Sermon and Worship Resources

Synonyms: thirstiness, dryness, parched, craving, strong desire, longing, yearning, avidity, hunger, voracity, keenness, eagerness, lust, appetite, passion, love, crave, want, covet, desire, hunger for/after, lust for/after, hanker for/after, have one's heart set on

Antonyms: aversion, distaste, apathy, dislike, hatred, antipathy, disgust, disregard, abhorrence, acrimony, wet, animosity, animus, antagonism, bad feeling, bitterness, be averse to, detestation

Showing 501 to 525 of 622 results

501. The Glory of the Cross

Galatians 6:11-18

Sermon

James Merritt

... the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ we have victory over all three. Through the cross we have victory over the flesh. “And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” (Galatians 5:24) That is, every day we can nail the lust of the flesh and the pride of life to the cross and live in victory. Through the cross we have victory over the world. “But God forbid that I should glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me ...

502. The Door Is Open

John 10:1-21

Sermon

James Merritt

... a life of meaningfulness. That is what Jesus meant when He said, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.” (John 10:10, ESV) The thief is all those wrong doors you could walk through. If you walk through the wrong door of greed, lust, jealously or selfishness it will suck the joy out of your life. It will rob you of significance and will lead you totally unsatisfied. When you walk through the door named, Jesus, everything changes. He goes on to say this, “I came that they may have life ...

503. The Messed Up

John 4:1-26

Sermon

James Merritt

... the lowest form of a Samaritan was a woman. Yet, here is a Jewish man speaking to her with respect and letting her know he would be honored to drink after her. For the first time in her life a man was not looking at her with the eyes of lust, but with the eyes of love. Now, the story gets really interesting. “Jesus answered her, ‘If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, “Give me a drink,” you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.’ The woman ...

504. Paradise Lost

Genesis 3:1-24

Sermon

James Merritt

... As the story begins keep in mind that Adam and Eve had been living a life we don’t know anything about. They were perfect people in a perfect environment, that had a perfect relationship with God. They didn’t know anything about crime, lust, bitterness, anger, anxiety, credit card debt or sickness. The word “eden” means “delight.” Everything was literally was coming up roses and then this happens. “Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. He ...

505. About Getting Drunk

Ephesians 5:15-20

Sermon

King Duncan

... , what is the controlling influence in our life? Paul is giving us some wise advice when he writes, “Do not get drunk on wine . . .” He’s saying, “Do not be controlled or influenced by wine.” Of course, you can be drunk with many things--lust, power, greed. Paul simply focuses on one that is a problem in nearly every society, chemical abuse. And with good reason. When we are under the influence of alcohol, our judgment is affected, we cannot make decisions wisely. We act out of character. And, yes ...

506. Poem: Adonais

Eulogy

Percy Bysshe Shelley

... . IV. Most musical of mourners, weep again! Lament anew, Urania! – He died, Who was the Sire of an immortal strain, Blind, old, and lonely, when his country’s pride, The priest, the slave, and the liberticide Trampled and mocked with many a loathed rite Of lust and blood; he went, unterrified, Into the gulf of death; but his clear Sprite Yet reigns o’er earth; the third among the sons of light. V. Most musical of mourners, weep anew! Not all to that bright station dared to climb; And happier they ...

507. Poem: In Memoriam

Eulogy

Alfred Lord Tennyson

... out my mournful rhymes, But ring the fuller minstrel in. Ring out false pride in place and blood, The civic slander and the spite; Ring in the love of truth and right, Ring in the common love of good. Ring out old shapes of foul disease; Ring out the narrowing lust of gold; Ring out the thousand wars of old, Ring in the thousand years of peace. Ring in the valiant man and free, The larger heart, the kindlier hand; Ring out the darkness of the land, Ring in the Christ that is to be. CVII It is the day when ...

508. How God Looks at Marriage

Mark 10:2-16

Sermon

King Duncan

... against her. And if she divorces her husband and marries another man, she commits adultery.” This seemed to those who heard this teaching to be a hard saying just like it was a hard saying when Jesus said if a man looks at a woman and lusts after her, he has already committed adultery with her in his heart. Jesus often spoke like this to show up the self-righteousness of the Pharisees, who thought themselves very pious and righteous. By holding up God’s ideals, he drove home the point that none of ...

509. Uncovering Cover-Ups

John 16:5-16

Sermon

Maurice A. Fetty

... that denies any ultimate sense of right and wrong. For many people there are no moral absolutes, no divine commandments to be obeyed, no universal, timeless principles to which they feel obligated. Many people are governed by whatever gives them pleasure or satisfies their lust, ambition, or craving for power and notoriety. "Do your own thing so long as it doesn't hurt anybody" is the popular slogan. If it gives you pleasure or makes you happy, it's okay. The late Chuck Colson, founder of Prison Fellowship ...

510. What Are You Seeking?

Matthew 2:1-12

Sermon

King Duncan

... A.D.). This fact shows just how much of a monster Herod really was. Just imagine! He would not even be around when this child king being sought would inherit the throne, yet he felt threatened by the reports of such a child. Herod was a man possessed by a lust for power. He was suspicious, savage, and warped. Note that when Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under (Matthew 2:16). He was a mad man ...

511. The Devil's Most Useful Tool

Illustration

Michael P. Green

The devil decided to have a garage sale. On the day of sale, his tools were placed for public inspection, each being marked with its sale price. There were a treacherous lot of implements: hatred, envy, jealousy, deceit, lust, lying, pride, and so on. Set apart from the rest was a harmless-looking tool. It was quite worn and yet priced very high. “What is the name of this tool?” asked one of the customers, pointing to it. “That is discouragement,” Satan replied. “Why have you priced it so ...

512. Scandals Fly

Illustration

Michael P. Green

John Dryden, a seventeenth-century British dramatist and poet, commented on man’s propensity to gossip: There is a lust in man no charm can tame, Of loudly publishing his neighbor’s shame. Hence, on eagles’ wings immortal scandals fly, While virtuous actions are but born and die.

Lust is the craving for salt of a man who is dying of thirst.

Frederick Buechner

514. The Mighty Have Fallen

Illustration

Michael P. Green

... the tree is large, you will get the impression that everything above is coming to earth. The great mass starts slowly to topple, crackling and exploding even louder at the base, until it comes sprawling down with a fearful momentum. The mighty can fall. The deadly saw of appetite or lust or passion steadily cut away the supports underneath until, what once was great, comes crashing down to earth.

515. The Trial Before Felix

Acts 24:1-27

Understanding Series

David J. Williams

... of v. 10 some corroboration of this?). At all events, he was procurator of Judea from A.D. 52 to about 58 (see disc. on v. 27 and notes). Like his brother, he had been a slave, and with reference to this Tacitus remarked that “with savagery and lust he exercised the power of a king with the disposition of a slave” (History 5.9). The picture drawn by Tacitus of Felix’s public and private life is not a pretty one. Trading on the influence of his infamous brother, he indulged in every license and excess ...

516. Living as Children of Light

Ephesians 4:17--5:21

Understanding Series

Arthur G. Patzia

... all sensitivity); and vice, (sensuality or “licentiousness,” RSV), is another way of describing all sorts of sexual license and perversion (aselgeia, “licentiousness,” “debauchery,” “indecent conduct”). And this indecent conduct was practiced with a continual lust for more (“without restraint,” GNB). Pleonexia describes greedy individuals continually seeking to gratify their desires. In this context, the author’s thought is that the pagan way of life is characterized by an increasing ...

517. Paul’s Longing to See the Thessalonians

1 Thessalonians 2:17--3:5

Understanding Series

David J. Williams

... so as we recognize that the comparative in the NT had practically replaced the superlative, “most abundantly.” And then, as if that were not enough, he adds, “with great desire” (en pollē epithymia). Epithymia speaks of passion, often in the sense of lust, but here of their passionate longing for their friends. 2:18 We wanted to come to you, Paul explains. The conjunction for (dioti) links this verse to the last and explains their longing. He especially wanted to come again and again (this phrase ...

518. Living to Please God

1 Thessalonians 4:1-12

Understanding Series

David J. Williams

... be honorable (timē) in the sense of honoring God (cf. 1 Cor. 6:20), in contrast with the sexual excesses of others which involve the “dishonoring (atimazō) of their bodies with one another” (Rom. 1:24). So he adds, not in passionate lust like the heathen. Pathos generally has a neutral sense, “experience,” “emotion,” but in the NT it consistently carries the bad sense of “passion,” not a violent emotion as we think of passion but rather as an over-mastering emotion. “It denotes the ...

519. A Workman Approved by God

2 Timothy 2:14-26

Understanding Series

Gordon D. Fee

... surprising in the context. Why here is Timothy told to flee the evil desires of youth? The answer lies basically in the meaning of the word evil desires (epithymiai; cf. 1 Tim. 6:9; 2 Tim. 4:3) in these letters. Rather than “lusts,” it simply means desires, especially evil desires. Thus Paul is not so much speaking of sensual passions as he is those kinds of headstrong passions of youth, who sometimes love novelties, foolish discussions, and arguments that all too often lead to quarrels. Instead ...

520. Titus' Task on Crete

Titus 1:1-16

Understanding Series

Gordon D. Fee

... 282; Jos., Antiquities 17.327; Life 247. Cf. Acts 2:11; 1 Macc. 15:23. 1:11 The greed of the Cretans was an established reputation. For example, Polybius says: “So much in fact do sordid love of gain [same word as in Titus 1:7 and 11] and lust for wealth prevail among them, that the Cretans are the only people in the world in whose eyes no gain is disgraceful” (6.46, Loeb). But since this problem existed also in Ephesus, perhaps one should not make as much of its particularly Cretan character as some do ...

521. Trials and Temptations

James 1:1-18, James 1:19-27

Understanding Series

Peter H. Davids

... my mind, while my human nature serves the law of sin” (Rom. 7:14, 25). The desires of people are good by creation, for they lead them to enjoy creation, to eat, to procreate, and so on, but they have been corrupted so that they also lead them to lust, to steal, and to fornicate. The external situation could not affect people at all unless the internal voice of their own nature was saying, “Go ahead; you deserve it; it feels good.” 1:15 The desire of the person who gives in to the enticement is here ...

522. Taming the Tongue

James 3:1-12, James 3:13-18

Understanding Series

Peter H. Davids

... with words is that they do not stop there: They have serious effects. “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me” is profoundly false biblically. The flame of the tongue catches the passion: A temper rises, a lust is inflamed. Soon the words, whether an internal dialogue unheard outside or actual speech, burst forth into action. The emotions, the whole of the body, are uncontrollably involved. And where does this destructive fire originate? From hell itself! Here the prison of ...

523. The Day of the Lord

2 Peter 3:1-18

Understanding Series

Norman Hillyer

... the true Christian way of life. The same verb is used of the defection of Barnabas in Gal. 2:13. Error (planē): erroneous teaching or, more aggressively, a deliberate leading astray. Lawless (athesmos): one who breaks the law of nature and conscience in order to gratify lust. The term appears in the NT only here and in 2:7 (regarding the Sodomites). See Turner, pp. 254–55. Fall (ekpiptein): The verb is used of shipwreck in Acts 27:26, 29. Secure position (stērigmos): a rare word (only here in the NT ...

524. The Nations Judged

Joel 3:1-16

Understanding Series

Elizabeth Achtemeier

... (Cf. 1 Kgs. 8:31–32; Jer. 50:29; Obad. 15; Ezek. 35:11; Hab. 2:8; Matt. 18:23–35; Rev. 18:4–17). And this is exactly what we see in the world around us: Hatred brings hatred in return; war breeds vengeance; suffering causes lust for vengeance; oppression cries out for retaliation. And God displays a certain permissiveness in such a system: God lets it operate, as an instrument of divine judgment. That brings us to the second thing that may be said: As Paul has written, sometimes God simply gives us ...

525. The Lord's Plan

Micah 4:6-13

Understanding Series

Elizabeth Achtemeier

... in the terms of a woman stripped naked before her lovers or captors (see esp. Nah. 3:5, but also Isa. 47:3; Lam. 1:8; Ezek. 16:37; 23:29; cf. Hos. 2:3; Mic. 1:11; Rev. 3:18). If the daughter of Zion is abandoned to the lust and greed of the nations, her God will be no god. 4:12–13 There is, however, one king (4:4) and one Lord of all the earth (4:13), who rules over all peoples and finally determines their destiny. And that king and Lord has a plan, verse 12 ...

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