Sermon and Worship Resources

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Showing 4751 to 4775 of 4977 results

4751. Like a Phoenix

Mark 6:1-13

Sermon

Dean Feldmeyer

... thinks he’s somethin’. Thinks he’s better’n the rest of us. That fool ain’t no different from any of us. He ain’t nothin’.” Tex says that was a lesson that always stuck with him. If you wanted to get along with these guys you had to keep your mouth shut and admit that you were, just like them, nothing. That’s what Jesus was confronting. He was nothing special to these people. He had nothing to say that they want to hear. They’ve known him too long and too well. To them, he ain’t nothin ...

4752. Consuming Fire

Hebrews 12:18-29

Sermon

Will Willimon

... tell myself that I've only got to hang on up here about twenty minutes, that the choir behind me really are nice, average people, and that this really isn't all that big a deal. It doesn't work. I still get chills, still get the shakes, still keep stomach medicine in my Gothic washroom. The place is big, dark, threatening. And you will find that there are Sundays when, even though we've got it all planned, nailed down, and the order of worship all worked out, God almighty still manages to reach in here and ...

4753. Lazarus, Arise!

John 11:1-44

Sermon

Will Willimon

... asking for you. You might as well come out." Mary comes out and says bitterly, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died." But Jesus doesn't reply. He is just as angry and upset about Lazarus' death as Mary. Being Jesus doesn't keep him from being angry over death and he lets Mary vent her anger because he understands, he shares her anger. He hates death as much as anybody. But Jesus moves on because he isn't here to wring his hands over death or blame, transfer, deny, or resignedly accept ...

4754. Living Bread

John 6:51-58

Sermon

Dean Feldmeyer

... son of God, blah, blah, blah. They aren’t sure what any of that means. They don’t really think about it. Most of them belong to churches. That is, they have their name on the membership roll of the church and they do the minimum required to keep it there. They send a check every two years or they show up at worship on Christmas Eve or Easter Sunday. They believe in prayer in schools but not in church. Sometimes they borrow the tables or chairs for their family reunions or high school graduation parties ...

4755. Holding On

Job 1:1; Job 2:1-10

Sermon

King Duncan

... his love and come to put your faith in him.” “Could be,” the boy replied. (5) I’m not sure Sir Malcolm’s answer to the boy’s question was very satisfying. But notice: Job didn’t really find an answer to that question either except to keep holding on to his faith in God and in the end he would see that, indeed, his Redeemer lives. If you read through the Bible, or through the pages of human history, you discover that God works through strengths and weaknesses, through wins and losses, through ...

4756. Now That's Rich

Mark 10:17-31

Sermon

King Duncan

... trust in the love and providence of God? “It is harder,” said Jesus, “for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God than for a camel to go through the eye of a needle.” That’s strong symbolism, but we need to recognize the dangers of wealth. It can keep us out of the Kingdom of God if we overvalue money and undervalue people, if we see money as an end and not as a means, if we write upon our money, “In God We Trust” but within our hearts we trust in our material accumulation. At some point in ...

4757. A Stand-in for Royalty

John 18:33-37; Revelation 1:4b-8

Sermon

King Duncan

... turn 95 years old. Have you given it much thought? I think I’ll be glad to get out of bed and eat a nice meal and spend some time with people I love. I don’t think I’ll need an alarm clock or a daily schedule to keep up with all my activities. I’m pretty sure I won’t be as busy as Queen Elizabeth II. Her Royal Highness attends over 400 events each year, including meetings, ceremonies, presentations, receptions and charity events. That’s more than one official event each day, 365 days each year ...

4758. The Days Are Coming

Jeremiah 33:14-16

Sermon

King Duncan

... his mouth shut, we wonder. His inability to hold his tongue cost him dearly. He was banished for a time from the priesthood. He was physically beaten and publicly humiliated on more than one occasion for expressing his unpopular convictions. Why couldn’t he keep quiet? After all, he could have enjoyed a peaceful life, a relatively comfortable life. He had the soul of a poet. He observed with joy the blossoming of the almond in early spring. He wrote of the migratory impulse of the turtledove, the swallow ...

4759. Seeking Jesus

Luke 2:41-52

Sermon

King Duncan

... ’s purposes for marriage and family. There are so many families today that have no foundation for their lives. All their energy is consumed with just external issues: managing their workload, juggling their schedules, paying bills, keeping up with the neighbors, keeping up appearances. There is no spiritual foundation, no eternal purpose that guides their relationships, their priorities, their goals. What a tragedy it is to see a Christian family whose values, priorities, relationships and choices look no ...

4760. Joy on an Elephant

Philippians 4:4-7

Sermon

Mary Austin

... with a kind of dogged determination. Her father taught her how to sail, even though she couldn’t see the sails or the shore, or where she was going. “But,” she says, “he told me to believe and feel the wind in my face.” That was enough to keep her going, and she says, “for the next eleven years, I swore nobody would ever find out that I couldn’t see, because I didn’t want to be a failure, and I didn’t want to be weak.” She chose unusual careers. She became an archaeologist, and ended ...

4761. It's A Wonderment

Mark 9:2-9

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... for the first time ever, Scott asked me to pray for him. Well, I prayed like I've never prayed before, not so much that he keep his job (though I did pray for that) but that God's will somehow be worked out in this and that Scott be given the strength ... upon the one who came to transform darkness into light, death into life, sin into forgiveness. It is a wonderment, all we have to do is keep our focus on the Son of God. But we can't do that on the mountain top because Jesus is already in the valley down below ...

4762. For Men Only?

Mark 10:2-16

Sermon

Frank Ramirez

... is an adulterer. More insight can be gained by looking at the next four verses of today’s passage. People brought little children to Jesus, hoping for even a touch from the master’s hand, and the disciples, like many church busybodies, did their best to keep the children at bay, but Jesus, when he saw this, responded indignantly, “Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.” At the time of Jesus, children represented one of the ...

4763. Deliverance through adversity

Sermon

Willie Soler

... fear of the Lord is a fountain of life, to turn one away from the snares of death.” (Psalm 14:27) c. Adversity strengthens our hatred for sin. The pain of adversity helps us recognize the deception of sin. Our hatred of evil will increase when we realize how sin keeps us from living in a way that honors God and how it damages the lives of those, we love “God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows ...

4764. For The Love of God Is Contagious

Mark 7:31-36 · Luke 5:12-15 · 2 Corinthians 5:16-20

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... ; the old is made into something new; those who are thought to be worthless by the world find value and love through a relationship with God through Christ. People find meaning, direction and purpose where before there was emptiness. This is what keeps the Church going. This is what keeps people coming and joining. Having a soul might not be contagious but the love of God is.£ I. RESILIENT: One of the reasons the Love of God is contagious is that it is resilient. It has the ability to be flexible and ...

4765. For the Love Of God is Forgiving

Luke 7:36-50

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... and we should love our neighbors as ourselves. But it is awful hard to remember that when you're driving in rush hour traffic and you keep getting cut off. It is hot, your car is hot, you are hot, both physically and under the collar. You don't want to love your ... that we have sinned and slapped the skunk. We don't even know that we're covered with the smell. We are running so hard to keep up with the race of those around us or we're running so hard to try and outdistance God, that the smell doesn't ever have ...

4766. Divine Divestment

Mark 10:17-27

Sermon

Will Willimon

... a kid in Sunday School." Evidently, this young man is a bigger success than even Jesus thought. He has not only been successful at getting material things but he has been a spiritual success as well. In the context of that day, the young man's success at keeping the Ten Commandments would not be that surprising. After all, because he is rich, he has plenty of free time on his hands, plenty of time to study the Bible and to do what the Bible commands. If he needs to take all weekend off to study the Bible ...

4767. Devour And Conquer

Mark 12:38-44

Sermon

Frank Ramirez

... home. Nor do we throw out gifts in a metal chamber to get more bling for the buck when we toss in our gift. People write checks, use paper cash, or even electronic transfers and do so without drawing undue attention to themselves. Also I suspect we must keep ourselves aware of the damage done by any unthinking person or church that equates a person’s good standing in church with the size of the offering we make. There are always in-kind contributions for those who may not always be able to do as much as ...

4768. It's a Wonderment

Mark 9:2-9

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

4769. Which King Do We Worship?

Matthew 2:1-12

Sermon

King Duncan

... up early and slept in their cars for two or three nights for this event. He says that as he left the event that day, he realized that in many areas of our country our health care system is broken. And he realized that his misinformation helped to keep it that way. So, he left his high-paying, comfortable job with one of the most powerful insurance companies in the nation. He wrote a book about the lies he told in support of his former employer. Out in that field in East Tennessee, this executive realized he ...

4770. The Art of Fruit

Luke 3:7-18

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... of our hearts. One may be able to dupe some by acting as a good person occasionally when convenience strikes, but if inside that person’s heart is still disconnected from God, Jesus will be able to tell. If one claims to love God and worship Jesus but keeps his or her life closed off from others, Jesus will be able to tell. In a sense, the threshing floor is Jesus’ artistic canvas. You may enter in disguise, but you will exit with the face that reveals the inner workings of your heart. What kind of face ...

4771. The Hiddenness Of Life’s Truths: Christian Life As Surprise

2 Corinthians 5:20b—6:10

Sermon

Mark Ellingsen

... surprising life that God has in store for us. The ashes of Ash Wednesday testify to God’s wonderful, surprising ways of bringing life out of death, good out of bad and hope out of despair. He may have that planned for you this week, this year! Keep that hope alive, that trust in a loving God, and a lot of what’s hidden in life will start to make sense to you. [1] Martin Luther, “Lectures On Romans” (1515-1516), in Luther’s Works, Vol.25 (63 vols.; St. Louis-Philadelphia: Concordia Publishing House ...

4772. God Doesn’t Always Behave Like We Think He Should

Philippians 2:5-11

Sermon

Mark Ellingsen

... won’t think we really need it enough. The first reformer said that expressly even before the Reformation. He wrote: A true Christian must have no glory of his own and must to such an extent be stripped of everything he calls his own... Therefore we must in all things keep ourselves so humble as if we still had nothing of our own. We must wait for the naked mercy of God, who will reckon us just and wise.[5] You and I need humility to get ourselves out to the way, in order to appreciate the fact that we are ...

4773. A Sympathetic High Priest

Hebrews 4:14-16; 5:7-9

Sermon

Mark Ellingsen

... all met death.) But with the knowledge that God in Christ is right there with you, you have the hope you need to struggle against the injustice, and that hope and gratitude is all you need (as it is said in the black church) “to keep on keep’in on.” And when that happens, Bonhoeffer and Easter remind us on this Friday that it is really Good — the victory is already won! [1] “Origen, On First Principles,” in Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol.4, eds. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, p.283. This is ...

4774. Spirit Powered Anointing

Luke 4:14-21 · Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... with her jewels. 11 For as the earth brings forth its growth, and as a garden enables seed to spring up, so the Lord GOD will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations. For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not keep still, her righteousness shines like a bright light, her salvation like a blazing torch. 2 Nations will see your righteousness, and all kings your glory. You will be called by a new name that the mouth of the LORD will bestow. 3 You ...

4775. Provoked

Luke 4:21-30

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... Whenever you feel that self-righteous bone rising up in your body, remember Nazareth. For God’s proclamation IS one of celebration –but it comes with a distinct caveat. It’s for ALL people. Jesus, Messiah and Lord, Son of God, proclaimer of God’s divine mission, keeps God’s original blessing to Abraham close to his heart: “You are blessed to be a blessing” (Genesis 12:2-3). In the words of the prophet Isaiah (42:1, 6-7): Here is my servant . . . my chosen one in whom I delight; I will put my ...

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