Sermon and Worship Resources

Showing 901 to 925 of 4999 results

John 1:1-18

Sermon

King Duncan

... plans are for you. God has a plan for you, a plan to adopt you into His family and have a loving relationship with you. This is the Good News. The eternal Creator God wants a relationship with you. God loves you that much. And God has gifts of loving-kindness and mercy and truth for all those who believe in and receive Jesus as their Lord and Savior. Can you hear me now? God sent you a message. I hope you’ve received it. But the real test of effective communication is whether you act on it. Now that you ...

902. The Catch

Mark 1:14-20

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... .When Jesus teaches his disciples how to “fish for people,” he is teaching them the art of the catch, the art of discernment, and the art of healing broken people. The Kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and gathered fish of every kind. When it was full, they drew it ashore and sat down and sorted the good into containers but threw away the bad. So, it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous. (Matt. 13:47-49) Interestingly ...

903. Jesus' Temptation

Luke 4:1-13

Sermon

Will Willimon

... it before. Temptation is a function of hunger. Is God for us or not? they asked Moses. Let's have bread as proof that God is our kind of God, i.e., a God who responds to our hungry need. What good is religion or praying, or your getting out of bed and being ... of God, save yourself." This time he didn't curse them or quote scripture, he just hung there. Sometimes, when we ask him to be our kind of God rather than the God he is, he doesn't curse us. Sometimes, in love he is silent. It's hard to hear our Lord ...

904. Metaphors Be with You

John 6:35, 41-51

Sermon

Dean Feldmeyer

... detail he could pull from them. We went to a tractor pull and he spent most of the time lecturing me on the different kinds of tractors and their engines and what had been done to them to give them more power. His wife said that he loved to ... Jesus answers that believing in him, the one who is sent by God, is God’s will. They respond that they need a sign of some kind to know he’s authentic. After all, Moses gave the people manna (bread) to eat and they followed him. What can you give us? they ask ...

905. Fathers Need A Giant Sized Faith

1 Samuel 17:1, 4-11, 19-23, 32-49

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... little guy does win. And, I guess it just goes to show that with God on your side, you'll always get a head. Sorry, I couldn't help myself. I think the story does teach us a some very valuable lessons about faith and life and even about the kind of stuff it takes to be good Fathers. So let's look at three qualities which David had which Fathers need today. I. POSITIVE ATTITUDE: First of all, David had a positive attitude. What do I mean by that? Well, Everybody else looked at Goliath and thought he was too ...

906. Sustaining Faith

Mark 12:38-44

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... would come up again, as Jesus overthrows money changing tables in the Temple courtyard. But in a way, this passage today is even stronger, because it is all too easy for any of us at any time to cloak our own agendas as gestures of faith. This is the worse kind of sin, using faith itself as a motive for human goals and greed. Part of what makes it so hard to understand sometimes what Jesus is saying and doing is because we have a desire to read what we want to hear. And it’s easy to “misread” when we ...

907. When What You Signed Up For...

Acts 16:9-15

Sermon

King Duncan

... recalls how unsure and unprepared he felt in his early years at that church. He says, “In the beginning, there were so many times I wanted to quit. I would pray, ‘Lord, you’ve made a mistake.’” But he stayed where God had led him and waited for some kind of answer. And one day that answer walked through his office door. His name was Ike, and he was ten years old. Ike came up and sat on Pastor Cochran’s knee and asked, “How long you gonna be here?” Pastor Cochran was honest with the boy. He ...

908. The Best Seat in the House

Luke 14:1, 7-14

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... to fill empty spaces with status and power, are becoming commonplace in our current culture, so much so, that we barely bat an eye when we see these folk around us or the behaviors that define them. Jesus in our scripture today is talking about just those kinds of people, the ones whose position and power must be flaunted no matter what the venue, so that they may be revered. Notice that the conversation Luke tells us about today is taking place during a sabbath meal at the home of one of the leaders of ...

909. The Trust of Simon Cephas

John 1:29-42

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... spiritual house that Peter would help to establish would align with the cornerstone forever. Jesus’ use of naming established buy-in and purpose in his disciples from the moment they followed him. His use of the metaphor of the unhewn stone would point to the kind of Temple Jesus intended to build. To that time, the only Temple anyone knew had a long history. The Jerusalem Temple was twice built upon the stone that bound Isaac and that served as a symbol of the foundation stone of the world, a community ...

910. The Hedge

Matthew 5:21-37

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... swear by but hedge much of the time) and to live authentic lives defined by a covenant with God. In the Pacific Northwest resides a kind of tree that seems to defy all standards of what it means to be a tree. It peels its bark revealing a rich red, golden ... offered in Jesus, to commit relationally with God in a covenant union that requires us to stand authentically on what it means to be the kinds of human beings God created us to be. We are not meant to go our own way, do anything to assert our own needs, and ...

911. Shut the Back Door!

John 10:1-10

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... exited grew too slow and long, people would begin to inch quietly toward the left through the pews and then silently exit out of the side door, cross the cemetery, and get to the parking lot before everyone else. Exiting through the “back door” was a kind of cop out in a sense though. Those who got away with it carried with them a slight sense of having done something a bit wrong. Yet they also felt a sense of relief having avoided spending another 15 minutes saying goodbye to the pastor and conversing ...

912. The Way

John 14:1-14

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... relationship he wants them to have with him requires them to see him as the focus of their journey,to invest in God (him) in a way that is entirely new, spiritual, communal, and requires an awful lot of trust, faith, emotional intimacy, and heart. That kind of trust won’t come easy to the disciples, and for many of us, it comes no easier. We want the easy route to heaven. A checklist for attaining eternity. Jesus says, it doesn’t work that way. Thomas (ever the practical, logical disciple) argues, “We ...

913. Invincible

John 14:15-21

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... indispensable person will be the one who knows you so well that he or she can, and will, tell you the absolute, no-holds-barred truth about yourself and your life. If you don’t have a person like that in your corner, you need to find one. Without this kind of “person,” you are going through life without a second set of eyes. And we all need a second set of eyes when our own see what we’d like them to see at any given moment. When our hearts are aflutter and hormone-soaked with glee, these loyal ...

914. Fine Tuning

Matthew 18:15-20

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... Those with a lot of patience, a gentle hand, and infinite finesse could get the clearest picture. The art of fine tuning isn’t reserved only for archaic televisions though. Mechanics fine-tune engines to hum perfectly and smoothly. Technicians fine tune systems of all kinds. Musicians fine tune their instruments. You probably fine tune your speech if you have to make one or your research report if you have to turn one in! Fine tuning is the art of aligning things in a way that allows them to function at ...

915. Walk the Talk

Matthew 21:23-32

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... allow him to help us make it all that it can be. Second, we have a choice of whether or not to engage with God. God made us this way, hoping that we would choose to seek God’s wisdom and work with God to make the “kingdom” a beautiful, kind, loving, relational place in which all serve God and each other. But God also knew that in granting us free will, we would also be challenged and tempted to serve the “world” instead. God needed us to see beyond our own reality and to trust in God’s truth ...

916. Wrapped in a Cloud

Luke 1:26-38

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... of snow glisten, almost blinding you with their brilliance. Sound seems to have evaporated away, and the earth seems to stand frozen and still in its white-coated glory. The silence is palpable. You get the feeling you’ve just entered a different kind of alien world, where time has stopped. When a slice of sun razors through, everything becomes so reflective, bright, and luminous that it’s hard to see at all, as blinding light casts dynamic shadows across the gleaming icy landscape. How exquisite, this ...

917. Taking the High Way to Heaven

John 1:43-51

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... this particular form, so that to translate it offers a challenge. But we can get clues from its root and related cognate words: m’sillah (highway) and salal (to build up, raise up, or exalt).[1] The closest meaning we can come to for “sullam” is a kind of gateway or portal, a “raised up road or spiritual pathway.” If the words now of John the Baptist come to mind, you are on the right track (pun intended): John replied in the words of the prophet Isaiah: “I am a voice shouting in the wilderness ...

918. Free to Forgive

John 20:19-31

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... David kills Bathsheba’s husband and marries his wife, his son ends up dying. Now, we might initially be tempted to see this as some kind of retribution on God’s part, but this is not the case. It’s not a matter of God punishing; it’s a matter of knowing ... of Jesus. Instead, “measure for measure” becomes a different concept for Jesus –a way to change the world and to cultivate a kingdom kind of community, one act at a time. Think for a moment about the parable of the wheat and weeds in Matthew 13. ...

919. The Christian Mother

John 15:9-17

Sermon

King Duncan

... Honey, look into my eyes and see what you can see. Look way down deep." The little girl got real close and looked intently into her mother's eyes. Then she said, "Mommy, I can see way down and the only thing I can see is myself." That is the kind of love for which every child hungers. And make no mistake about it, such selfless concern is ultimately rewarded. In his book AN OPEN ROAD, Richard L. Evans writes: "A certain woman was heard to say as she observed a manly young man, ˜I would give twenty years of ...

920. Do You Believe in Miracles?

Mark 4:26-34

Sermon

Lori Wagner

... will be the “creator and owner of that vineyard.” When Jesus attempts to explain in our scripture for today how we are to behave as trustees of God’s created world, and what our job entails as God’s vineyard workers in order to ensure a “kingdom” kind of community, he explains it in terms of seed sowing and seed scattering. The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow; he does not know how…..when ...

921. Getters of Things Done

Luke 10:38-42

Sermon

Dean Feldmeyer

... . Marys love a good book and can spend a whole day reading and wonder where the time went. Marthas love a job well done and can spend a whole day doing it but never have enough time. Marys measure their love in words, in kind and gentle acts, gracefully given. Marthas measure their love by the amount of callouses on their hands and the aches in their muscles. Marthas are overachievers, probably the oldest children, responsible, hardworking, and parent pleasers. They always know what to do. Marys are sweet ...

922. For Someone Who Will Be Terribly Missed

Isaiah 43:1-5 · Job 19:23-27

Eulogy

Richard E. Zajac

... rubbed your fingers across Tessie’s name on the mausoleum wall at Hillcrest Cemetery, there would come to mind the memory of an unbelievable mother who was as good at motherhood as she was at nursing, who made it a point to plant in her children the same kindness and compassion that so marked her nursing life. Tessie, as many of you know, worked the night shift and so she’d often be coming home just when her children were getting out of bed. And she’d often share her day with them with the hope that ...

923. Good News / Bad News

Luke 12:49-56

Sermon

Dean Feldmeyer

... Finally, in verse 51 he laid it all out for even the most clueless listener. Do you think that I have come to bring peace to earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! And then he followed up this general statement with several examples of the kind of division and conflict that the gospel can cause. Groups of friends can be divided against each other; even families can find themselves in conflict over the demands of the gospel. My friend and golf buddy, Darren, told of an occasion when one of the teens in ...

924. Temptation

Luke 4:1-13

Drama

Robert F. Crowley

... A modern retelling of the temptation of Christ. Playing Time: 4 minutes Setting: A lonely place Props: A knapsack with bread and wine Costumes: Hiking clothes Time: The present Cast: Guy Angela ANGELA: (Carrying a knapsack, sees Guy) Hi there. This is kind of a lonely place, isn't it? GUY: It suits me. I'm kind of a lonely guy. ANGELA: Oh, that sounds disturbing. GUY: Well, it shouldn't. I mean, I didn't mean it to be. I guess I'm just lonely out here. That's all. ANGELA: Been out here awhile, then? GUY: I ...

925. Easter Understanding

Luke 24:36-49

Sermon

Harry N. Huxhold

... Not Enough We should also recognize that words about God were not enough for the disciples. It is very safe to say that the disciples must have had endless talks, debates, and dialogues among themselves about what Jesus meant to them. This we can safely surmise from the kind of discussions Jesus had with them. Over and over again we know that his teaching was designed to point them to the future. He was very careful to try to prepare them for the time when he would no longer be with them as just one of them ...

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