Sermon and Worship Resources

Showing 826 to 850 of 4999 results

John 4:43-54

Sermon

James Merritt

... druggist they don’t know, and go home and take it and expect to feel better the next morning. Now if you can have that kind of faith in a doctor and a druggist, how much more can you have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ! III. When Grace Summons, Just ... out of ten Americans have received Him as Lord and Savior.1 You see, in the Bible there are different levels of faith and different kinds of faith. In v.50 this man had a satisfied faith, but now he has a saving faith. At first he believed in the promise ...

827. Come One, Come All

Luke 5:27-32

Sermon

James Merritt

... a shaker. Not one of the twelve that He chose would have made anybody’s got to have list. So far just a bunch of poor fishermen. Of all the missing persons Jesus could invite you would have bet your house and everything you own there is one kind of missing person Jesus would have never invited – you would have put all your money on Levi. Levi was a tax collector. He worked for the Roman government. The Roman’s collected their taxes through a system known as “tax farming.” They had divided all of ...

828. For Those Who Are Auditing the Class

Matthew 16:21-28

Sermon

King Duncan

... someone has a painful case of arthritis and they say with a sigh: “It’s just my cross to bear.” Somebody’s favorite television program is canceled, “Well, I guess this is my cross to bear.” Now we can feel for a person with a lazy husband or any kind of painful disease or whose television show was canceled. But this is not what it means to take up your cross and follow Christ. Neither does it mean wearing a cross as a piece of jewelry. I don’t mean to be judgmental, but we see crosses hung on ...

829. Faith’s First Impressions

1 Thessalonians 1:1-10

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... century. The chance of a small group of Gentiles and a few Jews who professed faith in a Roman-executed convict making any kind of a local impact seemed absolutely nil. And yet. Paul’s first written messages to this small community in Thessalonica were about ... final months. An eight-year old who would have been put into foster care; a mother who would have been put into some kind of nursing home facility for her final months: instead of being apart, both were together, in a loving home, the final months of ...

830. Why Christmas Is So Dangerous

Luke 1:26-38

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... always hard on the heart. Opening yourself to love means opening yourself to heartbreak, as every parent here today can tell you. Pain, suffering, evil, and the inevitability of mortality, they all make “loving” an action of both hope and heartbreak. But Christmas brings another kind of danger to your heart. Christmas is dangerous to anyone who wants to keep a heart of stone. As the prophet Ezekiel said (36:26), “A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; I will remove from ...

831. Turn On the Light

John 8:12-30

Sermon

James Merritt

... and people who do not follow Christ. You are the light in that darkness. You are the Christ-follower in your office, an office full of those who don’t follow and don’t believe. You are to be the light in their darkness. There are two kinds of natural light that illuminate our world: sunlight and moonlight. The moon doesn’t generate any light. Apart from the sun, the moon is nothing more than a pitch-black rock full of holes and craters. When the moon gets properly positioned to the sun, that moon ...

832. Dealing with Cantankerous People

Ephesians 4:30-5:2

Sermon

King Duncan

... able to be of much help. Mr. Anderson was a successful businessman of impeccable character, says Zig, and he had such a huge positive impact on him that he named his first son after him. By “successful,” says Zig, he doesn’t just mean materially. He was the kind of man a young boy could model his life on. He goes on to say that Mr. Anderson and his meat?market manager, Mr. Walton Haining, were both godly men who showed him what it meant to be a person of character--to be honest and accountable and ...

833. The Challenge to Forgive

Luke 7:36--8:3

Sermon

Maurice A. Fetty

... some of these undesirable qualities, he reminds us of some of our Puritan ancestors who, in their moral and religious earnestness, were quick to sniff out sin in others, but who forgot that the greatest sin of all was lovelessness. Simon the Pharisee may have been a kind of collector of celebrities. It may be Jesus had earlier given a stunning sermon at the synagogue and that Simon wanted to catch this rising star or perhaps even trip him up as an imposter, so he invited Jesus to dinner. But he gave him no ...

834. Warning Against False Teachers of the Law

1 Timothy 1:1-11

Understanding Series

Gordon D. Fee

... Paul makes two elaborations: it is described as the glorious gospel of the blessed God, and it was entrusted to me. The gospel is first of all the glorious gospel of the blessed God (lit., “the gospel of the glory of the blessed God”). This kind of genitive (“of-phrase”) construction is particularly difficult to make sense of in English (and there are about fourteen possibilities for its meaning in Greek). Although the phrase “of the glory” is often used in a descriptive way in the NT (e.g., Eph ...

835. Titus' Task on Crete

Titus 1:1-16

Understanding Series

Gordon D. Fee

... of being wild and disobedient? Although this reflects 1 Timothy 3:4, it is said in a slightly different and more positive way. These represent two sides of the same coin. His children are themselves to be believers; that is, the potential elder is to be the kind of person whose children have followed him in adopting his faith. Or it could mean they are “faithfully” to reflect the behavior of “the faithful.” In either case, the flip side of the coin is that they are not to be open to the charge of ...

836. Trials and Temptations

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

Understanding Series

Peter H. Davids

... 2 Cor. 6:7; Eph. 1:18; Col. 1:5; 2 Tim. 2:15; 1 Pet. 1:25). God purposely sets his second creation, his re-creation, into motion by sending out the word of the gospel. The result of this act is also beneficent, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created. “We,” says James, “are like a harvest. We are the first ripe fruit of God’s new creation, promising the full harvest to come.” Like Paul, James believes God will redeem all of creation, not just humanity (Rom. 8:18–25). The present ...

837. Ruth Meets Boaz

Ruth 2:1-23

Understanding Series

Michael S. Moore

... ), the God who leads Israel safely through the sea (Exod. 14:29), the God who confounds the plans of Balak the Moabite (Num. 24:10). Boaz, however, wants to emphasize a side of Yahweh that even Naomi seems to have forgotten: that Yahweh is a God of kindness as well as judgment, a God of refuge as well as war. Insight #2: The Redeemer as Cultural Gyroscope The word translated “kinsman-redeemer” in 2:20 (NIV) is the participial form of the verb ga’al, some form of which is repeated no fewer than twenty ...

838. Habakkuk’s Second Complaint

Habakkuk 2:2-20, Habakkuk 1:12--2:1

Understanding Series

John Goldingay

... is making them a means of punishment or correction or chastisement in Judah; “punish” (yakakh in the hipʿil) refers to the kind of discipline that is designed to change someone’s pattern of behavior in a proper direction. When Isaiah 2:4 and 11 ... that there will be no action for a while. Yahweh does continue to imply that there will be action, but does not indicate what kind. So if verses 4–5 begin the revelation, it will be disappointing if that is all the revelation comprises. But, in fact, Yahweh ...

839. A Widow at the End of Her Rope

1 Kings 17:7-24

Sermon

King Duncan

... was brought back from the dead? And don’t you think her testimony carried more weight because of the kind of person she was? Everyone knew she had a good heart. Everyone knew she was a kind and loving person. Now she had met a God who had set her free from worshiping a lesser ... god. Do you understand that when we encounter people of other faiths, this is to be our task--we are to be so kind and loving to them, that they see who God really is--He’s like Jesus. And when they learn about Jesus, they are ...

840. Love One Another

1 John 3:11-24

Understanding Series

Thomas F. Johnson

... careful study of the context of each passage. Here the reference is clearly back to vv. 16–18, in which the author has argued that authentic love is sacrificial and practical, as seen in the life of Jesus and in the lives of those who claim to follow him. This kind of love is how we know that we belong to the truth. His contention all along has been that the false teachers do not love their brothers and sisters (2:9–11; 3:11–18). But, the fact that his own followers do show love should further set our ...

841. God’s Love and Ours

1 John 4:7-21, 1 John 5:1-12

Understanding Series

Thomas F. Johnson

... Elder and the false teachers who seceded is whether the human, “come in the flesh” (4:2; 2 John 7) Jesus is the same person as the divine Son of God. To confess that Jesus is the Son of God is to possess a faith that overcomes the world. This kind of faith clearly separates one from the heretical opposition which denies and rejects Jesus (2:22–23; 4:3; 2 John 7; cf. 3:1; 5:10). 5:6 Again, the Elder emphasizes the human name Jesus Christ. This is the one of whom he is writing, a specific, historical ...

842. The Beginning

Genesis 1:1-2:3

Understanding Series

John E. Hartley

... with fish and ordering birds to fly across the expanse of the sky. These new species were to produce offspring of their own kind. After seeing these new creatures, God saw that they were good. In place of the usual “it was so” comes a detailed ... , pinched off fourteen pieces of clay and molded them into seven pairs of humans. After ten months these humans came forth from some kind of a womb (unfortunately the text is broken at this place). The gods then imposed on the humans the toil formerly done by ...

843. God’s Judgment of Babylon Calls for Celebration

Revelation 19:1-10, Revelation 18:1-24

Teach the Text

J. Scott Duvall

... the two witnesses, now the heavens and God’s people (and her leaders: apostles and prophets) are commanded to “rejoice” over his judgment of Babylon (cf. 12:12; Jer. 51:48). They are not rejoicing at the suffering of the wicked or satisfying any kind of lust for revenge but celebrating God’s victory over evil and his faithfulness to his suffering people. Their faith wasn’t in vain. God is faithful. Evil will not win! They rejoice “because [NIV: “for”] God has judged the judgment of you from ...

844. Obedience Is Better Than Sacrifice

1 Samuel 15:1-35

Teach the Text

Robert B. Chisholm Jr.

... lets bygones be bygones, who winks at failures and pats us on the back to build our self-esteem. But according to Scripture, “God is love.” And love devoid of judgment is only watered-down kindness. The holy God is not “kind.” Love is something far more stern and splendid than mere kindness.4 Here McCullough quotes C. S. Lewis: Kindness . . . cares not whether its object becomes good or bad, provided only that it escapes suffering. . . . If God is Love, He is, by definition, something more than ...

845. The Power of Persistence

Luke 11:1-13, Luke 18:1-8

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... listeners would have enjoyed the humor of this story: Once upon a time a traveler arrived at his friend’s house at midnight. Perhaps he had been traveling by night to escape the hot sun of Palestine. Perhaps he had been delayed by business, by a mishap of some kind, or by a stop to help someone along the way. In any case, he was not expected, but he knew his friend would give him a place to sleep for the night. The friend, in the best traditions of Eastern hospitality, would not dream of sending a guest ...

846. Being Thankful for the Right Reasons

John 1:14, Colossians 1:11-20

Sermon

King Duncan

... love is this . . . Christ laid aside His crown for my soul for my soul . . . Christ laid aside His crown for my soul for my soul.” When Robert Louis Stevenson retired to the Samoan Islands for his health he became to the natives of that island a kind and generous friend. Stevenson was concerned that there was only a path leading from the harbor of his island over which his new friends must walk in order to bring provisions to the interior. With his own money and personal efforts, Stevenson had a good road ...

847. Rahab and the Spies

Joshua 2:1-24

One Volume

Gary M. Burge

... people’s refusal to submit. Having made her declaration, she then asks the spies to swear in the Lord’s name and provide a sure sign that they will show kindness (Hebrew hesed) to her and her family by sparing them from death, reminding them that she has first shown kindness to them on her own initiative. So the spies swear to show kindness and faithfulness to her when the Lord delivers the city to them, as long as she keeps quiet about their visit. Here some have questioned the propriety of the spies ...

848. A New Possibility

Matthew 4:12-23

Sermon

James L. Killen

... long and torturous history since Jesus came preaching. Many of us find ourselves involved in one more chapter of that history. We live in a world full of dishonesty, moral compromise, and political corruption. Many of us feel jaded and cynical. We find it hard to take hold of any kind of hope, much less hope for a world in which we will all love each other. We feel that we have to follow this world's ways if we hope to survive. Many of us suspect that if we really did try to live the life that Jesus taught ...

849. When All Is Said and Done

Acts 16:9-15

Sermon

Charley Reeb

... work on our marriage. But the truth is, “If you are not actively pursuing the person you want to be, then you are pursuing the person you don’t want to be.”[5] Not to decide is to decide! So are you ready to make a decision about the kind of life you want to live? Let me ask you some questions which may help: What do you enjoy doing more than anything in this world? What keeps you up at night (besides indigestion)? A conviction, a worthy wish, or driving dream? What is your greatest passion, and does ...

850. Elephants in the Room: Depression

Lamentations 3:17-26

Sermon

Charley Reeb

... him. You don’t have to suffer. God will provide a way out of the valley. I promise. The writer of Lamentations promises us as well. Take a look at how he ended his complaint and lament: Then I remember something that fills me with hope. The Lord’s kindness never fails! If he had not been merciful, we would have been destroyed. The Lord can always be trusted to show mercy each morning. Deep in my heart I say, “The Lord is all I need; I can depend on him!” (Lamentations 3:21-24) No matter where you ...

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