Sermon and Worship Resources

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Showing 801 to 825 of 4963 results

801. The Final Word

John 11:25-26; Ephesians 1:12, 18-19

Sermon

Scott Suskovic

... God would judge him on all the good that he did, because there wasn't much. On that day, there was only one voice to be heard. The voice that spoke at Jason's funeral was the same that spoke at Lazarus' funeral and the same that spoke through the hope found in Paul's words to the Ephesians. It will be the same voice, the only voice that needs to be heard at your funeral. The voice of forgiveness. The only voice that can raise the dead. The voice of Jesus. The family needed to hear forgiveness. All those ...

802. Restarting Joy - Rejoice

Isaiah 55:10-13

Sermon

Derl G. Keefer

... me laugh; they will see me cry, pick myself up, and go on. They will see all of those things in my life that exude love and power and hope, and that will draw them to God's word, and they will know that's how I got to where I am.[3] Do you know the joy of ... me laugh; they will see me cry, pick myself up, and go on. They will see all of those things in my life that exude love and power and hope, and that will draw them to God's word, and they will know that's how I got to where I am.[3] Do you know the joy of ...

803. Sold!

Jeremiah 32:1-3a, 6-15

Sermon

Chrysanne Timm

... I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope. Then when you call upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you. When you search for me, you will find me ... through it." In the midst of our grieving over any loss, small or large, God will minister to us, offering us consolation, filling us with hope, reminding us that ours is a God who conquers death and promises life. Some people I know have been encouraged by signs in nature — a ...

804. Making Something Out Of Nothing

Haggai 1:15b—2:9

Sermon

R. Kevin Mohr

... ravaged Jerusalem."[1] Seventy years earlier than Haggai's time, the Jewish people were surprised by the prophet Jeremiah's message that God would be with them even in exile. Then, in the midst of the depressing reality of their return to what they had hoped would be the dawning of a new golden age, they were reminded that God was still with them in the difficulties of the rebuilding phase. Significantly, they were reminded that God's presence with them was not dependent upon the grandeur of the temple ...

805. Extreme Love

1 Corinthians 13:1-13

Sermon

King Duncan

... the very people they despise? That could be true if love is more important than faith. You say, Pastor, you’ve gone too far. It’s not me it’s St. Paul. If you’re not convinced, look at how he ends the chapter, “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.” Love is more important than faith? How you live is at least as important as what you believe? It’s a good thing we’re saved by grace. Neither our faith nor our works alone would do the job. We are ...

806. Nicodemus: A Young Old Man

John 3:1-21

Sermon

David O. Bales

... be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above’ ” (vv. 5-6). Jesus paused. Such a direct and uncompromising challenge hit Nicodemus like a rock from a catapult. If forced to say so, he’d admit that his faith was crippled, his hope blunted, his love as empty as a pond in a drought. His spirit was numb, his mind paralyzed, and now this young Nazarene simply reached into Nicodemus’s life. More than merely pointing to the aching spot, Jesus laid his hand exactly on the raw and bleeding ...

807. A Global Celebration

John 20:1-9

Sermon

King Duncan

... responds to that light: “What a fool am I . . . to lie in a stinking dungeon when I may as well walk at liberty. I have a key in my bosom called Promise that will, I am persuaded, open any lock in Doubting Castle.” And so it did for Christian and Hopeful. That key is God’s promise that the demons of hell could never defeat them. You and I have that key is well. Why are we content to lie in a stinking dungeon when we can walk at liberty as children of the resurrection? (7) Death has been conquered. We ...

808. Running over the Cat

1 Thessalonians 4:13--5:11

Sermon

King Duncan

... s victory over sin and death. We grieve in the light of the empty tomb. Grief is a normal and healthy part of life. Since the mortality rate for human beings is still, I understand, 100%, all of us are going to grieve at some time in our lives, and, hopefully, all of us will one day be grieved by someone else. It would be sad, indeed, if no one should care about our passing. Author Edgar Jackson years ago wrote a best selling book on grief. Here is how he describes grief: “Grief is a young widow trying to ...

809. An Announcement in Song

Psalm 98:1-9

Sermon

King Duncan

... their songs shook the powers of their nation and changed the world. Prayer and song will batter down the walls to hell. Music can do things nothing else can. Indeed, music can change the world. More than anything else, music gives us hope. That’s why people will always sing. Music gives us hope. The motion picture The Bridge Over the River Kwai was selected as one of the 100 great films of the 20th century. It is the story of some British prisoners of war during World War II who were held by the Japanese ...

810. Michael Corleone and the Widow

Mark 12:38-44

Sermon

King Duncan

... in everything--all she had to live on.” In other words, she gave the church (or the temple) her last two cents. She gave everything she had. We say, “What wonderful faith in God”--and it was. But here is what both disturbs me and yet also gives me hope. What if she was one of the widows who had actually been victimized by an unethical temple official? Think about that for a moment. She may have been giving her last few cents while, at the same time, she may have had every right to be angry with the ...

811. When the Dragon Wins

Luke 21:5-38

Sermon

R. Robert Cueni

... 21. To paraphrase the idea: When the dragon triumphs and the reality of this world overwhelms you, remember every victory by the powers and principalities of this world are temporary. Ultimately, God is in charge of human history and not the dragons. There is reason to hope in the midst of otherwise hopeless situations. As Jesus puts it, when you are "hated by all because of my name… not a hair of your head will perish. By your endurance you will gain your souls" (vv. 17-19). On occasion, the dragon wins ...

812. Two Kinds of People

Jeremiah 17:5-10

Sermon

King Duncan

... forget not all his benefits . . .” (103:2). And as Jeremiah once put it, “Blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him” (17:7). We need to learn to trust God. And we need to see the possibilities God offers us. Isn’t that what hope is? To believe that--even in the desert--a stream of life-giving water still flows. We may not see it with our eyes. We might not feel it with our fingers. But God promised us that it does exist. Indeed, Christ told the woman at the well that he ...

813. Before the Sanhedrin

Acts 22:30--23:11

Understanding Series

David J. Williams

... dishonestly, as claiming to be what he no longer was, but as still one with the Pharisees with respect to the hope of the resurrection of the dead. He made practically the same assertion before Agrippa in 26:5 (cf. Phil. 3:5). 23:7–8 Paul may have ... acted from the best of motives. He may have genuinely hoped to point the Pharisees to a surer base for their own doctrine of resurrection by pointing them to Jesus. But one suspects that there ...

814. Body

2 Corinthians 5:1-10

Understanding Series

James M. Scott

... the tabernacle into the temple (cf. 1 Kgs. 8:4; 2 Chron. 5:5), where it remained (cf. 2 Chron. 29:5–7) until it was destroyed with the temple in 587 B.C. (cf. Ps. 74:7; Lam. 2:6–7). Perhaps our passage implies the apostle’s hope that the resurrected tabernacle of his body will be brought into the eternal heavenly temple built by God himself. 5:2 On clothed with our heavenly dwelling, cf., for example, 2 En. 22:7–10, where Enoch is transformed in the seventh heaven during a face-to-face encounter ...

815. Instructions to Timothy

1 Timothy 4:1-16

Understanding Series

Gordon D. Fee

... means “eternal life” (see 1:16), has already begun. The life of the future is therefore both a present reality and a hope of life to come. (See further the note on 4:1.) Paul’s argument has strayed a bit, but not without purpose. ... in true godliness and concludes by telling him why: The result is life, now and forever, not only for those of us who have put our hope in the living God, but for all those who will believe (cf. 1:16). The next paragraph (vv. 11–16) returns to Paul’s personal concern ...

816. The Coming of Zion's King

Zechariah 9:9-13

Understanding Series

Pamela J. Scalise

... 7, “my people will receive a double portion . . . they will inherit a double portion in their land.” God will restore (the hipʿil of shwb) twice as much to Zion. This context implies that her double portion will consist of people. Jews in Diaspora, the prisoners of hope, will return and fill the land. In this way God will reverse the double punishment for Israel’s sins (Jer. 16:18; Isa. 40:2; 51:19; cf. Job 42:10). 9:13 God promises to brandish a reunited Israel, Judah, and Ephraim, like a strung and ...

817. A Squirrel Crossing a Busy Street

Romans 5:1-5

Sermon

King Duncan

... times are not designed to destroy us but to make us stronger. Times of adversity also make us wiser. They help us take stock of our lives and make changes that can propel us forward. As St. Paul writes, “Suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.” Sherwood Wirt, in his book Jesus, Man of Joy has a very helpful section on the positive role that pain can play in our lives. He tells the story of a young boy growing up in a Christian home in Ohio. One day this boy leaves ...

818. Distress and Help

Isaiah 33:1-24

Understanding Series

John Goldingay

... of historical approach cannot lead to compelling conclusions. We have to study the chapter as it is, as an exposition of what hope means in the light of what has preceded, without knowing its date. 33:1 The “Oh” (NIV Woe to) addressed to a ... ; 23:1, 14). Potentially it applies to any attacking power. “Betraying” (see also 24:16) suggests a nation that fails to fulfill the hopes people have in it. Again, betrayal was a characteristic of many large and small nations that appear in this book and later in ...

819. Comfort for God's People

Isaiah 40:1-31

Understanding Series

John Goldingay

... means that the weary find new resources of energy and perseverance, because they know that they have a future. In this particular case, the grounds lie in God’s power as Creator. This fact about the past and the present gives grounds for hope in the future. Creator-power is thus applied to weariness. The Poet’s characteristic designation of the audience is the double expression Jacob . . . Israel (v. 27), and we will often use this designation. It may refer directly to the Judean deportee community in ...

820. Egypt

Ezekiel 29:1-21, Ezekiel 30:1-26, Ezekiel 31:1-18, Ezekiel 32:1-32

Understanding Series

Steven Tuell

... fourth month of Zedekiah’s reign (2 Kgs. 25:2–4) and Jehoiachin’s exile. The date of the first oracle against Egypt, then, is almost a year to the day after the beginning of the siege and just six months before the fall of Jerusalem, when hopes for deliverance by Egypt had already been dashed. After the date and the divine word formula (v. 1), the Lord addresses the prophet as Son of man and commands him to “set your face against Pharaoh king of Egypt and prophesy against him and against all Egypt ...

821. The Risen Jesus Revealed

Luke 24:13-35

Teach the Text

R.T. France

... and fills the deep cavity you did not know was there. . . . Our hearts burn when the words of Scripture meet the horizon of our needs; that is, when the Word comes so close it shouts our name. It confronts our despair, shapes our future, and offers us Easter hope.1 We, like the two on the Emmaus road, need Christ to remind us of his power in our generation. Theology: The Challenge of Jesus, by N. T. Wright. New Testament scholar N. T. Wright re-creates the Emmaus Road scene for the post-modern reader in a ...

822. Paul, Phoebe, Patronage, and Spain

Romans 16:1-27

Teach the Text

C. Marvin Pate

... sense the end-time conversion of the Gentiles. These are the Abrahamic covenant (Gen. 12:1–3) and the prophets’ predictions of the nations streaming into Jerusalem to worship God (e.g., Isa. 45:15; 60:15–17; Mic. 4:13). Paul began Romans with exactly that hope (1:5–7). This is the added detail to the kērygma that Paul contributes to the gospel of Jesus Christ. With this, Paul has come full circle in his letter to the Romans. He is the apostle of grace whose eschatological mission was to win the ...

823. Resurrection and Christian Living

1 Corinthians 15:12-34

Teach the Text

Preben Vang

... foolishness of rejecting resurrection. What would be the sense of exposing oneself to danger and risk of death if there were no hope beyond death? To make sure the Corinthians are aware that Paul has done just that, he mentions his brush with death in Ephesus ... (cf. Rev. 21:3–4). 4. Paul’s focus on resurrection—in contrast to the teaching on the survival of the soul—gives new hope to the sick, the dying, and the mourning. Since death does not mean the end of the body, life’s temporal end no longer ...

824. Job’s Reply to Eliphaz

Job 6:1–7:21

Teach the Text

Daniel J. Estes

... . 10:19; 17:27). Job, however, refuses to be muzzled, as the mythological Yamm and Tannin were (corresponding to the “sea” and the “monster of the deep,” respectively; 7:12). 7:14 even then you frighten me with dreams. As in verse 4, Job hopes that sleep will bring relief from his painful adversity, but it does not. When he is tossing and turning until dawn, he is also frightened by nightmares and visions. In ancient thought, nightmares were often regarded as the work of demons or divine agents,1 ...

825. Zophar Rejects Job’s Complaints

Job 11:1-20

Teach the Text

Daniel J. Estes

... sees this as a clear-cut case. However, he misses the special circumstances of Job’s situation, so his counsel to repent is both off the mark and painful to the friend whom he has set out to help. Zophar is accurate in his contrast between the hope of the righteous and the hopelessness of the wicked. Throughout the Bible the two ways that lead to life and death are often set before humans, who are challenged to choose life. Zophar’s logic, however, has blinded him to the fact that Job has chosen the ...

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