Sermon and Worship Resources

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Showing 901 to 925 of 2404 results

901. Resurrection: From Slave to Child

Galatians 3:26--4:7

Sermon

Leonard H. Budd

... Pettus Bridge choose to stay home that Sunday afternoon and read the newspaper. Today there are Christians in South Africa - white and black - who are reading their Bibles, and learning the resurrection message anew. Others in Central America are discovering in Christ power to achieve freedom from slavery that old ways have maintained. They are sons and daughters under God. And, of course, you walk a road, too. We all do in this life. It is a road that has been walked upon by others, tracing our human story ...

902. They Also Serve Who Wait

Luke 2:21-40

Sermon

Thomas Long

... to be over and the child to be born, for death. It is never easy to wait. It is hardest of all to wait for God. Not many can bear its harsh discipline. Not many can attain its delicate balance of action and hope. Not many can achieve its deep wisdom. Not many can endure its long and dark hours. Therefore, since the demands of waiting for God are so great, there is always the temptation to transform waiting for God into something else, something less. There are some who would change waiting for God into ...

903. A Tempting and Lonely Place

Mark 1:35-39

Sermon

Thomas Long

... , but the father was uncertain. What he mainly wanted was for Willimon to call his daughter and "talk some sense into her." Willimon called Anne and reminded her of the many hours she had already put into pharmaceutical training and of her many academic achievements, all of which she now seemed to be willing to throw away. "How in the world did you come to this decision?" Willimon asked. "Well," she said, "it was your sermon yesterday that started me thinking." She went on to describe her own experience ...

904. Living in the Future Present

Mark 9:2-13

Sermon

Thomas Long

Back to the Future is a highly imaginative motion picture which prospered at the box office several years ago. The film features a madcap scientist who perfects a machine capable of achieving the human dream of traveling through time. A teenaged boy uses the machine to journey to his hometown as it was in the 1950s, before the boy was born. What happens in the movie from that point on is, of course, ludicrously good fun. The boy meets his parents and ...

905. Blind Bartimaeus - Model For Healing

Mark 10:46-52

Sermon

James W. Robinson

... - he made the dean’s list several times, and graduated in the upper fifth of the class who earned Bachelor of Science degrees in the School of Business and Public Administration. Determination powered him to his goal. Nothing worthwhile can be achieved without determination. No malignancy can be removed without determination, for the sufferer must first resolve to see the surgeon. No neurosis can be treated without determination, for the victim must first resolve to consult a therapist. No river can be ...

906. Inevitabilities and the Last Days

Mark 13:1-31

Sermon

James W. Robinson

... are seen to be eternal. But two atomic bombs have reminded us that entire hometowns can be blown away in seconds, and a whole nation devastated in minutes. The iron hand of corporations and conglomerates dictates that upward mobility be achieved through horizontal mobility. The farm that has been in the family for generations is snatched away overnight, due to the vagaries of the marketplace and shifts in government policy. Sprawling residential and commercial developments swallow the wild and wooded scenes ...

907. What Do We Do Now That We’re Happy?

Isaiah 62:1-12

Sermon

Thomas D. Peterson

... look as if he really felt I was great when he handed me the award. And, so it goes, with suspicion corrupting our big event almost from the beginning. I talk often with a minister who has worked against great odds to reach a level of achievement. To the eyes of his peers he has done this. He serves two churches. In the larger one he is generously loved and complimented. The community and his denomination hold him to be effective in personal and group relationships. In his outlying appointment, a small group ...

908. The Remnant Year

Jeremiah 30:1--31:40

Sermon

Thomas D. Peterson

... Jesus’ ministry has the same quality of careful economic use of those he loves. Consider: he took the blind and gave them sight; he claimed the lame for walking; and the women in travail he brought to joyous delivery. This is the most remarkable achievement of the Christian world picture: that it could take slaves, cripples, inbeciles, the simple and the mighty, and make them all secure heroes, simply by taking a step back from the world into another dimension of things, the dimension called heaven. Or we ...

909. Who Knows?

Jonah 3:1-10

Sermon

Thomas D. Peterson

... and send them in a different direction, to their deaths. Who could know? Each of us is a mixture of daydreams and grand plans. Oh, what we will do and will not do - we think we have it all plotted out. What a marvel we will be after we achieve this or obtain that. There’s time enough and to spare, so we lay waste this opportunity and that, never dreaming that other forces are exerting themselves on us. How different the real drama of life works itself out. We wake up some year to find ourselves in an ...

910. Advent 3

Isaiah 61:1-11, John 1:1-18, John 1:19-28, 1 Thessalonians 5:12-28

Bulletin Aid

Paul A. Laughlin

... , and the healing, the liberation, the comfort, the joy and the justice that it will bring. We also confess that we have failed miserably, as individuals and as a church, to live our lives with those gifts as criteria of success or goals to be achieved. Forgive us, we pray, and help us to realize in our small ways what you have promised to bring to reality on a universal scale, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen Second Lesson: 1 Thessalonians 5:16-24 Theme: Productive waiting Exegetical Note This series ...

911. Christmas 1

Isaiah 9:1-7, Titus 2:1-15, Luke 2:1-7, Luke 2:8-20

Bulletin Aid

Paul A. Laughlin

... for power and prestige, privilege and possessions, we forget how explicitly you directed your joyous message to the humble, the simple, the despised, the oppressed. Forgive us for making your Gospel a status symbol, an instrument of self-service, a tool for achievement and acquisitiveness, a message for the respectable. Humble us with the reminder of the lowliness of Jesus’ birth, the low estate of the shepherds, and the sobering words of the Master that his good news was for the poor and oppressed. In ...

912. Proper 16

2 Samuel 23:1-7, Ephesians 5:22-33, John 6:25-59, John 6:60-71

Bulletin Aid

Paul A. Laughlin

... or destroyed by people. People: HUMAN RELATIONS ARE FRAGILE, AND MARRIAGE PARTICULARLY SO. Leader: But Christian marriage has an added dimension: for in Christ husbands and wives are to be submissive to one another in love. People: MAY GOD HELP US TO ACHIEVE SUCH MUTUALITY, AND TO BUILD STRONG AND HAPPY HOUSEHOLDS AS A RESULT. Collect God of love, who have given us scriptural guidelines for loving human relationships, set before us your ideals for Christian marriage; that we may see in the mutual love ...

913. Proper 20

Job 26:1--31:40, James 3:13-18, Mark 9:14-32, Mark 9:33-37

Bulletin Aid

Paul A. Laughlin

... and status to be flaunted, as a way of gaining respectability and reward in the eyes of others. Forgive us, we pray. Impress upon us that being Christians is above all to be beneath all, as children to you and servants to humanity. In the name of the Christ, who achieved greatness in humility, we pray. Amen

914. "The Sawdust and the Circus"

Numbers 27:12-23

Sermon

... others this love that has filled us and changed our being. Jesus, you see, came to the world to bring life, and to reconcile men to God. The reason the world seems only illusion to many of us is that just when we think we’ve achieved something - worldy success, promotion, security - it tends to be as empty as the stomach after cotton candy has been eaten. The things the world calls security are only illusion because at the heart of things we are all insecure because of our guilt - that feeling that ...

915. Facing the Glory Road

Matthew 20:17-19

Sermon

Louis H. Valbracht

... years, that will be a pity, but I dare not do less than work for it as long as I live." Some such determination must be ours, if we are to walk the road to glory. Boulder Dam is a notable engineering feat, but like all worth-while achievements, it cost sacrifice. Eighty-nine men lost their lives building it. They at least knew that they died for something that would be accomplished. God grant that over the sacrifices that this world crisis costs, we can put an inscription like that which is over Boulder Dam ...

916. THE MARRIAGE GAP

Genesis 2:4-25

Sermon

William McKee Aber

... ; the SOMETHING BLUE worn by the bride was based on the colors some Jews wore on their garments to signify purity and loyalty; the RICE thrown at the bridal pair came originally from the custom of offering food to the spirits to appease evil and achieve fertility; the SHOES tied on the car of the honeymooners once represented a transfer of property; the CLASPING OF HANDS was the symbol of community, and has parallels in the laying on of hands for ordination. But for all of those confusing elements, the ...

917. Who Needs a Shepherd These Days?

John 10:1-21

Sermon

Charles L. Koester

... brainpower, compassion, and technology, any problem could be solved anywhere. Mr. Kennedy challenged science to go to the moon. The seemingly impossible target was hit within a decade. Everybody made money in the stock market. Great times. Good goals were achieved including far-reaching Civil Rights legislation later passed under Lyndon Johnson’s administration, along with the promise of our times to be "The Great Society." Those were the days. An age when the brilliant minds of our nation were stretching ...

918. COMMAND TO SHARE

Luke 3:1-20

Sermon

Ewart E. Turner

... drive the long distances to meetings without receiving mileage. They bring sack lunches. In one year the giving to the United Methodist Committee on Relief has increased by 224%, from $1,418,302 to $4,602,656. Nearly every denomination has similar achievements. You cannot help but believe In the miraculous working of the Holy Spirit when the rise and expansion of the organization "Bread for the World" is considered. Immediately after the war the Evangelical Church in Germany, though its churches and cities ...

919. What's Mine Is Yours

Luke 12:13-21

Sermon

Ewart E. Turner

... the beginning of creation. It is called the Kingdom of God. It is gradually being inaugurated as men come to understand it and give themselves to it in love and obedience." With these words as a lead, Godson began to explain one of God’s agencies for achieving this - the movement among men called CROP. "CROP is only one of many agencies which the Sons of God have founded to train the Lord’s poor to help themselves to produce life-sustaining food, and in the meantime, to give them emergency food to keep ...

920. Toward Health With Confidence

Sermon

Leonard H. Budd

... as a reign of righteousness - where everyone counted. Ninety-nine sheep were not enough. It was the lost one that held importance, too. The kingdom was important. It was like a pearl of great price - for which a merchant is willing to sell everything in order to achieve the greater investment. And he said, "Blessed are the poor, for they shall inherit this kingdom." I had not seen my mother all that morning. She was up and out of the house before I awakened. My intent on Jesus’ words had led me into the ...

921. Clean Light

1 Corinthians 6:12-20

Sermon

William F. Dunkle

... untouched by modern education. There is no end to the ways we have tried to be and stay righteous in food or drink, in dress and appearance, in fads and fashions, taboos and fetishes. Whether we cover our heads or shave our hair, none of us ever achieves the complete subjugation of our flesh. Is this because most of us still fall into the heresy of Gnosticism? Are we afraid to be physical? Do we still hope for salvation by denying our bodies? Do we think flesh is less than spiritual because it is mortal ...

922. Extended Light

1 Corinthians 7:29-31

Sermon

William F. Dunkle

... anyway he pleased, privately or publicly. Who would care? But that age is gone. That time is passing away. All the forms of that world are changed - or at least certainly are changing. Almost all cultures now value children. Women everywhere are achieving increasingly liberated status. Jesus came. That changed everything! Or remember the Roman soldier who commanded the detail ordered to crucify Jesus. He was a professional military man. In Caesar’s legions he had served in campaigns all over the world and ...

923. Unwavering Light

1 Corinthians 7:1-40

Sermon

William F. Dunkle

... . Christ calls for the total commitment in his followers that he demonstrated in his own life. A real artist does not ask himself how little of his life and talent he must give. When somebody asked Tintoretto what he mixed with his paints to achieve the special red color so characteristic of his paintings, he said, "Blood!" Even so the Christian life demands our all. Accordingly, Saint Paul makes no attempt to deny or decry the validity of marriage for his Corinthian Christians. He only warns that nothing ...

924. Commanded By Example

John 13:31-38

Sermon

O. Garfield Beckstrand, II

... long as the two are together, they share the same characteristics. In the presence of Christ we feel his love and take on his likeness. We have a new quality of love which would be impossible without him. By no supreme effort of our willpower can we achieve this love which is the distinctive mark of Christian discipleship. Yet if we live close to Christ we receive from him the inspiration and the power which lift us from that discouraging cry, "I ought and I must, but I can’t," to his glorious word, "In ...

925. In All Things Be Thankful

Ephesians 4:17--5:21

Sermon

Brett Blair

... that you grant me one thing more, a grateful heart.” We must learn to become thankful so that we do not become discouraged. III We must learn to become thankful or we shall surly grow arrogant and self-satisfied. Mankind is certain that whatever he has achieved is of his own doing. But the truth teaches us that none are independent. When we give thanks, we reach beyond ourselves. I was always taken with the scene in the Jimmy Stewart movie “Shenandoah.” The time frame is the Civil War and Stewart is ...

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