Sermon and Worship Resources

Showing 1426 to 1450 of 2157 results

John 20:1-18

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... The Last Temptation of Christ and Dan Brown's DaVinci Code. Both are great novels. Both are great works of fiction. Both authors used ancient gnostic gospels as sources for their ideas. Do you know what the gnostics believed? Or why the church rejected their versions of the gospel? It's really quite simple. First off, the books that contain these stories of Jesus and Mary, and even the now popular Gospel of Judas, that's in the news, were all written forty or fifty years after the latest date given ...

1427. Cross Eyed: Rebuke

Mark 8:31-38

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... of the Bruised Shoulder and The Gospel Changes Lives. Jesus said, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me." Look to Jesus. Be Cross Eyed in your Faith. 1. Source Unknown 2. King Duncan, www.Sermons.com 3. My version of a story I first heard from Ruth Huber Rohlfs 4. Best Sermons 3, Harper & Row, 1990, p. 115

1428. Jesus’ Inaugural Adress

Luke 4:14-21

Illustration

Mickey Anders

... your country can do for you -- ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man." - John F Kennedy, 1960. Today's Scripture is Luke's version of the opening moments of Jesus' public ministry. We might call this his inaugural sermon: "The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight ...

1429. The Law of the Pendulum

Mt 14:22-36; Mk 6:45-56

Illustration

Brett Blair

... a man move so fast in my life. He literally dived from the table. Deftly stepping around the still-swinging pendulum, Ken asked the class, "Does he believe in the law of the pendulum?" The students resounding response was, "NO!" A SHORTER VERSION OF THIS ILLUSTRATION: The physics professor had just finished his lecture about the pendulum, wherein he had shown the mathematical proof that an untouched pendulum will always swing in ever-decreasing arcs. He then asked for a volunteer to demonstrate this fact ...

1430. A Heart that Sings with Joy

Luke 15:1-32

Illustration

Scott Hoezee

"I saw them eating and I knew who they were." That saying, or some version of it, is well-known now. And it certainly describes the Pharisees whom we encounter in Luke 15:1-2. Jesus was welcoming the very folks whom the religious establishment had written off. Worse, he was at table with them, which was an intimate act of fellowship that implied a ...

1431. 2 Corinthians 5:16-21

2 Corinthians 5:11--6:2

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... In this week’s epistle text Paul reminds his Corinthian audience that they are followers of Christ. As followers of Jesus, they now inhabit a new place, a new relationship, a new reality. Paul begins by offering one of the most compact versions of the gospel ever written: “one has died for all” (v.14). That sacrificial act, and the resurrection which followed, transformed the human condition and made reconciliation a reality for all who are in Christ. Paul describes his own post-conversion experience ...

1432. Valley of Betrayal (Series: Peace in the Valley)

Luke 22:47-53

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... over to the Pharisees and the Romans so that the Son of Man can fulfill his mission on Earth and earn his right to heaven. It is a twisted piece of Gnostic heresy which threatened the early church and manages to be resurrected from generation to generation. In this version Judas is the enlightened one, while the rest of the disciples wander in the dark. Nowhere in the Bible is Judas cast as a hero. And the words of Jesus keep ringing in our ears. Are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss? II. The Problem ...

1433. Discover the Perfect Gift of Christmas

Luke 2:1-7

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... truth is, the most Perfect Gift has already been given to us. I. The Perfect Gift A. The small mountain church was crowded with parents and grandparents. Toddlers wandered in the aisles and around the platform. One of the preschool groups was presenting their version of the Christmas pageant. They were using the baby brother of one of the students as the baby Jesus. As the angels appeared to the shepherds, one little angel lingered behind, near the manger. She was simply fascinated by the baby. As a toddler ...

1434. Does Love Really Make the World Go ’Round? (Series: Real Faith for Real People)

1 John 4:7-21

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... 2 million dollars each trying to be elected mayor of Nashville. A job, mind you, that pays $136,000 a year! Hunger for recognition and status is in our blood stream. For a growing number of the world-wide pornography peddlers, sex, at least a perverted version of it, makes the world go ’round. Pornography is now a 13.3 billion dollar business. Porn web sites draw 72 million visitors a month. Our founder, John Wesley, had a better idea. He believed that love could make the world go ’round. Love, for John ...

1435. John 21:1-19

John 21:1-14

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... to the gospel story. There are Greek vs. Hebrew grammatical discrepancies in this final chapter. But the message, the testimony of an ongoing, faithful community, is the enduring connective tissue that make chapter twenty-one John’s credible conclusion. The opening version of this final chapter consciously endeavors to connect the previous chapter to this addendum. As in 6:1, John refers to the lake as the “Sea of Tiberias.” The partial list of disciples he provides includes “Thomas, called the Twin ...

1436. The Color Wheel of Blindness

John 10:22-42

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... with the old adage “what you see is what you get” is that vision is surprisingly subjective. Ask any police officer trying to get eyewitness reports at the scene of an accident and they will confirm that ten witnesses will give ten very different versions of the event. They eye might be an amazing piece of biological equipment. The eye might be a remarkable camera. The eye might be a feat of unparalleled divine imagination. But the information behind the images the eye spies is processed by our whole ...

1437. Will 2012 Be the End of the World?

Revelation 7:9-17

Sermon

King Duncan

... to allow hope into our lives? Once there was a Quaker minister named Edward Hicks. He depicted God’s promises for the future in a painting which he called “The Peaceable Kingdom.” Some of you may be familiar with that painting. Hicks actually painted several dozen versions of this theme. While Hicks’ technique may seem childish to us now, he gives us a beautiful vision of a world at peace. It is a world where babies can play with wild animals and where people of different races can sit down and eat ...

1438. The Voice of the Shepherd

John 10:1-10

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... was a KJV Bible. He picked it up and discovered it was open to Psalm 59. He began to read, and when he came to the tenth verse he found these words underlined, "The God of my mercy shall prevent me." The word prevent as used in the King James Version of the Bible means "to go before." This is how John Wesley developed the idea of Prevenient Grace. The text means, "The God of my mercy shall go before me." Sure enough, someone had written a paraphrase of the text in the margin, "My God, in His loving-kindness ...

1439. The Inheritance

Colossians 1:11-20

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... in that group because I'm over 50 and to some of our youth and children, that means I'm ancient. But most of us old timers remember S&H Green Stamps and the savings stamps you got at the grocery stores and gas stations. Cigarettes even had their own version in every pack. You collected the stamps and glued them in books. And when you got so many books you could either dig out the catalog or go to the Redemption Center and trade those stamps for some item. Of course it took about a million stamps to get ...

1440. Let's Make A Deal

Luke 16:1-13

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

OK, this morning we're going to play our own version of Let's Make a Deal. I'll give a dollar to whoever has a golf ball in their pocket. And I'll give a dollar to anyone who can show me a set of reindeer antlers. I've got another dollar for the person who brought a Gorilla with ...

1441. John 17:20-26

John 17:20-26

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

The gospel of John is the most conscientiously cosmic of the four different versions we have of Jesus’ life, death, ascension, and resurrection. With his opening words John retells the Genesis creation story with his focus on the indivisible relationship between the Logos and the cosmos, the Word and the world. Logos is that pre-existing relationship which stands before the creation of all ...

1442. Chosen by God

Ephesians 1:1-14

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... , the word always had in it the idea of difference and separation. (Peter referred to us when he talked about our being a holy priesthood, as “God’s own people”. The phrase literally means “a people of God’s possession” The King James’ version translates it “a peculiar people”. (Joke: woman with the kitchen trash and the garbage truck.) That’s not the kind of peculiar people we are to be as people called to holiness. The word peculiar comes from the Latin meaning “a slave is private ...

1443. On the Road with Zacchaeus

Luke 19:1-10

Sermon

James W. Moore

... ve been worried sick about me… that just hearing my voice was the happiest moment of his life… that they’re coming to get me… they’re coming to take me home.” Now… wait a minute… we’ve heard this story before, haven’t we? It’s a modern-day version of The Parable of the Prodigal Son… a story Jesus told long ago to show us how loving and gracious and forgiving God is! When we turn to Him in penitence… When we say to Him, “I’m sorry,”… He is there for us. He runs to greet us ...

1444. The Wise Men: Going Home Another Way

Matthew 2:1-12

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... not at the visible things but at the invisible. The visible things are transitory: it is the invisible things that are really permanent. That’s the new way of seeing. Since Christmas, “An eternal light to glory beyond all comparison,” as the Revised Standard Version puts it, has entered our experience, and we can always go home from Bethlehem by another way. There is a family in this church, the father of which had surgery for malignant brain tumors last week. In the dark, they are learning about the ...

1445. Samaria and Our Spiritual Journey

John 4:1-26

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... she never talked about it. And I had never heard that story before. Here she was, an 85 year old woman, remembering her first experience of the love of God in an orphanage! I’d never heard that Bible verse, but I found it in Psalm 27: 10, (King James Version). She went on to say that all through her life, God had always provided for her, and still was. She felt she had always been surrounded by the providence of God. She’s now 92, and living in a nursing home. Still full of faith, and ready to be with ...

1446. Who Will Cast the First Stone?

John 7:45--8:11

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... a lot of problems for scholars who seek to interpret John Gospel. This particular portion of the text does not appear in the principal Eastern manuscripts of the book. Nor is it found in tile ancient Coptic manuscripts. That is the reason the Revised Standard Version does not include it in the texts but as a footnote. Some manuscripts place the texts in Luke Gospel following Luke 21:38, and some include it in other places of this gospel of John. It is found in Western manuscripts. Jerome included it in ...

1447. That The World May Believe

John 17:20-26

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... be a retreat from the world. Jesus did not pray that we would find a way to escape but that we find victory. The monastery or the convent can never be a model for the life to which Jesus calls us. A life withdrawn from the world is a distorted version of the Christian faith. Sam Shumaker the leading evangelical voice of the Episcopal Church during the past fifty years expressed it powerfully in a poem: “I Stand by The Door”. I stand by the door. I neither go too far in, nor stay too far out, The door is ...

1448. A Sunday Kind of Love

John 16:5-16

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... future. Love is an action. Love is a verb. You can make all the difference! Triangulate the Love . . . Live the Love Triangle. Live “A Sunday Kind of Love:” Lover, Beloved, Love. [You could have someone sing “A Sunday Kind of Love” as your closing, or you could play the Reba version of it, or one of the earlier ones. Or you could just read the lyrics one more time.]

1449. Come Forward to God's Throne Where There Is Grace (Relief for Guilt)

Hebrews 4:1-13

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... Where There is Grace”. It is from the scripture lesson that we get the title. Listen to verse 16: “Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” Today’s English version translates that: “Let us be brave, then, and come forward to God’s throne where there is grace. Now, let me be bold in sounding my thesis. Most of us are ridden with guilt because we do not accept the fact that at God’s throne there is grace ...

1450. When a Person Is Called

Galatians 1:1-10

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... , or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to that which we preached to you, let him be accursed.” Other translations put it even stronger. Today’s English Bible says let that person be condemned to hell. The New International Version says, “Let him be eternally condemned!” Phillips says. “Let him be a ‘damned’ soul!” What sort of arrogance is this? Paul is saying that if anyone preaches a gospel, if anyone takes a stance, other than that which he has taken, let him be ...

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