Sermon and Worship Resources

Synonyms: thirstiness, dryness, parched, craving, strong desire, longing, yearning, avidity, hunger, voracity, keenness, eagerness, lust, appetite, passion, love, crave, want, covet, desire, hunger for/after, lust for/after, hanker for/after, have one's heart set on

Antonyms: aversion, distaste, apathy, dislike, hatred, antipathy, disgust, disregard, abhorrence, acrimony, wet, animosity, animus, antagonism, bad feeling, bitterness, be averse to, detestation

Showing 1151 to 1175 of 2173 results

1151. The Three Kings

Matthew 2:1-12

Sermon

King Duncan

British pastor Geoff Thomas tells about an amusing event that occurred sometime back at Bryan College in Dayton, Tennessee. A gifted preacher, Al Martin was preaching in the main auditorium of the college for a special conference, and the congregation was completely absorbed by what they were hearing. Then toward the end of the sermon, all the lights in the place went out. Now that’s not too unusual. All kinds of things can cause power failures. But you might be interested in what caused this interruption ...

1152. About Donkeys and True Greatness

Mark 11:1-10

Sermon

King Duncan

A few years ago, the devotional guide, Our Daily Bread, carried a story of a pastor who was also a traveling evangelist who rode a donkey as he traveled from village to village in Brazil preaching the gospel. One day the evangelist fell asleep in the saddle as he made his return home after a tiring day. A couple of hours later he was rudely awakened by the roughness of the ride. His donkey had left the trail and was walking through a rocky field. At first the pastor was angry, but he calmed down when he ...

1153. Have You Been Pruned?

John 15:1-8

Sermon

King Duncan

Writer Henry Mitchell visited a region in California that is home to some of the world’s finest vineyards. His eye was caught by rows of vines that had just been pruned. It was depressing. All that was left of the once beautiful grapevines were rows of ugly-looking stumps and a few “runners” stretching from each of those stumps. “It looks disastrous,” Mitchell remarked to his guide. “Don’t worry, the guide replied. “We do that for three years to every vine [we cut it back] before it’s allowed to [yield] ...

1154. Why Am I Afraid?

Romans 8:14-17

Sermon

King Duncan

It’s not long until some of you will be heading out for a summer vacation. I hope you won’t take a vacation from God. Some of you undoubtedly will be camping. You may appreciate the story of a couple who were vacationing in Yosemite National Park. The wife expressed her concern about going camping because of bears and said she would feel more comfortable in a motel. The husband said that he’d like to camp. To calm her concerns he said they’d talk to the park ranger to see what the likelihood was of an ...

1155. Do You Believe in Miracles?

Mark 7:31-37

Sermon

King Duncan

Joe Sardler had been blind for six years. His blindness was caused by atrophy of the optical nerve. One night Joe tripped over his dog’s dish which had been left on a step. Subsequently he fell down the basement stairs. As he fell, his head slammed against a wall--and suddenly, miracle of miracles--his vision was restored. All of a sudden Joe could see things he hadn’t seen in years, such as the face of his five-year-old daughter. Can you imagine such an incident? Can you imagine how this event made him ...

1156. Characteristics of Christ That You and I Need

Mark 8:27-35

Sermon

King Duncan

Some of you will remember a delightful story Pastor Chuck Swindoll once told about a missionary who was sitting at her second story window when she was handed a letter from home. As she opened the letter, a crisp, new, ten-dollar bill fell out. She was pleasantly surprised, but as she read the letter her eyes were distracted by the movement of a shabbily dressed stranger down below, leaning against a post in front of the building. She couldn’t get him off her mind. Thinking that he might be in greater ...

1157. In Awe of Christ

Luke 9:28-36

Sermon

King Duncan

In a YouTube video attorney and educator Randall Niles addresses the wonders of creation. He notes that on a clear night, with a full sky in view, you can count about 1,030 bodies of light with the naked eye. Think about that for a moment . . . 1,030 bodies. “It was that way 4,000 years ago,” says Niles, “and it’s the same today.” Then about 400 years ago, Galileo invented the first telescope. At that point, about 3,310 bodies of light were visible--more than tripling the number of stars which could be ...

1158. In the Wilderness with the Devil

Luke 4:1-13

Sermon

King Duncan

Paul Grobman in his book Vital Statistics tells about incident that occurred on January 21, 1996. This incident--which might be every child’s fantasy and every parent’s nightmare--involved two brothers, Antony and Jerome who live in Quebec, Canada. It seems that the two boys wandered off from their backyard and went to a nearby Toys R Us, the now defunct toy store chain. While amusing themselves in the gigantic toy store Antony and Jerome slipped into a playhouse where they promptly fell asleep. When they ...

1159. Jesus' Guide to Wise Investing

Luke 12:13-21

Sermon

King Duncan

A sixth-grade teacher posed the following problem to one of her arithmetic classes: “A wealthy man dies and leaves ten million dollars. One-fifth is to go to his wife, one-fifth is to go to his son, one-sixth to his nephew, and the rest to charity. Now, what does each get?” After a very long silence in the classroom, one little fellow raised his hand. With complete sincerity in his voice, he answered, “A lawyer.” He’s probably right. Most of us are quite serious when it comes to money. It is estimated that ...

1160. Get the Garbage Out!

Matthew 3:1-12

Sermon

King Duncan

For those of you who are parents or grandparents, I bet you remember your baby’s first words. Were you surprised by what those first words were? You spend the first six to nine months of your baby’s life just babbling at him and making all kinds of words and sounds. And one day, he or she suddenly responds! It’s a great feeling. Unless your baby’s first words are something unexpected. A parenting website asked parents to submit stories of the strangest first words their babies ever said. Laura Conaway from ...

1161. Déjà Vu or Divine Revelation?

Luke 23:35-43

Sermon

King Duncan

Have you ever had an experience of déjà vu? Déjà vu is French for the words, “already seen,” and it’s this strange feeling that you have seen or experienced this moment before. It’s especially common among those who only come to church on Christmas and Easter. They’re like, “Doesn’t the church talk about anything else—Jesus in the cradle or Jesus on the cross? I think I’ve heard this before.” I’m just kidding, of course. We appreciate worshipers anytime you come. Comedian Steven Wright said in one of his ...

1162. An Invitation That Went Astray

Matthew 3:13-17

Sermon

King Duncan

Series: Seeing God More Clearly in 2020 Anyone here ever been involved in planning a wedding? Have you ever noticed that there are so many details involved in planning a wedding that brides and grooms tend to get really stressed out in the weeks leading up to the big event? Bride-to-be Cassandra Warren was so hurried to get things done that she accidentally sent an invitation to her wedding to a wrong address. The wedding was to have a Star Wars theme and she was excited about it, but this one invitation ...

1163. Scroll Bread and Honey

Mark 1:1-8

Sermon

Lori Wagner

How many of you have tried to diet? Come on, I know you all have! Which ones have you tried? Everyone today has a special diet. I know some of you probably have tried the Atkins Diet, the South Beach Diet. What others? Some of you eat gluten free! Some of you cut out other allergens, like peanuts, or shellfish. A while back the rage was “mono meals.” The mono meal diet meant you ate only one thing, a fruit like bananas or a vegetable like potatoes. (This kind of eating regimen didn’t work so well for ...

1164. What is Your Golden Calf?

Exodus 32:1-33:6, Luke 19:1-10

Sermon

Lori Wagner

Everyone loves the comic strip “Peanuts.” At least everyone over 30. (Charles M. Schulz died in 2000). But the really poignant thing about Schultz’s beloved characters is that he brought to life the struggles and doubts from his own childhood and allowed his characters to act out those difficulties of life through comedy and laughter. One wonders if doing this wasn’t a healing endeavor for him as well. The traumas of our past stay alive within us until we can vanquish them somehow by coming to terms with ...

1165. Job and the Mind Storm

Job 42:7-17, Job 42:1-6, Job 38:1--41:34

Sermon

Lori Wagner

Overthinking is one of the worst stress inducers in our lives. We all know the overthinker –the one who, no matter what the situation is, will make mountains out of molehills and declare tragedy the moment something doesn’t go as planned. Or that person who, when contemplating a change or an event, will worry about every detail so much that he or she derives no enjoyment whatsoever from the event itself. There are “go-with-the-flow” people. And the upright and the uptight. They overthink everything. And ...

1166. The Well Watered Soul

Ezekiel 17:1-24, Ezekiel 47:1-12, Matthew 12:1-14

Sermon

Lori Wagner

One of the strangest, mysterious, and most resilient trees in the world is the Pacific Madrona tree. The madrona is a tree that doesn’t know how to be a tree. It’s an evergreen that has cinnamon-red bark, twisting branches, and beautiful red berry clusters. It produces these berries when no other tree is bearing fruit. It’s one weird, but wondrous tree. The tree grows in western Washington, Oregon, in the San Juan Islands, and on Vancouver Island. The tree only grows at the most unlikely places for a tree ...

1167. OK Boomer

Matthew 21:28-32

Sermon

King Duncan

(Pastor, if you use Youtube clips in your service, you might consider this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYo9QgVqAW8 for this sermon) OK boomers, we’ve got some things we need to talk about today. Of course, we’re not all boomers. I realize that. How many boomers do we have in the congregation today? To qualify as a boomer you had to be born roughly between 1946 and 1965. [That didn’t sound right. I said you had to be born “roughly” between those two dates. You didn’t have to be born “roughly” at ...

1168. Giving Comfort

Isaiah 40:1-31

Sermon

King Duncan

Once there was a Baptist minister and humorist named Grady Nutt. Grady could tell some of the most hilarious stories. One of Grady’s classic stories was of a seminary student who pastored a rural church on the weekends. Word came to this student preacher that a man in his church had died. Could he come and conduct the funeral? The young preacher had never done a funeral before, but after receiving counsel from one of his seminary professors about how to proceed, he drove out to the home of the man who had ...

1169. An Important Village with a Questionable Reputation

John 1:43-51

Sermon

King Duncan

According to a recent report from the BBC News, inhabitants of a village in northern Nigeria are celebrating the renaming of their village. The old name of the town was “Area of Idiots.” Wonder why they wanted to change it? “Area of Idiots.” The new name of the village is “Area of Plenty.” I believe you will agree with me that’s an improvement. The local emir announced the name change after residents complained that they had been mocked for years because of that name and were ashamed to tell people where ...

1170. The Museum of Failed Products

Genesis 9:1-17

Sermon

King Duncan

There are many unusual tourist attractions in the U.S., but recently I heard of one that sounds both fascinating and depressing at the same time. There is a museum in Ann Arbor, Michigan, I understand, that has as its unofficial name, “The Museum of Failed Products.” Ponder that name for a few moments, “The Museum of Failed Products.” The museum looks like a standard supermarket inside. However, all the items on the shelves are products that were taken off the market because nobody bought them. I wonder ...

1171. Our Need and God's Provision

John 6:1-21

Sermon

King Duncan

What’s your favorite food? The food you could eat once a day for the rest of your life, if you had to? At this time of year, you can find food festivals all over the U.S. that celebrate just about any kind of food you might enjoy. There’s a Garlic Festival in Gilroy, California. Waikiki, Hawaii hosts a Spam Festival every year—if Spam is really what you long for. Atlanta, Georgia holds a Chomp and Stomp Festival every year that features a chili cook-off and bluegrass concert and dance. If you Google your ...

1172. The Dean's Dilemma

Ephesians 5:15-20

Sermon

King Duncan

When you were a kid did you ever fantasize about finding a magical being who would grant wishes for you? Kids see endless possibilities in the world, yet their power is fairly limited, so they get a lot of satisfaction from imagining a magical being, like a genie or a fairy or an angel, who can instantly give them whatever they desire. But the movies and stories along these lines almost always come with a moral: Be very careful what you wish for—you just might get it. It reminds me of the story I like to ...

1173. Jesus Meets Our Needs

John 2:1-11

Sermon

Derl G. Keefer

Weddings symbolize the hope of the future for people who are in love. They symbolize to commitment, undying love and the best in each other’s company. It is at such an occasion that the first miracle of Jesus happened. The wedding took place in Cana of Galilee not far from Nazareth. It is the small village where Nathanael lived and he is the one who had said, “Can anything good come from there?” (John 1:46). Cana and Nazareth obviously were rival communities. Yet, it is here that Jesus, his disciples and ...

1174. The Lonely Prophet

1 Kings 19:1-4, (5-7), 8-15a

Sermon

King Duncan

One of the great concepts that has come out of the sobriety movement and organizations like Alcoholics Anonymous is the acronym HALT—H. A. L. T. The word, of course, literally means “to stop.” But in sobriety circles, the acronym HALT serves as a reminder to be careful how you react when you are Hungry, Angry, Lonely or Tired. Researchers have found that, for someone with addiction issues, these four states leave you particularly vulnerable to temptation. They suggest that, before you take a drink or pop a ...

1175. A VIP Seat

Luke 14:1-14

Sermon

King Duncan

In our society, we have a unique obsession with following the “lifestyles of the rich and famous.” There are TV shows and websites and magazines that focus on the homes and wardrobes and parties of the wealthy and well-connected. And so many of us like to take a sneak peek into this world that we will never experience in real life. Back before the pandemic, sociologist Ashley Mears wrote a book titled Very Important People: Status and Beauty in the Global Party Circuit that shared insider details on the ...

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