governor of the State of Pennsylvania, as he was boarding a train, "Go right up the steps, sir, turn left, and take a seat." But the Lt. Governor turned right instead of left and found himself in an empty car. He had just settled himself down when some twenty people, all dressed exactly alike, came in the car. The conductor said, "Sir, I think you’ll want to move into the other car. You see, these people are all from the ...

469. Out of the Darkness

John 9:1-12

Sermon

Robert Bachelder

"... I am the light of the world." - John 9:5 St. Augustine wrote of our lesson: "This blind man stands for the human race ... if the blindness is infidelity, then the illumination is faith." Surely we need the illumination of Christian faith today. Ours is one of those epochs of which it may be said, as Shakespeare said of Romeo, "affliction is enamoured of thy parts ... and thou art wedded to calamity." Worse still, we seem bereft of a vision to sustain us. "Without a vision, the people perish," declares ...

470. When the Church Is the Church

Philippians 2:1-11

Sermon

Raymond Gibson

The late Bishop Arthur J. Moore was greeting people after a preaching service when suddenly he was confronted by a man who said, "I’m not a church member, Bishop, and I’ll tell you why. I have never found a church that is perfect. If I could ever find a perfect church, I would join it!" Bishop Moore looked the man straight in the eye and said, "My friend, the church is not perfect because I am a part of it. And if you ever become a part of it, it will be even more imperfect!" The bishop’s summation of the ...

471. Must We Have All the Answers?

Gn 2:9 · Deut 30:19-20 · Job 52:5

Sermon

Robert Noblett

The young man and his father were headed into New York City for a Saturday outing. It had been some time since they had spent much time together, and the father reasoned that a day such as this was just what was needed. As they crossed The Tapanzee Bridge into Fun City, the son asked, "Dad, what is the name of this bridge?" The father answered, "Son, I don’t know." Later they were driving along Fifth Avenue and the son asked his father, "Dad, is that the Empire State Building?" Replied the father, "Son, I ...

472. Moving Fences

2 Corinthians 5:16-19

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

During World War II a Protestant chaplain with the American troops in Italy became a friend of a local Roman Catholic priest. In time, the chaplain moved on with his unit and was killed in combat. The priest heard of his death, and knowing that the chaplain had no close family back in the States, he asked the military authorities if the chaplain could be buried in the cemetery behind his church. Permission was granted. But the priest ran into a problem with his own church authorities. They were sympathetic ...

473. God Stood Up

Sermon

James Bjorge

As you sit before your television set, the program, "To Tell the Truth," flashes on the tube. The host, Gary Moore, introduces the panel members and the game is soon underway. Three persons come onto the stage and all claim to be the same person. Two are pretenders; one is the real person. The object of the game is for the panelists to discover the right one so they ask questions and then attempt an educated guess. As they toss out their questions, the audience both in the studio and at home is also ...

474. No Withdrawal

Sermon

James Bjorge

Christmas is a time to get "hooked" on Jesus. And that is a condition from which you will need no withdrawal. A Catholic Sister, who is blind, told me she has an incurable disease. I thought she was going to elaborate on her blindness which came as a result of diabetes. Rather she said, "I have the Jesus disease." Then she went on to say that she wanted no cure for that state of being. However, we will often have to admit that there is a post-Christmas slump. It is a bit of a let-down after a season’s high ...

475. Well, What's for Sure?

2 Timothy 1:1-2:13

Sermon

Louis H. Valbracht

One of the favorite books in my library is a little book published recently titled Children’s Letters to God. There is in that book a letter by a fourth or fifth grader, but it might have been written by an adult. He writes: "Dear God, Our minister says that you are everywhere, but I don’t see you anywhere. How come? Your friend, Harold." I thought the closing was a nice touch: "I don’t see you anywhere. Your friend." Typical of the kind of ambiguity from which all of us suffer. Occasionally, someone will ...

Showing results