Sermon and Worship Resources

Showing 751 to 775 of 1285 results

1 Timothy 6:6-10

Sermon

James Merritt

... has over $35,000 in consumer debt. The average amount of credit card debt in households with more than one card is now more than $8,000 according to CardWeb.com. About 43% of American families spend more than they earn each year. Personal bankruptcies have doubled in the last 10 years. Many people have more month than they do money. They have more bills to pay than bills to pay them. This problem prevents more extreme home makeovers than almost any other problem you could imagine. Gallup reports that 64% of ...

752. The Big Picture

Romans 11:36, Ephesians 1:5, Colossians 3:18-21

Sermon

James Merritt

... of having one have been dashed and disappointed as we have seen a shocking breakdown of the family itself. To be honest a lot of the research and statistical data looks pretty grim. Since 1960 the divorce rate in our country has doubled. Single parent households have tripled. Couples living out of wedlock have quadrupled and couples living out of wedlock are now in the majority. Domestic violence has quadrupled. We have the highest teenage pregnancy rate of any developed nation in the world. Some ...

753. We Are At War

Ephesians 6:10-20

Sermon

James Merritt

... E. Lee, Robert E. Lee. He'll do this, he'll do that, he'll do the other." Ulysses S. Grant heard all he wanted to hear and finally said to them, "I am tired of hearing about Robert E. Lee. You would think he was going to do a double somersault and land in our rear. I want you to quit thinking about what he is going to do to you, and I want you to start thinking about what you're going to do to him." We're in a war. We've got to get ready to rumble ...

754. Honor Graduate

Exodus 20:12

Sermon

James Merritt

... love God and love your neighbor. The second six commandments is summarized in the second commandment of loving our neighbor, and so we find that loving our neighbor really begins at home. It is the first lesson in the university of life. It is a double-edged commandment, because it is not only to the children; it is also to the parents. It basically tells us two things: I. Parents Must Teach Children Why They Should Honor Their Parents Parents, listen carefully to the next statement. Your children will not ...

755. One Year to Live

Jeremiah 28:10-17

Sermon

James Merritt

... there is a young man, whose real name I will not give you, but we will just call him, "Johnny." Johnny is not very handsome; in fact he is not handsome at all. He is not very intelligent. He makes very little money. He lives in a double-wide trailer on a small piece of land out in the middle of nowhere. Every Saturday, Johnny goes to a detention center for young teenage boys, who have committed horrible crimes, but are too young to go to prison - young men who have murdered, raped, and robbed. Johnny ...

756. God Where Are You? - The Problem of Evil

Genesis 3:1-6, Judges 6:13

Sermon

James Merritt

... off the healthful skin, sliced the starchy center into chips and deep fried them and Man gained still more pounds. God then gave lean beef, so that Man might consume few calories and still satisfy his appetite and Satan created McDonalds and its 99¢ double cheese-burger. Satan then said, "You want fries with that?" Man replied, "Yes and super-size them!" Satan said, "It is good." Man went into cardiac arrest. God sighed and created quadruple by-pass surgery and Satan created HMOs. Funny? Yes, but it makes ...

757. Hark! The Herald Angels Sing

Luke 2:8-12

Sermon

James Merritt

... Center they were, "Very happy". A little over four decades later, with triple the affluence we had then, only 31% said the same thing. In fact, when you look at the soaring rates of depression, the quintupling of the violent crime rates since 1960, the doubling of the divorce rate and the tripling of teenage suicides, we are richer and yet unhappier. It reminds me of a prisoner who was standing before a judge and the judge said, "I noticed that in addition to stealing money, you also took rings, watches ...

758. When I Am Tempted

Matthew 4:1-11

Sermon

James Merritt

... devil takes Jesus to the highest point in the city, to the southeast corner of the temple, overlooking the KidronValley. It was the part of the roof known as the royal portico and beneath it was a 450 foot drop. Satan says to Jesus, "Why don't you do a double back flip and a swan drive down below, because after all you know you are the Son of God and you know God will protect you and you know God will not let anything happen to you. There are a lot of people who will be watching you and if ...

759. The Weakest Link

Luke 18:9-14

Sermon

James Merritt

... as "good" as he was, he was not good enough. We are told that he tithed everything that he possessed. Now the Old Testament only required that you tithe your income, but this man tithed everything that he earned and everything that he bought. In other words, he was a double tither. We are told that he fasted twice a week. Now a Jew was only required to fast once a year on the day of atonement so this man fasted 103 times a year more than he was required. He was super religious. But what's wrong with this ...

760. Life on the Rock

Matthew 7:24-29

Sermon

James Merritt

... a par 4. To put this in perspective, I can shoot a 6 on a par 4. As a matter of fact, I do it all the time. All this man needed to win the Calret Jug, the British Open trophy, was to shoot what we call in golf, a double bogey. Now the hole was not easy; it was bisected three times by what the Scottish call a "Wee Burn" which is a Marshy Creek. So all he had to do was hit three short shots, putt three times, take his six, win the hole, smile for the cameras, collect ...

761. Houston We Have a Problem

Nehemiah 1:1-11

Sermon

James Merritt

... do with it. I've never even seen Jerusalem. I don't even know those people." I heard about two old ladies who had never flown in an airplane before and they were afraid of jet planes, but they agreed finally to fly in a prop plane. It was a double engine plane with about thirty passengers. They took off and not long into the flight they heard a noise and one of the ladies looked out the window of the other side of the plane and saw that the right engine had stopped. Her friend looked at her and said ...

762. One Step at a Time

Nehemiah 2:1-10

Sermon

James Merritt

... instant coffee to instant mashed potatoes. Life travels at warp speed and it is getting faster by the day. Just this past week, there was this headline on CBC News: , "Physicists smash internet speed record." The column read, "Researchers have more than doubled the world speed record for internet data transfer. Scientists at the CERN Particle Physics Laboratory in Switzerland sent the equivalent of a full length DVD movie over the internet in about seven seconds."[1] Modern day life has one speed—FAST ...

763. Bethlehem: Where Extremes Meet

Luke 2:1-14 (15-20)

Sermon

Gary L. Carver

... of Christmas, and that is the response that followed the event. Phillips Brooks describes it beautifully in the words of his famous Christmas carol, "O Little Town Of Bethlehem." "The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight." This is a kind of double reaction that occurred centuries ago to the coming of God in Christ. There was delirious joy both in heaven among the angels and on earth among the simple folk, like the shepherds in the field and old Anna and Simeon in the temple. One of the ...

764. The Extravagance of Love

Luke 7:36-8:3

Sermon

David R. Cartwright

... , and I were trying to figure out just how much it was going to cost to live for almost three months in Cambridge. Even with the generous grant, things are expensive there. Added to that is the high exchange rate. At the time the U.K. exchange rate was about double that of the U.S. As we did our planning, it looked like we had enough money for everything we wanted to do except for a digital, single lens reflex camera that I had my heart set on. I resigned myself to using my old camera, which was certainly ...

765. Faithquakes

Luke 17:5-10

Sermon

Ron Lavin

... tell you, seventy-seven times.' " Peter thought he was being generous. The rabbis of his time taught that under certain conditions of repentance you might forgive a person as many as three times. Peter thought he'd be commended for more than doubling that amount. He was all shook up when Jesus told him, "Not seven times, but seventy-seven times." Other translations say, "Not seven, but seventy times seven." Whatever the numbers, Peter must have felt that he was experiencing something like an earthquake when ...

766. Repairing Our Lives

1 Corinthians 15:19-26

Sermon

Richard Gribble

... of reconciliation, repair, and hope while the community was in exile: "Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem and cry to her that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid, that she has received from the Lord's hand double for her sins" (Isaiah 40:1-2). After the community's return to Jerusalem the prophet continued to proclaim God's call for a new day, a fresh start. For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth; the former things shall not be remembered ...

767. Whose Inheritance Is It?

Ephesians 1:11-23

Sermon

Donna Schaper

... grows humanity. We are best served by using our knees when it comes to our inheritance. Like Cole Porter's famous dictum that every one of his songs should have a "lemon line," so that the other lines look better, saints are advised to double their portions of humility. Catholics whose priests have "gone bad" can take heart: the sacraments withstand the sinner. Protestants whose preachers are boring can take heart: The Word of God survives most clergy. Saints are often confused with clergy, and this is a ...

768. When Christ Is King

Colossians 1:11-20

Sermon

Donna Schaper

... life. Living by Christ means mobilizing mercy. We become merciful toward our own stupidity. We experience grace. We become merciful toward those who rob us, like the Good Samaritan did. We mobilize mercy by giving more than we have — and we find that what returns is double the payment. Over and over we hear people say, when we thank them for extraordinary acts, "I received so much more than I gave." Christ showed us the way to multiply by subtraction: We follow that lead. I often think of life as one long ...

769. Strange Arithmetic

Mark 10:7

Illustration

Donald B. Strobe

... that it reduces your individuality. Too often one party or the other seems to be saying: "Alright - we two shall become one...and I AM the one!" Obviously, such a marriage is headed for trouble. Ideally, when "two become one" it means that each one is doubled, but not duplicated. You still retain your individual identity, but you add to yourself the identity of the other, and the whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts. "For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his ...

770. Two Schools of Thought on Divorce

Matt 5:31-32; Mark 10:1-12

Illustration

Mickey Anders

... a whim, but a woman could not divorce a man for any cause. The Old Testament contains a highly patriarchal position that viewed a woman's sexual immorality more as property damage against her husband (or her father) rather than as a moral issue. A double standard shines throughout the Old Testament, where it was not uncommon for the male rulers to have many wives and hundreds of concubines. If you look carefully at the question of the Pharisees, you will find no concern whatsoever about a woman's rights in ...

771. The Boy Grows Up

1 Samuel 2:18-20, 26

Sermon

Mary S. Lautensleger

... received a call that Jason was being punished with five more volunteer hours. Reluctantly, they took him back as they were launching a community-wide recycling program. Jason was assigned to a sixteen-year-old "volunteer supervisor." They had to give the supervisor double credits for volunteer hours in order to get him to work with Jason. During those five hours, Jason learned how to explain recycling to residents and worked as a team member with the other kids. Much to everyone's surprise, Jason began to ...

772. The Possible Dream

Genesis 45:3-11, 15

Sermon

Mary S. Lautensleger

... his brothers. His men load the brothers up with grain and secretly replace their money inside the sacks. Joseph sends them back home to bring Benjamin to him, while keeping Brother Simeon as a security deposit. His brothers return, bringing Benjamin, gifts from Canaan, and double the money to finance their food. Joseph plans to share a meal with them at noon. He enters the dining hall, sees Benjamin, and hears that his dad is still alive. He runs into the next room again and cries a little, blows his nose ...

773. Just Stay in the Race

Mark 13:1-8

Illustration

King Duncan

... they began working on the movie Ben Hur, DeMille talked to Charlton Heston the star of the movie about the all-important chariot race at the end. He decided Heston should actually learn to drive the chariot himself, rather than just using a stunt double. Heston agreed to take chariot-driving lessons to make the movie as authentic as possible. Learning to drive a chariot with horses four abreast, however, was no small matter. After extensive work and days of practice, Heston returned to the movie set and ...

774. No Small Parts

Luke 2:1-7

Drama

Lois Anne DeLong

... ) He felt pretty bad about being Joseph again. Maybe he’s not coming.... Director: But we really need him as Joseph. He’s the only one in the group that can pull it off. Stage Manager: Should I check to see who else we have? (Joseph bursts through the double doors stage right. He’s carrying bits of his costume with him.) Joseph: (slightly out of breath) I’m sorry I’m late. I was working on my part. Mary (Third Child): But what did you have to work on? Joseph: Oh, there was a lot to figure out. I ...

775. “Unto Us A Child Is Born... Next, On Omar”

Luke 2:1-7

Drama

Lois Anne DeLong

... his weather forecasts. Wise Man 1: So, we’ve mapped out a different route and we’ll be going home another way. Wise Man 2: Speaking of which, we should be going. Wise Man 3: Yes, we have a long journey ahead ... and, besides, our camels are double-parked. Omar: Well, thank you for being on our show. Ladies and gentlemen, a big hand for the Wise Men. (Wise Men once again exit up the center aisle.) Omar: I don’t know. Shepherds seeing visions. Kings dreaming dreams. Either everyone has gone crazy, or ...

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