Sermon and Worship Resources

Showing 1126 to 1150 of 4508 results

Sermon

King Duncan

(Growing Strong in the Season of Lent, #1) A story appeared on Facebook recently about a person who went to a concert. At the end of the concert, this person noticed two ushers standing near his seat who were applauding harder than anybody else in the whole place. The man said he was thrilled with this particular concert because of the talent and virtuosity of the musicians. It also impressed hi...

1127. Ash Wednesday

Bulletin Aid

Julia Ross Strope

Note: This service is an abbreviated order so that people who are taking time from work can stay within their allotted time off. Also, the whole service is somber, including the music, so it ought not be too long. Call To Worship (During Lent, count the Sundays with a candelabrum holding six purple candles and one white candle. For Ash Wednesday, light these candles during the Call To Worship.) L...

1128. Ash Wednesday

Bulletin Aid

Russell F. Anderson

Theme: A call to repentance and renewal. The people are called to return to the Lord with acts of worship, giving and devotion that spring from the heart. COMMENTARY Old Testament: Joel 2:1-2, 12-17 We know little about the writer of this book and there are no historical markers by which to judge the period in which it was composed. Many scholars believe that Joel lived in the Persian period (55...

1129. Why Are Christians So Judgmental?

Sermon

Charley Reeb

“I love your Jesus. I just don’t see many Christians who look like him.” Ghandi said that to E. Stanley Jones, a famous Methodist Missionary, many years ago. It was a prophetic statement because a large percentage of people in our world today feel just like Ghandi. United Methodist minister Martin Thielen writes about a good friend who stopped going to church. He was going through a bitter divorc...

1130. Good-Bye Mardi Gras, Hello Lent

Sermon

R. Robert Cueni

Lent, the season of preparation for Easter, begins today. Traditionally, Lent is marked by prayer, fasting, self-reflection, and repentance. Lent is sufficiently serious that some Christian calendars have installed a season to prepare for it. It is called Mardi Gras. Whereas Lent projects a somber, almost lugubrious mood with a theme of denial and self-discipline, Mardi Gras is just the opposite. ...

1131. I'm Sorry, Father

Illustration

A Catholic priest working in an inner city was walking down an alley one evening on his way home when a young man came down the alley behind him and poked a knife against his back. "Give me your money," the young man said. The priest opened his jacket and reached into an inner pocket to remove his wallet, exposing his clerical collar. "Oh, I'm sorry, Father," said the young man, "I didn't see you...

1132. Eggs For Sale

Illustration

Charles Spurgeon and his wife, according to a story in the Chaplain magazine, would sell, but refused to give away, the eggs their chickens laid. Even close relatives were told, "You may have them if you pay for them." As a result some people labeled the Spurgeons greedy and grasping. They accepted the criticisms without defending themselves, and only after Mrs. Spurgeon died was the full story r...

1133. Looking with Magic Eyes

Illustration

William L. Self

In 1983 Mehmet Ali Agca was in the midst of the crowd in St. Peter's Square. He pulled a gun out of his pocket and tried to assassinate Pope John Paul II. He was arrested and imprisoned. In January 1984 the Pope visited the prison, and when he walked through the cell door, he said to the young man, "I forgive you." The papers in the city of Rome made much of it, but one editorial writer made a si...

1134. Let Us Play

Illustration

Kendall K. McCabe

My dear friends, let us play. Yes, you heard me correctly. Now is a time for play. In fact, today the church begins that time of the year when we do our most serious playing. And playing is a serious business, you know. Ask any teacher of children. Better still, watch children at play. No wonder they are tired at the end of the day. They work hard at playing. They take it seriously. Play is the ...

1135. Recharging Your Batteries

Illustration

King Duncan

An Italian newspaper recently carried a story about a young couple in Milan who seemed particularly devoted in their worship. The priest at a cathedral there reported that the pair spent an hour or more on a regular basis sitting before a statue of the Virgin Mary. Naturally, he assumed they were praying. Turns out, this young couple was recharging their cell phone. They had noticed a stray elect...

1136. Ash Wednesday

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

COMMENTARY Old Testament: Joel 2:1-2, 12-19 The prophet Joel receives a word from the Lord. The ram's horn is to be sounded so that the people might assemble before the Lord. It is a time of crisis but the source of the trouble is not clear. Scholars differ greatly as to when the book was written anywhere from 800 B.C. to 350 B.C. Nevertheless, the situation calls for swift and forthright action....

1137. There’s Still Time

Sermon

Frank Ramirez

Nowadays the cost of a dinner and a movie keeps going up, and a vacation can be especially expensive, but if I really want to go somewhere I just take the change out of my pocket and lay it on the desk. It's like a time machine. Each coin has a year stamped on it, and just thinking about the year helps me travel back in my memory. 1979 is the year my first son was born and the year I started in mi...

1138. Treasure Hunters

Sermon

Schuyler Rhodes

When my children were young, one of the things I loved was preparing treasure hunts for them. I used to spend hours getting ready for these wonderful, rowdy events. Their Mother would take them with her to help with the grocery shopping while I remained home working to lay out a series of elaborate clues. The clues would be written in puzzling rhyme, leading from one place to the next on our five-...

1139. Ash Wednesday

Sermon Aid

Marion L. Soards, Thomas B. Dozeman, Kendall McCabe

OLD TESTAMENT TEXTS The Old Testament texts explore the themes of sin and death that are central to Ash Wednesday. Joel 2:1-2, 12-17 proclaims the judgment of God on sin through the terrible Day of the Lord, while Psalm 51:1-12 is a penitentiary prayer in which the guilt of the psalmist is confessed as a basis for petitioning God for deliverance. Joel 2:1-2, 12-17 - "The Terrible Day of God's J...

1140. A Tattoo for the Heart

Sermon

King Duncan & Angela Akers

(A meditation for Ash Wednesday) It’s an old story, but it bears repeating. An armed robber accosted a French priest on a dark, back street in Paris and demanded his wallet. As the priest opened his coat to reach for his wallet, the thief caught sight of his clerical collar and immediately apologized. “Never mind, Father,” he said. “I didn’t realize you were a priest. I’ll be on my way.” The pri...

1141. With Gratitude and Humility

Sermon

April Yamasaki

On a recent trip out of town, I stayed at a hotel that offered a complimentary breakfast. After serving myself from the generous buffet, I decided to send a photo of my breakfast to my sisters just for fun. I re-arranged the country-fried potatoes on my plate, moved the sausage patty and hard-boiled egg so they were nestled beside the potatoes, with the watermelon and other fresh fruit filling the...

1142. Ashes at Starbucks

Sermon

Mary Austin

This passage from Matthew is an odd choice from the lectionary, for the day we have the most public display of our Christian faith. “Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them,” Jesus says. Good advice. Then we go ahead and mark our foreheads with ashes for everyone to see. If we stop for bread and milk on the way home or go to an early service and wear our ashes to ...

1143. A Meditation for Ash Wednesday

Sermon

King Duncan

Every once in a while a whimsical story makes our newspapers ” a story with no real significance except for what it reveals about the human family. Last year on Ash Wednesday the Associated Press carried a story about a woman in Olney, England named Dawn Gallyot who defied snow and a biting wind to beat seven other women to the finish line in the annual Shrove Tuesday pancake race. In her first ra...

1144. Carrying God's Mark

Children's Sermon

Various Authors

Props: Dark ash and oil, to mark a cross on your forehead Lesson: (only a very light cross on forehead) Hey, guys, do you see this mark on my forehead? Can you tell what it is? It’s supposed to be a cross. I went to the Ash Wednesday service tonight, and the pastor put it on my forehead. But it’s so light you can’t even tell what it is. It’s not fair! Some of the other people got dark crosses, one...

1145. Carrying God's Mark

Drama

Various Authors

Props: Dark ash and oil, to mark crosses on the foreheads of the leaders (Leader 2’s should be pretty light, while Leader 1’s cross should be darker and more obvious) Cast: Leader 1 Leader 2 Leader 1: So (name), how did you like the Ash Wednesday service tonight? Leader 2: It was kind of quiet and the scripture passages were a little difficult to understand, but I liked it. (really looking at Lead...

1146. A Portion of Thyself

Sermon

Wayne Brouwer

At a graduation ceremony, the president of a Christian college stood at the podium and looked out over the huge crowd of people. He shook his head and said to himself (right into the microphone, of course!): “All these Christians in one place, and no one’s taking an offering!” We take offerings a lot, don’t we? Every Sunday at worship services, the money plates are passed. In fact, we can hardly t...

1147. Pray

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

Did you hear about the five-year-old boy who announced to his parents that he never wanted to pray again? When his mother probed the kid's unbelief, she got this simple explanation. “I prayed and prayed, and prayed for a new puppy dog, and all I got was a new baby brother." Well, prayer does have its problems. We ask for guidance and all we hear is silence. We get what we want and wind up not...

1148. Prayer

Understanding Series

Robert H. Mounce

6:5–6 A second important religious duty among the Jews was prayer. In the morning and in the evening the devout Jew would recite the Shema (three short passages of Scripture from Deuteronomy 6 and 11 and Numbers 15), and at nine in the morning, noon, and three in the afternoon he would go through the Shemoneh Esreh (the Eighteen Benedictions). Acts 3:1 notes that Peter and John went to the temple ...

1149. Let Our Kids Pray

Sermon

Carl B. Rife

Quite a few years ago I saw a bumper sticker on a car that said, "Let Our Kids Pray." I had an immediate reaction and I acted immediately on the reaction. I went to my car and got a pen and paper and wrote on the paper "Who's stopping them?" and put it under the windshield wiper. Now that bumper sticker and my response get us into the whole area of prayer in the public schools. I would like to pr...

1150. Wanting To Be Seen

Sermon

David Belgum

Theatron is the word we translate as "to be seen." In the theater, on the stage, that is the whole purpose, to be seen. On the stage is where persons legitimately pretend (hypocrisis) to be someone other than what they are in real life. It is perfectly okay for Billy Smith to pretend to be Robin Hood in the school play. It is even announced in the program that Billy will "play the part" of Robin H...

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