Sermon and Worship Resources

Antonyms: keep, claim, continue, stick by, self-control, power through, achieve, defend, bear, hope, acquire, quick visit, adopt, continue along, adhere, remain, pursue, support, take up, keep up, reuse, advocate, stay, persevere, cherish, keep going, carry on

Showing 1351 to 1375 of 4957 results

1351. The War of Malchus’ Ear

John 18:1-11

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... much would be gained. Today, I guess that I am a uneasy “situationist” when it comes to war. I am willing to consider the possibility that, under certain circumstances, a war might be the lesser of two evils; but I am always suspicious of anyone who claims that their own particular campaign to destroy other people is justifiable in the eyes of God. So: Scripture passages can be quoted both for and against almost any position one wishes to take in this matter. What are we to do? Well, if we are trying ...

1352. On Panicking Close to Shore

John 6:16-24

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... at Passover. (See Raymond Brown, “The Gospel According to John,” Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday and Co., Inc., P.235) If there were any false Messiahs or would-be leaders of the people in revolt against Rome, they would be expected to put forth their claims at Passover time. If there were going to be any sort of political revolt, it would take place at Passover. This possibility is what led Pontius Pilate to leave his beautiful summer palace in Caesarea by the sea and journey down to Jerusalem, to take ...

1353. The Saint Who Played Second Fiddle

John 1:35-42

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... bowl. A whole lot of people in the world are looking to us, expecting to see something of hope in us, something of Jesus in us. Will they be disappointed? The world expects us to be an example of what the Kingdom of God looks like. Albert Camus claimed to be an atheist. But he once made a statement at a Dominican monastery in which he said: “What the world expects of Christians is that Christians should speak out loud and clear, and they should voice their condemnation (of evil) in such a way that never a ...

1354. The Saint without a Name

Luke 6:12-16

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... Lord Jesus Christ.” That character which we see in Jesus is reflected in God. What a revelation! But what a responsibility, also, for we carry a royal name. We are children of that kind of God, and what we do and say reflects upon the God we claim to believe in and worship. In a mystical book written around the year A.D. 500, the ancient author attributes the following words to St. Bartholomew: “The science of the knowledge of God is both very great and very small and the gospel is wide and great and ...

1355. Philip the First

John 1:43-51

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... following Jesus, all right, but from a heckuva way off!” That seems to be true of most of us in most periods of history. “Have I been with you so long, and yet you do not know me?” That is Christ’s lament across the ages. People have claimed to know Him and supported the Crusades, when they went to the Holy Land and slaughtered thousands of people so that the blood ran in the streets of the Holy City up to the knees of the horses, all in Christ’s name. People have supported slavery and apartheid ...

1356. Jesus Came Preaching

Mark 1:14-15

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... listener’s conscience. Or it may mean that the listener was right and the preacher wrong! None of us has a degree in infallibility. As Colin Morris says about preachers who claim to know too much: “They would be modest enough to confess they haven’t the foggiest idea what is going on in the head of their family pet but lay claim to sure knowledge of what their Pal Up There is thinking about the National Economy, the Middle East conflict or the future of mankind.” (Ibid., P.17) Over the years, there ...

1357. Family Reunion

Mark 3:31-35

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... from Cornwall...and the grave of the Virgin Mary’s uncle was found at Glastonbury.” (LONDON TIMES MAGAZINE, December 1, 1985, quoted in Conrad Hyers, And God Created Laughter, Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1987, page 57) What’s more...the author claimed to be a member of Jesus’ Family!! His claims have never been taken seriously. But you and I can be members of Jesus’ Family, if we will. In fact, that is precisely what we are called to be. “All in the family”...with Christ. I will never forget a ...

1358. Only the Abba Knows

Mark 13:32-37

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... that when Christ comes again he will gather up the saints - the real Christians - to meet Him in the sky...regardless of whether or not they have acrophobia! I read of a Lutheran pastor who saw the perfect rebuttal on another bumper sticker: “IN CASE OF RAPTURE I CLAIM YOUR CAR!” As I said, in light of the fact that Jesus said that even He did not know, it has always seemed presumptuous to me for any of us to say that we do. Yet there are many apocalyptic preachers today who are all but selling tickets ...

1359. What Kind of Vote Would Jesus Get?

Mark 15:1-15

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... make it through the primaries! His message doesn’t “play well in Peoria” - or anyplace else, for that matter! Who would get our vote? That is a very live question, even in our own day. We are certainly not all agreed on the answer. Even we Christians, who claim to be followers of Christ, are not sure we want to follow Him that far. Most of us still look upon him as an impractical dreamer, out-of-touch with the realities of this world. If we are terribly honest, we might admit that most of our sympathy ...

1360. Living Large for God (Part 3)

1 Chronicles 4:1-23

Sermon

Eric Ritz

... . One day he told his critics and detractors, "The world is my parish!" That was not the conventional thinking of his time. A priest was called to a certain parish. That parish was his responsibility. But Wesley, like Jabez, prayed that God would enlarge his territory. He claimed the world as his parish. That was holy boldness and living large for the kingdom of God. This is a prayer you and I can gladly pray: bless me and enlarge my territory. Take care of my needs, give me a joy that pain cannot touch and ...

1361. Nightline

Matthew 2:1-12

Sermon

Eric Ritz

... , and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:10, 11 RSV). Thirdly, this lesson teaches us that evil is a real part of our world and that it seeks to claim us. But the power of Christ is a greater power and not only claims us but frees us from the shackles of the deceptive promises of evil. Many years ago Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick, the famous preacher from Riverside Church, New York, shared a message at the University of Beirut where in attendance were ...

1362. Honestly, Are You Worried about Tomorrow?

Matthew 6:25-34

Sermon

Eric Ritz

... away little mouse, swim away little fish. God will provide all we need and more." And then addressing himself, he said, "Stop worrying little man, God has enough and more!" The tragedy of most of our lives is that we worry so much about tomorrow that we never claim the resources that God has provided to live today. Don't let the mountain of your life scare you from beginning the first step of the journey. My friends, in light of the worries and anxieties which life in the 1990s will set before us, let our ...

1363. The Telling Trademarks of Truth

James 3:13-18

Sermon

Eric Ritz

... , we Christians are different."We seek wisdom from above"--and it shows. May that be the trademark of your life. Instead of going nowhere, you will be a number one draft pick on God''s team that He is building to inherit the Kingdom. The next time someone claims to have the Secrets to Life, close your wallets, open your Bibles, and show them the Real Secret to Life--a relationship with God in the person of Jesus Christ. I close with this thought: You''re writing a "gospel"; a chapter each day, By the deeds ...

1364. The Lord Is My Shepherd

Psalm 23:1-6

Sermon

Eric Ritz

... and worship. "The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want." The great reformer Martin Luther once said that "the hinge of this great text is found in the words MY and I." However, the words MY and I represent that a particular individual has only claimed personally what a larger faith community has believed and taught. The Old Testament faith community was far more corporate and community minded in its scope. The people of Israel saw themselves as a NATION--as a people with a common unity--that was loved and ...

1365. The Bible: The Book No Other Can Match!

2 Timothy 3:16

Sermon

Eric Ritz

... we discover and learn the ultimate will of God. It is the Bible that leads us to have a personal relationship with God’s Son, the Living Word. This is why no other book can match this Book in importance. LASTLY, THE CHURCH MUST ONCE AGAIN CLAIM AND BE CLAIMED BY THE BOOK THAT NO OTHER CAN MATCH. The biggest problem that political leaders, pastors and church members have is that when we make a decision, we first try to find some biblical text to support what we have already decided. This is the opposite of ...

1366. Dealing with the Hard Moments of the Journey

2 Corinthians 4:1-18

Sermon

Eric Ritz

... red clay dirt to the wooden cross that served as an altar and slowly poured the earth onto the ground. Watching were her mother, the Rev. Kelly Clem, pastor of Goshen United Methodist Church, and congregation members who survived the 1994 Palm Sunday tornado that claimed the lives of 20 members including four-year-old Hannah, the Clems'' older daughter. On this day, they met not just to remember the friends and loved ones who died March 27, 1994, but to look toward the future of their congregation and the ...

1367. When Life Seems to Be Going in the Wrong Direction

Philippians 1:1-11

Sermon

Eric Ritz

... and unknown lands. As long as the dream is alive, so are the people who pursue them. Never underestimate the power of an idea. I can''t believe you can explain the recent changes in our world without the power of dreams and the people who were claimed and shaped by them. How else can you explain how an unknown shipyard electrician in Poland could begin and sustain a movement of reformation in his native land--a movement they tried to crush and control but without success. You look at Lech Walesa and you see ...

1368. What Do You Do When the Lights Go Out?

Isaiah 9:1-7

Sermon

Mike Jackson

... parsonage. The November sky was filled with heavy clouds which prevented any moonlight or starlight from breaking through the shutters on our sliding glass door. It was as dark a night as I can ever recall. Cheryl had claimed her side of the bed – the one with easiest access to the bathroom, and I joyfully claimed my side of the bed. After a day of unloading and unpacking, we fell asleep, exhausted, but content in our new home. As sometimes happens to middle aged men, I was awakened in the middle of the ...

1369. You Are Free to Fail

Mark 6:1-6

Sermon

David G. Rogne

... field where he could not succeed, Joe DiMaggio moved to another field and became one of the great successes of baseball. Sometimes the best thing we can do is to learn from our failures and try a different approach from the one we've been following. Thomas Edison claimed that he probably had more failures than anyone ever did, yet we do not remember him as a failure. He patented 1,093 inventions in his lifetime, that would lead one to believe that he couldn't have had too many failures. The truth is that he ...

1370. The Face that Launched a Thousand Lives

2 Corinthians 4:1-18

Sermon

Fredrick R. Harm

... being interviewed in Hamburg, Germany, Helmut Thielike spoke of the Christian response to the grandeur of Jesus. "Once it happened. Once in the world's history it happened, that someone came forward with the claim that he was the Son of God, and with the assertion, 'I and the Father are one.' He proved the legitimacy of that claim through the depths to which he descended. A Son of God who defends his title with the argument that he is the brother of even the poorest and the guilty and takes their burden ...

1371. Grace in the Midst of Judgment

2 Corinthians 5:11--6:2, 2 Corinthians 5:1-10

Sermon

Glenn McDonald

... that indicated the charges on which he had been convicted. In other words, something in his private record was made public. "Murderer." "Thief." "Insurrectionist." We recall that the words "King of the Jews" were posted above Jesus. That was the "blasphemous" claim of Jesus that according to the Pharisees merited his death. Colossians 2:14 makes an extraordinary statement. When Jesus died, he took something with him to the cross. He took your record of failure and sin. He took mine, too. Jesus willingly ...

1372. Grace in the Midst of Unanswered Prayer

2 Corinthians 12:1-10

Sermon

Glenn McDonald

... have to happen." Jesus follows his plea with the most spiritually mature and eloquent prayer statement in history: "Yet, not what I want, but what you want." Anything is possible, but there is one pathway that will bring about the ultimate good. Jesus gives up a claim on his own comfort, his own way of imagining the future, in order to say, "Father, of all the things that could possibly happen, make the one happen that you want." Let's be honest. Most of the time our prayers tend to revolve around concerns ...

1373. The Highest Bidder

Ephesians 3:14-21

Sermon

Harold Warlick

... -hand" of the leper. Some had no fingers, some were just a few stumps. Many patients sat on their hands or otherwise kept them out of sight. "I am a hand surgeon," he began. "So when I meet people, I can't help looking at their hands. The palm-reader claims he can tell your future by looking at your hands. I can tell your past. For instance, I can tell what your trade has been by the position of the calluses and the condition of the nails. I can tell a lot about your character. I love hands." Brand went ...

1374. Needy People Please Apply

Acts 4:32-37

Sermon

King Duncan

... to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need.” Oh. There were no needy people because they shared everything in common. No one claimed any of his possessions as his own. I wonder what would happen if we made that a condition of church membership today? Everyone sell your house, your car, your boat, whatever you own and bring the proceeds here and let’s divvy them up. Some of us who ...

1375. Sowing Good Seed - Father's Day

Mark 4:26-29

Sermon

King Duncan

... confessed their lie as soon as they saw Paul's father. His noble character made him influential in his community. Nelson Mandela, former president of South Africa, inspired Paul because he used non-violence and communication to bring about peace between enemies. Paul claims that the examples of his father and Nelson Mandela inspired him as he faced murderous mobs during the Hutu massacre. (6) A great Dad can have that kind of influence. Many Moms are just as courageous. Still it is true that a conscientious ...

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