Sermon and Worship Resources

Showing 4776 to 4800 of 4999 results

4776. Giving While We Are Alive

John 17:1-11

Illustration

Lee Griess

... the old story of the conversation between a pig and a cow. The pig is complaining to the cow that nobody ever has a kind word for him. "Look at the way I give of myself," he says. "I produce bacon, ham, and pork chops. The bristles of my skin are used for brushes, my hide for luggage. Why, some people even pickle my feet and consider them a delicacy. Why is it then that everyone speaks more kindly of you, the cow, than of me?" To which the cow replied, "My friend, perhaps it is that I give of myself while ...

4777. Those Kissing Christians

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... Paul Christians began referring to each other as “brothers and sisters,” and kissed each other to generate a new kind of family formed not out of biological relationship but by a kinship of faith. Whereas “kissing” was customarily used to ... we? How good are we at kissing our neighborhood, kissing our city, kissing our enemies, kissing our moment in history? This is Jesus’ kind of competition: who gets the Best Kiss Award? [Here you might want to conclude by getting the kids to pass out some Hershey ...

4778. Kissing Cousins (Father's Day)

2 Corinthians 13:11-14

Sermon

King Duncan

... is a beautiful thing. But you may be asking yourself how on Trinity Sunday I can justify a sermon on kissing? Well, in our Epistle for the day, St. Paul talks about kissing . . . and he is for it! Surprise, surprise! Of course, this was a very special kind of kissing. In our lesson for the day we find Paul’s final words to the church at Corinth. He writes at the conclusion of this important letter, “Greet one another with a holy kiss.” Then he adds, “All the saints send their greetings.” So, there ...

4779. Laugh, Thomas, Laugh!

John 20:19-31

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... seen it with Lazarus. But this was different. Jesus had not died of natural causes ... causes that could somehow miraculously be reversed by the intervention of the Son of God. This was murder — spears and nails and a cross. A thoughtful man would have to say that this kind of death is not reversible ... and Thomas tells the others precisely that. "Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe. Think about it, people ...

4780. Understanding Bible Prophecy

Deuteronomy 18:14-22

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... , with all its wild imagery — ten-horned, seven-headed beasts, dragons, wild animals, and so on — functioned as a kind of pictorial narrative about God and justice and answers the inevitable question, namely, "If there is a good God ... Revelation until Hitler came. Perhaps that is why we have so many wacky interpretations of Revelation in our land: We have never had the kind of persecution that those to whom it was addressed underwent, and thus have no clue about how it really speaks. Praise God from whom ...

4781. Cross-Bearing

Mark 8:31-38

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... , "Look at me; I'm bearing my cross," and everyone chuckled. Except the wife, of course. Most assuredly, a wife on a lap in a crowded car is not what Christ had in mind when he talked about taking up the cross. Nor did he mean the kind of thing of which people complain — difficult working conditions, aging parents who are no longer able to function, recalcitrant teenagers who refuse to obey, or even giving up chocolate for Lent — as "my cross to bear." The cross was an ugly thing, an instrument of death ...

4782. Preaching Back Home

Mark 6:1-13

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... the apostle Paul, Bonhoeffer did some of his most memorable work from prison, calling attention in his letters and papers to the necessity for a "worldly Christianity," the kind of faith that is willing to get involved in the great struggles of humanity. He complained that most modern preaching of justification by faith was a kind of "cheap grace." Grace, he insisted, comes only when people step out and follow Christ in costly discipleship. Bonhoeffer had been particularly influenced by the Sermon on the ...

4783. Thanks for the Memory, Bob

John 6:24-35

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... glowing obituary he had written. It worked. He did become involved in his church and community more than ever before, and the result finally was that the fanciful obituary he had written on one slow day proved to become a road map for his life. What kind of obituary would you like to have written about you? Thanks for the memory, David ... or Bill or Bob or Jean or Jane. Suddenly, we find ourselves in church and, not just anywhere, in front of the communion table. There are the oft-repeated words: "Take ...

4784. Transitions

2 Kings 2:1-12

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... better life? More attention paid to issues of poverty, not just the millions of our own people considered by the government as living below the poverty line, but the one billion people in the world who eke by on less than $1 per day? What kind of changes will we see? Transition time - change - in the church, in society, and everywhere. My friend, Carlos Wilton, notes: Living through life's transitional times is never easy. Feelings of grief for that which is lost, or about to be lost, can seem overwhelming ...

4785. Simeon

Luke 2:22-40

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... borders, and be a new David. They say it is just a matter of time. But there are some of us who have come to the conclusion that God's plan for his people no longer involves military might and conquest. We have begun to look for a different kind of Messiah, one who will deliver us, not just in this life, but through all the ages of eternity. Some of my brethren might be disappointed at such a Messiah — they would rather have a commander of armies. But I am becoming more and more convinced that this will ...

4786. Grand Opening

Matthew 2:1-12

Sermon

Robert J. Elder

... unity in the birth of this child not only demands preaching, it demands faithful representation before the world. Any insistence on acceptance of social position over acceptance of gospel demands is treacherous. If we say that this or that kind of person with this or that kind of job, or this or that ethnic background just doesn't feel "comfortable" in our church, this is treacherous. When the churches anywhere in the world practice an official or unofficial apartheid more faithfully than their transit or ...

4787. Skin Game

Mark 1:40-45

Sermon

Robert J. Elder

... , lepers were to stand off at a distance and shout, if they still had voices to shout with, "Unclean! Unclean!" Not the kind of regulation that was likely to do much for self esteem. As we might imagine, leprosy was dreaded not only for its ... person, forced to live a pitiful life, unable to fulfill the deepest need of the human heart, the need for acts of loving kindness that are part of the normal human scene for healthy people. One ancient addition to the story, which appears in many old manuscripts, ...

4788. The Serpent

John 3:14-21

Sermon

John Smylie

... life. He is known as light. Each of these images provides us with a sense of safety and security, and each offers us a kind of comfort. Yet to compare Jesus with a snake or a poisonous serpent is a far more challenging visual metaphor to get our ... who know the saving embrace of our Lord Jesus Christ are also to love the world that rejects us and rejects God's mercy and kindness? Absolutely yes! We who have the privilege of knowing our Lord Jesus Christ, we who are lifted up with him, we who know the joy ...

4789. When The Baker Becomes the Bread!

John 6:51-58

Sermon

Robert Leslie Holmes

... multitude (v. 5). This leads to the miracle of the feeding of 5,000 from a boy's lunch of five barley loaves and two fish (vv. 9-13). Jesus reminds the crowd that God provided bread for their forefathers in the desert (vv. 31-32) before speaking about another kind of bread as he repeatedly identifies himself as the bread of life: "The bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world" (v. 33). "I am the bread that came down from heaven" (v. 41). "Here is the bread that comes down ...

4790. Tough Talk for Tentative Disciples

John 6:56-69

Sermon

Robert Leslie Holmes

... other places, too. In John 3, Nicodemus — a religious scholar no less — confused spiritual truth with gynecological medicine. In John 4, the woman at the well first believed Jesus was some kind of water quality expert. In John 5, the man by the pool of Bethesda believed at first that he had been the beneficiary of some kind of welfare program. There was nothing spiritual about his understanding of his healing until Jesus told him, "Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you" (John 5:14). We see ...

4791. King Me!

John 18:33-37

Sermon

... ; advancing toward a goal. The way you get there — the way you succeed in checkers — is to conquer your opponent. Jump them and they no longer exist. Double-jump them and they disappear faster. I love checkers, though I hardly ever win. It is not that I am too kind to win; I am, in fact, ruthless! So I must be too dumb to win! Whatever the reason, I always seem to lose at checkers. The game changes dramatically when one of the players reaches the opposite edge of the board. When we land on that far side ...

4792. The Unbelievable Truth

1 Corinthians 15:1-11

Sermon

Nancy Kraft

... about anywhere else in the Bible, so we're not sure what it's referring to: a time when the risen Christ appeared to more than 500 brothers and sisters at once. Now, when over 500 people see something at the same time, you cannot dismiss it as some kind of vision or a dream. There can be no doubt that it really happened. After Jesus was raised from the dead, hundreds of his followers had the opportunity to see him. They saw the risen Christ. That explains why their lives were so transformed. I'm not sure ...

4793. Loving God

1 John 5:1-6

Sermon

Nancy Kraft

... is of value, it must be unattainable. She always longs for someone who is a little out of reach. Movies are filled with this kind of story line. Like the dorky guy who falls in love with the homecoming queen. It's also the stuff fairy tales are made ... me?" We'll usually answer a question like that by coming back with a laundry list. "Well, let's see ... I love you because you're kind, and you're smart, and you make me laugh, and you have the most beautiful eyes...." But do you really love someone for any of ...

4794. Doing Christ’s Work

Ephesians 1:15-23

Sermon

Nancy Kraft

... to live with his disciples in another way, through the Holy Spirit. So, they didn't have to fumble around in the dark as they were figuring out how to be Christ's body in the world. The Spirit came to them and gave them a special kind of wisdom that transcended the conventional wisdom of the world. The Ephesians passage for today describes this as an enlightenment that came from of the eyes of their hearts. Through the eyes of their hearts they could see the hope to which he had called them, "the riches ...

4795. I’ve Got a Home in that Kingdom

2 Corinthians 5:6-10, 14-17

Sermon

Gibson “Nibs” Stroupe

... while, I wondered if it would really work, but as the weeks and months passed, and the number of polio cases dropped, my confidence grew. I was no longer dominated by the fear of polio. We live in an age of fear again, a fear of a different kind, a fear of terrorism. We have seen its deadly hand, and though some of the fear is overblown and exploited, the terrorists have revealed a real vulnerability that is always present in our lives, a vulnerability that we spend much time and energy and money trying to ...

4796. Dividing Walls

Ephesians 2:11-22

Sermon

Gibson “Nibs” Stroupe

... my senses again and saw that I was not in Bangladesh but rather in the United States, in a county on the affluent north side of Atlanta. It was a stunning and difficult revelation. In today's passage, the author of Ephesians makes a direct attack on these kinds of divisions, and he affirms that in Jesus Christ, there is a whole new vision — a whole new world — that we are asked to enter and to explore. He proclaims that God has broken down the dividing walls in Jesus Christ, and in this movement, we are ...

4797. Oops! I Did It Again

Matthew 16:21-28

Sermon

King Duncan

... believe it. We got down on our knees and we prayed and, now, I know I am important to Jesus and that he loves me.” With that he started crying again, happy and unashamed. When his sobs subsided, he earnestly burst out, “You know, boy, kindness can make you cry.” (7) Well, kindness can make you cry. But that is part of what taking up the cross of Jesus is all about. We love as he loved. We don’t try to repeal the Great Commandment or the Great Commission. We try to live them out. Oh, we backslide ...

4798. Matthew 22:1-14

Matthew 22:1-14

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... robe.” This observation, and the king’s reaction to the under-dressed state of his guest, are both odd and extreme. First, according to the known traditions of first century wedding rituals and observances, there is no mention of a specific kind of attire required of attending guests. Certainly for a festive, formal affair such as a wedding, guests would be expected to come in clean, probably white, clothing. But there was no one specific garment required to make guests admittable. Second, given the ...

4799. The Ball Game

Mark 13:1-31

Drama

Arley K. Fadness

... appropriate baseball caps. Frank has his glove and Bill carries two glasses of pop. Bill is visibly upset by having to wait in line to get in and buy the pop.) Bill: Boy, Frank, I never thought we were gonna get in here! What a line! Frank: Yeah, it was kind of long. But, hey, Bill, forget it. We’ve got front row seats, third-base side right behind the dugout! Here they are. (sits down) Bill: Forget it? I can’t forget it. It seems like I’ve been waiting for something or somebody all day! I’m fed up ...

4800. Watching for a

Mark 13:1-31

Drama

Arley K. Fadness

... ) Pardon me, I overheard you talking, sir. You’re looking for someone in a blue turtleneck sweater, aren’t you? I saw such a person out in the parking lot when I just came in. He’ll be coming this way. Husband: Why, thank you, that’s very kind of you. And who are you watching for — maybe we can return the favor? Mother: My son! He’s coming home from St. Olaf today or tomorrow — didn’t say which day nor by which means of transportation — Husband: You mean, he didn’t tell you? Mother: No ...

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