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 1326 to 1350 of 5000 results

1326. Anything But Trivial

Nehemiah 7:73b--8:18

Sermon

Tony Everett

... an entire nation is focused on a major celebration. People from towns throughout Israel have gathered in one place, the water gate outside the Temple at Jerusalem (7:73). It was the seventh month, Tishri (our September/October). They were here for a month-long series of celebrations that commemorated events that had defined their identity as a people of God. The celebrations began with the blowing of trumpets to call the people to remember the many saving deeds of the Lord. During the seventh month was the ...

1327. When Wisdom Cries Out

Proverbs 8:1-36

Sermon

Carlyle Fielding Stewart

... too busily preoccupied with other things to pray. They are too distracted with the world, too saturated with "getting and spending," in the words of the poet Wordsworth. As the teenage daughter of a parishioner once quipped, "Why do we have to pray? God takes too long to answer anyway!" In this world of the mad dash and the quick hash, people too readily expect the quick fix and immediate results in the challenges they are facing. Theirs is a slot machine faith. Put the coin in the first time and hit the ...

1328. They Didn't Have To Do It, But They Did

Genesis 14:1-24

Sermon

Carlyle Fielding Stewart

... , always wrote "Thank you" in the memo line on his checks. When asked why he did this, he said, "It's just a blessing to have money for which to pay my bills. I am just grateful to God for this blessing." Little things like giving thanks go a long way in fostering good will among fellow human beings. Melchizedek did not have to bless Abram, but he did. He had gratitude in his heart for what Abram did. The king could have easily ignored the heroics of Abram. He could have looked the other way and forgotten ...

1329. Many Parts, but of One Body

1 Corinthians 12:12-31

Illustration

John R. Steward

... think you are? This is hell. But this is not your place. Come with me." The guide took him to another room that was also filled with a large banquet table and delicious food. In this room, there was also a large spoon with a handle that was five feet long. However, in this room no one was fighting. Instead, one person would take the spoon and use it to feed another. They in turn would use the spoon to return the favor. The guide turned to the man and said, "This is heaven." Source: Robert Schuller, Be an ...

1330. Prepared Servants

Luke 12:35-48

Sermon Aid

William E. Keeney

... bottom of the robe into their belt so that they were not encumbered by it. 4. "Return from the Wedding Banquet." (v. 36) A wedding is a festive occasion. Though the actual ceremony of marriage may be brief, the feasting associated with it may run for a very long time. It may go late into the night. Slaves had to be ready to receive the master whenever he chose to return home. A wedding feast was often used as a symbolic representation of the kind of joy experienced in the kingdom of God. 5. "He Comes and ...

1331. What To Do With A Self-willed Child

Luke 2:41-52

Sermon

Charles H. Bayer

... not the only ones to travel to the capital from Nazareth. Both for protection and companionship families traveled together. You know how it is when families get together. The teenagers collect in their own swarm and do their own thing. Following the celebration and after a long day on the road home, Mary probably said to Joseph, "Have you seen Jesus?" "I guess he's with his friends," was the likely reply. "I'll go and tell him supper's ready." Joseph finds his buddies, but there is no Jesus. No, they haven ...

1332. God Remembers

1 Samuel 1:1-20

Sermon

John A. Stroman

... When he was weaned she brought the infant Samuel to the house of the Lord at Shiloh, and she presented him to the Lord, saying, "As long as he lives he is yours!" Little did she or Elkanah know that Samuel was to become a prophet, a mediator of God's word ... . She brought the infant to the house of worship and presented him to the Lord. Hannah told the Lord that Samuel was God's for as long as he lived. Hannah's response to the gift of God's grace was to give back what she had received. We too must give back ...

1333. How to Affair-Proof Your Marriage!

2 Samuel 11:1-27

Sermon

Stephen M. Crotts

... wives and they turned his heart away from the Lord. My, my! But what an awful legacy of immorality David thrust upon his children. A man, utterly broken from the effects of adultery, once moaned to me, "If I had known how far down it would take me, how long it would hold me, how deeply it would hurt me, I would never have done it." Adultery is like a rat nibbling the cheese in a trap. The food is great. But the service is terrible. Just how terrible adultery can be is eloquently described in the following ...

1334. Mirror, Mirror ON The Wall . . .!

Sermon

Stephen M. Crotts

... zoo, came home and wrote a letter to God? "Dear God," the boy wrote, "did you mean for a giraffe to look like that or was it an accident?" A lot of people feel that way about themselves. "There really must be some mistake! My neck shouldn't be this long!" "Me and my big feet!" "Wow! Look at my face! Ugly! When God was handing out looks, I must have thought he said 'books' and hid behind the door because I didn't want any."\n But did you know that the Bible teaches that God is in complete control ...

1335. Through The Eye Of The Needle

Mark 10:17-31

Sermon

Steven E. Albertin

... no one is saved. Then no one is worthy of being a disciple. And that is precisely the point Jesus is trying to make -- to the rich young ruler, to his disciples, and to us! As long as we ask, "What do I have to do?" as long as we think that our deeds or our money or our church attendance will count for something, as long as we think we can do something to win God's approval, then we are stuck. Then we will never make it. Then we are like that camel stuck in the eye of the needle. Then ...

1336. Getting In Tune Again

Isaiah 40:1-31

Sermon

William L. Self

... Protestants and eighteen million Catholic Christians are in China!2 We have taken too small a view of God's work. We think like businesspeople -- if we don't have a profit every quarter, it's wrong. God thinks in decades and centuries and millennia. God takes the long view; we take a little view. God works somewhere else, above time. We need to understand that the mission of the church is the mission of the church. Those of you who are young to the faith and for the first time beginning to see the work of ...

1337. All Dressed Up And Somewhere To Go!

Isaiah 62:1-12, Isaiah 61:1-11

Sermon

Harold Warlick

... ample time. But the inscrutable silence simply pushed him back on resources, memories, and ideals he already had. With great certainty he said, "It's as if God has said all God intends to say."1 Indeed, sometimes the speechlessness of God can be a long and awful thing. Such silence creates a kind of skepticism in communities about whether God has any coming salvation or not. The historical backdrop for today's text is similar. It helps us understand the wellspring of hope embodied in the promise of Isaiah ...

1338. Point Of Origin

Genesis 1:1-2:3

Sermon

Harold Warlick

... of our genes with chimps. We are indebted to Homo erectus as our Homo sapien ancestor. Perhaps a magic twist in 0.1 percent of our genes within the past 60,000 years did create the anatomical basis for spoken complex language. Certainly as long ago as Charles Darwin's The Descent of Man, it has been pointed out that we are similar to other animals in being subject to the same laws of development from primitive forms in nature, passing on variations by inheritance from individual to individual, reproducing ...

1339. Till Death Do Us -- Unite

Acts 10:34-43

Sermon

Paul W. Kummer

... a smile to Pastor Neal's face. This time, however, there seemed to be an unusual tone to her words, "Pastor, could you stop by this afternoon? I need to talk with you." "Of course, I'll be there around three. Is that okay?" It didn't take long for Pastor Neal to discover the reason for what he had only sensed in her voice earlier. Sarah shared the news that her doctor had discovered a previously undetected tumor. "He says I probably have about six months to live." Sarah's words were naturally serious, yet ...

1340. God Works Wanders

Genesis 12:1-8

Sermon

Gerald Whetstone

... Should we go back?" "No. There's no going back." "Good," Sarai says, "I was hoping you would say that." They stare at the stars a long time before they close their eyes in sleep. Listen? Do you hear God calling you? "Go," He says, "from your familiar pain and trouble and come to ... which will be new to us. Still, God says, come to the place I will show you. Some of us have held hurts so long we can't imagine life without them. Some we learned very young. Perhaps we grew up in a world where we never were ...

1341. Live Together In Harmony

1 Corinthians 1:10-17

Sermon

Richard Hasler

... dead man's brother kills his murderer, and that sets off a chain reaction. Soon the cousins get in the act too. Eventually, everyone is killed off and that is the end of the feud. Of course, as Buck adds, "... it's kind of slow, and it takes a long time." Huck wonders what really caused the trouble in the first place. Was it land? His friend is not sure but probably it was a dispute over land that caused all the fighting. But that happened 30 or more years ago. Huck asks, "Doesn't anyone know?" His friend ...

1342. Choosing Sides

Romans 8:1-17

Sermon

Sandra Hefter Herrma

... device has gone by the wayside. Our society -- even our theologians -- no longer believe in "The Devil." As Walt Kelly said through Pogo, a long time ago, "We have met the enemy, and he is us!" No longer do we say, as Flip Wilson used to say, "The devil ... peace and trust in God to be able to sleep in the back of the boat with Jesus. This treaty has been offered to us by God, long before we even knew that we were "at war," before we had any sense of our own lostness. But the choice of whether or not to accept ...

1343. Memorial Day

Ecclesiastes 3:1-22

Sermon

Brett Blair

... National Cemetery at Antietam. His great sacrifice is easy for all to recognize. But we cannot forget the rippling effect of his death and how his loss effected the lives of others. His mother and his sister were also the victims of war, though history has long since lost track of their resting places. II We gather this day not only to remember but also to recommit. If we walk away this morning, and let our national holiday pass us by tomorrow, with no stronger resolve to end wars, then we have celebrated ...

1344. Don't Be Stupid

Jeremiah 4:5-31

Sermon

Richard L. Sheffield

... other creature can do that. Animals (and little children) can realize that they are about to be punished for something they did, but only mature human beings can judge themselves."1 God's call is to maturity, to good judgment in the life he has made; to living it long and living it well; learning how to do good and not evil. God wants you and me to be like the Apostle Paul who wrote to the church in Corinth, which was beset by stupid, childish squabbles: "When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought ...

1345. Where Are You?

Hosea 11:1-11

Sermon

Richard L. Sheffield

... where you are; are you where you need to be in your life? Occasionally at mealtimes at our house, especially when it's been a long and busy day and I'm distracted, Xavia will say "Dick! Where are you?" I'm sitting there. I'm eating there. But I'm ... years ago, seven years ago, or even seven days ago? Where were you last Monday? Do you know? Maybe not. That's not so long ago, but unless something "memorable" happened, you may not remember the ordinary things that were part of getting you to where you are now. ...

1346. Crackpots

Jeremiah 2:1-3:5

Sermon

Richard L. Sheffield

... is: "Each of you is a crackpot, and so am I!" How so? The first thing to remember is that the word "crackpot" was around a long time before anybody used crack or smoked pot. If you do either then "crackpot" might be as good a term as any to describe your ... 's a good bet that my feet will hit the floor and not the ceiling. That's a good assumption that holds water, at least as long as the law of gravity holds. I can live by that. But what assumption do I live by in my relationships with other people and with ...

1347. A Salute to Mothers

Romans 16:1-27

Sermon

Brett Blair

... by body and soul, I know whose prayers would make me whole.Mother of mine, mother of mine. There was an interesting story on CNN not long ago about a twenty-five year old man in San Franciso who was dying of aids. And you know how he got it and I ... and imagining that I will awaken in the arms of my mother. I know that she will never leave my side. I tell you friends, long after some fathers have disowned their children a mother will still be there. There is a tenacity there that we must salute. II Secondly, I ...

1348. Week Four Of Lent

Sermon

Richard Gribble

... were returned to Jerusalem and they began to rebuild their lives. In today's First Reading Isaiah speaks about the new Jerusalem. It will be a place where the past is no longer remembered. The new city will be created to be a delight. People will live very long lives; the cries of former days will not be present. The people will live in the houses they build and eat of the fruit of the vineyards they plant. The renewal of hope which only God can give is illustrated in the Gospel as well. The royal official ...

1349. Holy Week

Sermon

Richard Gribble

... as we must in our daily lives. As time went on, the mission, the vocation of Jesus, became more clear. I am sure that Jesus' long prayer sessions with his Father helped him to know his mission and gave him the strength to carry it out. Since Jesus was human I ... , he still had not found the meaning of life. Thus, as an old man he continues his search. He leaves the city. He walks for a long time and he comes upon a river. It is the same river that he and his best friend had crossed so many years ago, when they ...

1350. Make A Choice

Luke 19:28-44

Sermon

Robert Beringer

... Holy Week story. But then it struck me that Palm/Passion Sunday's real purpose is to remind us of the necessity of making a choice ... making a decision about Jesus Christ, and Christ's claim on our lives. When Jesus entered the city of Jerusalem on that day long ago, he made it abundantly clear that he was God's Messiah! From that moment until now, people have had to decide: Are we for him or against him? Will we accept him or reject him? That choice is still yours and mine, and depending on what we decide ...

Showing results