Sermon and Worship Resources

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Showing 1051 to 1075 of 4957 results

1051. Pain And Promise In The Heart Of God

Hosea 2:2-23

Sermon

Harold Warlick

... of the Judaeo-Christian heritage is that God takes on the attributes of humans. God's essence is unknown, but the Scriptures claim that God's actions are known. God experiences what humans experience. In the Old Testament God walks in the Garden of Eden. God closes the door of the ark. God smells the fragrance of sacrificed animals. God chases Moses in the wilderness. In like manner Hosea describes God as a ...

1052. Here Is Where It Happens

1 Samuel 2:12-26

Sermon

Arthur H. Kolsti

... value. In every direction one looked there was the cross. Maybe I was one of the blind being counseled and led by the blind. So the doubt was sown and it was a good doubt. What happens in us and in our world when the transcendent claim of God goes into eclipse? What happens when intelligence is no longer informed by conscience? What happens when human relations are void of redemptive compassion -- when life choices are based on inadequate definitions of what it means to be a man or a woman? Some doubts ...

1053. Between The Parentheses

Revelation 1:4-8

Sermon

William G. Carter

... that week, Grachev had been baptized.4 By all appearances, Grachev was a soldier in search of a war. But now he has been claimed in the strong name of the Trinity through water and the Word. Who knows what will happen next? Now that he has been ... in whose purposes all creation shall be completed. In between new creation and final consummation, we have a place to stand and a promise to claim. We belong to God, the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. And as poet T. S. Eliot ...

1054. The Final Questions

John 6:60-71

Sermon

George W. Hoyer

... Answer: "We can. We can accept it." This is no true or false exam. Explain your answer. How can you? How can you believe such claims by this man? He is the son of Mary. His father is Joseph the carpenter. How can you, why do you, accept Jesus as the ... life." The second question comes from the Lord: "Does this offend you?" He is asking us about all that he has been claiming about himself. Phillips phrases the question: "Is this too much for you?" Raymond Brown translates it, "Does it shake your faith?" Many ...

1055. Looking A Little Bit Crazy

Mark 3:20-30

Sermon

William G. Carter

... over heaven and earth. We can act in the face of death as if death has already been defeated. We can gather in a place like this, singing praises to a Savior who has already assured us of the world's redemption. We can stand around the baptismal font to claim God's promises for our children. Trusting in the final triumph of God, we can act redemptively even when the world calls us crazy. Maybe that's what we are: crazy cousins with our odd uncle Jesus. When we live as if God's reign has already come, we ...

1056. He Shepherds Us!

John 10:1-21

Sermon

Harry N. Huxhold

... of what attacks are made on our lives. He is aware of the problems that we have to face. He knows what we must endure. He is alert to the many difficulties that we must face. That is important for us to understand. What Jesus makes clear about his claim to power is that he so completely identifies with our problems that he is perfectly willing to lay down his life for us. What makes Jesus so sensitive to what we must endure is that he had the same enemies and the same problems confronting him. It was not ...

1057. August 7-13

John 6:25-59

Bulletin Aid

RobertT D. Ingram

... the reenactment. Recruit a group of adults to plan and produce a contemporary skit about a husband and wife. The husband complains about what the Christian faith expects him to believe. He can accept that Jesus was a good man who taught a good way to live, but claims such as Jesus coming down from heaven are too hard to believe. His wife, on the other hand, is drawn unquestioningly to Jesus Christ. What seems to be naivete to him is deep faith to her. The pastor can use such a skit as a springboard for the ...

1058. Christmas 2

Matthew 25:31-46

Bulletin Aid

RobertT D. Ingram

... our behavior in all these things, may those for whom we pray embrace Jesus as their guide and savior.And may your favor be upon them, and upon us, for only then will any of us know peace. Amen. Commissioning and Blessing Ldr: You claimed Jesus at his Bethlehem birth, Father, Cng: And you have claimed each of us at our beginnings too. Ldr: You drew Jesus to you as he grew in wisdom and years, Cng: And you draw us closer to you as we grow in our faith. Ldr: Then you sent Jesus out in obedient ministry. Cng ...

1059. How Can We Restore the Christian Home?

Mark 10:1-12

Sermon

Donald Macleod

... his arms and blessed them, laying his hands upon them." (vv. 13, 14) The Christian home, once the stable element in the structure of our Western society, is besieged today from without and within. Without is an age of bloated agendas, hurried and frantic claims upon our time and resources, to such a degree that the average American home has no identification except as a crossroads where its family members encounter each other on their way to somewhere else. Within is a rumpus room where there are no longer ...

1060. Come Out!

John 11:38-44

Sermon

Thomas Peterson

... a vision of the Creator. The voice of Jesus still comes to me and to you. Come out! He calls us into life, good news. Once life stirs inside the shroud that has held us captive to a false gospel, the thrill of genuinely good news begins to claim us. Then Jesus calls to our friends, family, clergy, workers, and caring professionals, “Unbind the hands; unbind the feet; unwrap the face.” Then it is that the hands that have been bound pick up the first object we see of meaning before us and begin to do good ...

1061. Would That God. . .

Mark 10:46-52

Sermon

Thomas Peterson

... us to see for ourselves. Though we are our own worst enemies, we can become our best friends. What we do matters; therefore what we refuse to do matters also. We come to see the difference. It is we who need to be putting to work the faith we claim to possess. Freed from fantasies, our faith gets down into the everyday concerns of our lives and starts to work. Facing these insights, we know that the old self must be discarded and a new one dared. When the faith we have gets to work, it becomes “worked ...

1062. Read the Directions

Sermon

John R. Brokhoff

... over drunken driving cases was himself convicted of drunken driving. His car hit another car at a stoplight, and his blood-alcohol level at the time was measured at 0.21, twice the legal intoxication limit of 0.10. In spite of that, he refused to resign, claiming that this would not impair his ability to be a judge in city court. Christ’s justice does not come from a source like that. He was never fairly convicted of any wrong. In generosity and concern for others, Christ is also the perfect example. He ...

1063. OK, God You Win!

Job 42:1-6

Sermon

John R. Brokhoff

... as it goes, but the personal vision of God is the best and only way to know God. Job said, “My eye sees thee.” Can we today really see God? Indeed, we can in various ways. We can see God in nature. Nature is not God as the New Age claims, but we can see God in the beauty and power of nature. A famous French entomologist, Jean Henri Fabre, at the age of eighty-seven, wrote a ten-volume work on insects. Someone asked him if he as a scientist and scholar could still believe in God. He positively replied ...

1064. The Robe

John 6:25-59

Sermon

Robert Salzgeber

... does not matter in the least having been from Nazareth and born in Bethlehem, if only you come out of the matrix and womb of God. So Jesus proclaims that "Everyone will be taught by God." Because we have come out of the matrix of God we can claim our inheritance. We can claim the bread that comes down from heaven. The bread of such a kind that whoever eats it will not die. The bread that if anyone eats it, he/she will live forever. The bread is Jesus himself, which he gives so that the world may live. Thus ...

1065. Solomon's Song Of Love

Sermon

Sue Anne Steffey Morrow

... the second growth of raspberries ripen to their full flavor on the bushes, on this Sunday, when the summer roses cast an aroma that catches us up in the subtlety of their smell, on this Sunday we are called by this text to claim the goodness of all that is created and especially claim the goodness of our sexuality, the beauty of our bodies and the pleasure that the gift of love and loving gives to us: "My beloved is mine and I am his. He pastures his flock among the lilies. Turn, my beloved, like a gazelle ...

1066. Tying Up A Strong Man

Mark 3:20-30, 1 Samuel 8:1-22, 2 Corinthians 4:1-18, Mark 3:31-35, Psalm 138:1-8

Sermon Aid

William E. Keeney

... in comfortable and conventional ways. They become alarmed or distressed if someone goes overboard and tries to live out religious commitment too fully or too radically. But a real issue is raised by the fine line that sometimes separates the true religious proclamation and the claims of a person who is a fanatic. When is such a person really shaking us up to arouse us out of our complacency in accepting the familiar evil? Or when is the person stepping across the bounds of sanity into the unreal world of ...

1067. Lent 2

Mk 8:31-38 · Rom 4:13-25; 8:31-39 · Gen 17:1-7, 15-16; 22:1-18 · Ps 22

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

... a substitute sacrifice, provided by the Lord himself. Tradition identifies Moriah with Jerusalem and specifically the temple mount. The Samaritans claimed that Moriah was located on Mount Gerizim. Epistle: Romans 4:13-25 The true descendants of Abraham are not those ... the eyes of the world. Jesus warns that if we are ashamed of Jesus or his gospel in this life, he will be ashamed to claim us as his own when he comes into his kingdom (v. 38). Christianity seems so square, so simple and naive in the eyes of the ...

1068. Lent 4

John 3:1-21, Numbers 21:4-9, Ephesians 2:1-10

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

... , preferably Nordic types. The Black Muslims assert that only black people are the apple of God's eye and the whites are Satan. Various Christian groups have had the audacity to claim that the Lord only listens to people in their group. For all of these groups and more, God is merely a projection of themselves. The God we know in Jesus Christ claims the whole world as his own. Broadcasting this good news provides the church's reason for being. The test of true love (v. 16). "God so loved ... that he gave ...

1069. Proper 11

Ephesians 2:11-22, 2 Samuel 7:1-17, Mark 6:45-56, Mark 6:30-44

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

... humans by giving us new hearts and the will to please God. 3. Sermon Title: How God Builds A House. Sermon Angle: In the First Lesson, David wants to build God a house and God replies that he will build a house of David. In this lesson, Paul claims that God is building a house of those who believe. Here is how the house is constructed. Outline: 1. God builds his house on the foundation of the apostles and prophets (v. 20). 2. Christ is the cornerstone (giving the house shape and form) (v. 20). 3. Christians ...

1070. Advent 2

2 Peter 3:1-18, Isaiah 40:1-31, Mark 1:1-8

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

... way at the present time, as news media and government officials sometimes ridicule our values. Some of those in the so-called religious right endeavor to seize power as an avenue of publicly proclaiming the values they hold dear. Yet such power can make those who claim it callous to the needs of those who differ from them and imperious to the Spirit of God. Then God will send other prophets who will make their haunting cry echo from the wilderness. We wish to see Jesus. Some Greeks came to Philip and said ...

1071. Easter 5

John 15:1-17, Acts 8:26-40, Acts 9:19b-31, 1 John 4:7-21

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

... Old Testament imagery the Jewish people are the vine. Isaiah says that the vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel (Isaiah 5:1-7). Ezekiel also likened the nation to a vine (Ezekiel 15; 19:10). Other passages could be cited as well. Jesus is claiming here that he is the true or authentic vine, not Israel. The Jews believed that the way to stay alive spiritually was to keep in close contact with their ethnic and spiritual identity. "Not so," says Jesus, "I am the true vine." To stay alive spiritually you ...

1072. Easter 6

John 15:18--16:4, Acts 10:23b-48, 1 John 5:1-12

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

... to disparage baptism (God forbid!) but to keep us open to the Spirit's visitation. Lesson 2: 1 John 5:1-6 Who does God claim as his child? Sometimes we refer to all humans as children of God. This is true in a biological sense; God made us all. However ... is the sign, according to John, by which we can and will conquer the world. Gospel: John 15:9-17 What kind of love (v. 9). Jesus claims that his love for us is the same kind of love that the Father showered on him. Yet what kind of love was it? The Father's ...

1073. The Epiphany Season

Mt 2:1-12 · Jn 1:43-51 · Mk 1:9-28; 35-45 · Mk 2:1-12; 18-22 · Mk 9:2-13

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

... Lord. The Eastern Church continued to celebrate the baptism of Christ on January 6th, while the Western Church associated Epiphany with the story of the Magi. The church of the East lifted up the Lord's baptism, so as to combat Gnostic heresies that claimed that Jesus was adopted as the Son of God in baptism. The story of the Magi was also appropriate because it proclaims that the light of Christ dispels the darkness for all people. Unfortunately, the average Christian associates the story of the Magi with ...

1074. Proper 16

John 6:25-59, John 6:60-71, 1 Kings 8:22-61, Ephesians 6:10-20

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

... knew that Jesus is the only way to go, the only road that is the way of eternal life. SERMON POSSIBILITIES Lesson 1: 1 Kings 8:(1, 6, 10-11) 22-30, 41-43 Sermon Title: Confirm The Covenant. Sermon Angle: In Solomon's dedicatory prayer he claimed the Lord's covenant promises. He prayed that Yahweh would confirm and carry out the promise made to his father, that a descendent from his line would always remain on the throne. That promise was conditioned on David's descendents walking in the ways of the Lord ...

1075. Proper 24

Job 38:1–41:34, Isaiah 52:13--53:12, Mark 10:35-45, Hebrews 5:1-10

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

... of God's game plan for victory. Lesson 2: Hebrews 5:1-10 Sermon Title: God's Mercy For The Ignorant And The Weak. Sermon Angle: The sins for which sacrifices were offered were basically sins of ignorance and weakness (v. 2). The sacrifices did not claim to cover those who sinned wantonly or arrogantly, without remorse and repentance. On the cross, Jesus carried out his high priestly role by offering a prayer for mercy on behalf of those who were ignorant. On the other hand, Jesus was hard on those who knew ...

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