Sermon and Worship Resources

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Psalm 22:1-31, Isaiah 52:13--53:12, John 18:1-11, Hebrews 10:16-25

Bulletin Aid

Julia Ross Strope

... hours the sanctuary is open. These hours are for persons who wish to “feel” the pain of injustice, guilt, shame, and betrayal surrounding Jesus’ death. People enter space/sanctuary, dimly lighted, with instrumental music playing quietly, live or recorded — the classical passions, sections from Jesus Christ Superstar, jazz masses, Tavener’s Ikos, and the nineteenth-century cross hymns. The cross may be draped in black; a single red or white rose might be placed on the communion table along with the ...

877. All Is Different Now

Mark 9:38-50

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... only about praising the restorative, redemptive power of Christ. Discipleship is the carrying of the cross of Christ. But the cross is not a burden. The cross is a death. "When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die," wrote Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his classic The Cost of Discipleship. Come and die to self. Come and die to the world. Come and die, that we might Go and live. The emptying of self (kenosis) is for the filling of Christ (plerosis). Power struggles. Riots. Rebellion. Violence. “Us-vs.-Them ...

878. You Provoke Me...and That's Good

Hebrews 10:1-18

Sermon

King Duncan

... . Of course, Christ set the example of love and kindness for us. “We love because he first loved us,” says I John 4:19. Michael J. Gelb, in his book How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci notes that da Vinci’s “The Last Supper,” one of the classic masterpieces in the history of art, was done in a circular motif. Everything on the table is round, such as the bread and the plates. Also, the disciples are arranged in a half-circle on either side of Jesus. There is a distinct purpose behind da Vinci’s ...

879. Finding Redemption in the Midst of Judgment

Malachi 2:17--3:5

Sermon

Derl G. Keefer

... . The messenger comes from a heart of love. Love tempers judgment. The Old and New Testaments are filled with stories, illustrations, quotes, and messages of God’s eternal love. The one verse that clings to the mind and typifies the essence of redemption is the classic, John 3:16: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (NIV). The writer, John, goes further as he pens, “For God did not send his Son into ...

880. Teammates in Building The Kingdom

1 Corinthians 12:12-31a

Sermon

Richard Gribble

... , destruction, and death. These are only aliases. There real names are Studehler, Miller, Crowley, and Layden." Grantland Rice, a well-known sports columnist in the first half of the twentieth century, wrote those memorable words in October 1927 after attending a classic gridiron struggle between Army and Notre Dame, played at the Polo Grounds in New York. With these words a legend was started, for Notre Dame football, the team's immortal coach Knute Rockne and, that day especially, for the Four Horsemen ...

881. Formula for Eternal Life

1 Corinthians 15:35-38, 42-50

Sermon

Richard Gribble

... school. There is actually little that George does not do. He is the one who washes, irons, and mends the students' clothes, cleans the dormitory, fixes what is broken, does the grocery shopping, and takes care of the outside yard. In short, George is a servant in the classic sense of that word. He serves the students and often the faculty and staff of that school from morning until after 8 p.m. each day. He rides his bicycle to work over the dusty and narrow dirt road each day. He returns on the same road ...

882. Thicker Than Blood

Galatians 3:23-29

Sermon

April Yamasaki

In the classic movie, Mary Poppins, Julie Andrews plays a no-nonsense, yet delightful, nanny to two young children. As a nanny to a wealthy family, she is part teacher, part parent, and part disciplinarian. She gets the children up in the morning, puts them to bed at night, supervises their many adventures, ...

883. Rally or Rail?

John 18:28-40

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

“Who’s on first?” That was the opening line of a classic baseball sketch acted out in 1945 by the vaudeville comedy team of Abbott and Costello. [You can find it on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sShMA85pv8M ]. The big joke was that the ball players’ last name were “Who” (first base), “What” (second base), “I Don’t Know” (third ...

884. Trumpet Medley

Joel 2:1-2, 12-17

Sermon

David J. Kalas

... ringing" at all. My wife's cell phone, for instance, used to be set to meow like a cat when someone called it, which generated some memorable reactions in certain group settings when the phone rang. I have friends whose phones offer a brief excerpt of classical music. I've heard teenager's phones that are programmed to say something when someone's calling, like "Pick up the phone" or "It's for you." And we can even program specific ringtones for specific callers. Likewise, the alarms we set to awaken us in ...

885. A Missed Opportunity to Forgive

Luke 15:11-32

Illustration

Staff

... . Almost weekly she wrote them letters. Not once did they reply. After 10 years, she received a large box in the mail. Inside, Elizabeth found all of her letters; not one had been opened! Today those letters are among the most beautiful in classical English literature. Had her parents only read a few of them, their relationship with Elizabeth might have been restored. It is difficult to imagine how hard her fathers’ heart must have stayed to receive those letters and never even open a single one ...

886. Blessed Are Those Who Believe

John 20:19-31

Sermon

King Duncan

... Patricia de Jong’s sermon, “Blessings and Promises,” First Congregational Church of Berkley, 6/9/96. Cited by Agnes W. Norfleet, http://www.shandonpres.org/public/files/docs/Abraham_and_Sarah_1_of_4_1st_Fam_of_Faith_6-1-08.doc 5. Pope John Paul II, Sign of Contradiction (New York: The Seabury Press, 1979). 6. Warren W. Wiersbe, Classic Sermons on Suffering (Michigan: Kregel Publications, 1984).

887. Love to Life

Luke 13:10-17

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... in distress — fallen into a ditch is the biblical example, but extrapolations are many was to be rescued, taken care of, healed. It is these compassionate exceptions that Jesus declares to his piqued host. Jesus’ logic is an example of the classic Jewish “qal wehomer” (less to more) argument: if you would rescue an ox or donkey on the Sabbath “how much more” would you rescue “a daughter of Abraham.” Jesus’ argument is further strengthened because the plight of this “daughter” was not ...

888. Luke 13:10-17

Luke 13:10-17

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

889. Choosing

Joshua 24:1-27

Sermon

Argile Smith

... won’t allow us to come and see it any other way. God alone has been the source of your victory, and he alone needs to be the object of your devotion.” Having weighed the option, Joshua shows us next how to register our choice. With his classic statement, “Choose you this day,” he suggests the value of making our choice and registering it in the presence of others. With his declaration, “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord,” he gives us an example to follow when we think about how ...

890. Luke 16:1-13

Luke 16:1-15

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... of light” are to use “dishonest,” worldly wealth, to help bring in the kingdom — a kingdom that will ultimately reveal the worthlessness of all this age holds dear. Jesus turns any pedigree into a magnificent and manifest destiny. Finally, using a classic “qal wehomer” (“light to heavy”) argument Jesus concludes his parable by noting that “whoever is faithful in very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much.” Even though the ...

891. Be Patient

James 5:7-12

Sermon

King Duncan

... in. Difficulties in growing food forced the crew to open their reserve food supplies. Disagreements over the focus of the project caused the Biospherians to split into two separate groups which avoided each other, much like the tribes in William Golding’s classic novel Lord of the Flies.” (4) The project was abandoned. Biosphere 2 still lives on as a tourist attraction and as a research facility of the University of Arizona. It was not a failure scientifically. Much was learned from this experiment. But ...

892. Getting out of the Doldrums

Luke 6:17-26

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

The classic children’s book, The Phantom Tollbooth (1961), tells the story of a young boy named Milo. One dull, rainy afternoon Milo receives the anonymous gift of a cardboard fold-and-cut tollbooth. Bored Milo builds the tollbooth and “drives through” it with his toy car. Immediately Milo disappears from his ...

893. The Christian's Royal Jelly

1 Corinthians 1:1-9

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... of those who would receive that royal offering. Despite the fact that the Corinthian church was looking and acting like a spiritually sickly invalid, Paul knew that feeding them the good news of the gospel would empower and renew their faithfulness. In his classic “Meditations of the Heart,” African-American theologian and educator Howard Thurman (1899-1981) tells the story of a man who was walking along the sidewalk at the close of the day. Near the curb a group of birds was pecking away, trying to ...

894. The Lifesaver App

1 Corinthians 1:10-17

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... . In 2006 another snazzy word was reconfigured when “Twitter” was born. By 2012 there were over 34 million “tweets” sent per day. Technospeak is a language that continues to expand exponentially. We used to increase our vocabulary by reading “the classics.” Now we can only increase our new and necessary vocabulary for living in the twenty-first century by reading our “emails” “tweets,” and “blogs.” It seems we will all need to pass weekly vocab tests throughout our lives. Yet for ...

895. A Topsy-Turvy Gospel

1 Corinthians 1:18--2:5

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... where fairness is least, grandness and nobility can be greatest. That’s why we can enjoy every moment as a gift from God. That’s why you can trust God with your tomorrow. Thank God for this topsy-turvy gospel of ours. One of the great classics in the history of Christian literature is Augustine’s Confessions. Written in Latin in the late fourth century, St. Augustine expressed the essence of this topsy-turvy gospel in this way: In this world things come and go, so that the whole may be complete. ‘Do ...

896. One For All

Romans 5:12-21

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... others of upcoming speed traps. In a small, simple way, flashing his lights was Michael Eli’s own “one for all” action. He did not know anything about the person driving towards him towards a speed trap. But he offered a complete stranger, a classic “ship passing in the night,” a word of warning, a caution to “slow down,” a call to change behavior and take a safer, slower course. Who knows if the “heads up” to “slow down” Eli offered might have forestalled an accident or injury that ...

897. Jesus and the Man Born Blind

John 9:1-41

Sermon

James W. Moore

... We can’t have that! So, they come out with the fervor of Barney Fife to investigate. They interrogate the healed man’s parents… and scare them out of their wits… and then they interrogate the man who has been healed… and he gives them a classic and powerful response that has resounded across the centuries. He says: “This one thing I know. Once I was blind, but now I see.” You see, this man (like most people) is a Pragmatist. Look at what he is saying to their “hard-line” questioning! “I ...

898. Five Ways to be "Holy" During Holy Week

Matthew 21:1-11

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... by anonymous e-mails. “Flash mobs” stormed the Bastille. A “flash mob” broke the Hebrews out of Egypt. On the down side, Leni Riefenstahl, the cinematographer for the Nazis, successfully choreographed and filmed the “flash mob” recorded as the 1934 horror classic, “The Triumph of the Will” — the greatest propaganda film for the Nazi movement ever recorded, and maybe the greatest horror film of all time. It was a film about the rebirth of Germany that both inspired and destroyed an entire ...

899. A Global Celebration

John 20:1-9

Sermon

King Duncan

... John Bunyan understood that. Bunyan, a Baptist, was imprisoned in England in the 17th century. His crime was that he refused to sign a document affirming the Church of England’s statement of faith. While in prison, he wrote the classic allegory, “The Pilgrim’s Progress,” regarded by scholars as one of the most significant works of religious English literature. In one beautiful passage, Christian and his traveling companion Hopeful are awaiting certain death in Doubting Castle. Many people have been ...

900. Voice Recognition

John 20:19-23

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... like being on some kind of social media overload, with hundreds of negative twitter messages bombarding your brain whenever you try to take a chance, take a walk, take a deep breath and take a giant step forward. In the early Disney classic “Bambi,” Thumper the rabbit has a word for the “spring fever” he sees among the forest creatures. People are becoming “twitter-patted,” Thumper said. The creators of “Twitter” probably didn’t have that reference in their inbox. To be “twitter-patted ...

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