Sermon and Worship Resources

Showing 151 to 175 of 990 results

Sermon

Nancy Kraft

The season is upon us once again. Around this time every year we can expect the annual cycle to bring us to this special season when we are intentional about carving out extra time in our lives for that which is most important to us. It's not like other times of the year. Instead, during this season, for many of us, our thoughts and our conversations take a distinctively different focus. Of course...

152. Uncle Abraham

Sermon

William G. Carter

I have good news for you this morning. None of you are good enough to be here. Sorry about that. I thought I saw a few of you flinch. Maybe I need to be a bit more sensitive in how I begin. Let me try again. I have good news for you this morning: God is not impressed with a person in this room. By the look on some of your faces, I'm not sure that was any better way to start a sermon. Give me on...

153. Abraham Believed God

Sermon

Richard W. Ferris

Abraham believed God. What more powerful statement of faith can there be than those three simple words? Abraham believed God. Let's make a very important distinction about this statement. It doesn't say that Abraham believed in God. It says, "Abraham believed God," and because of his belief in what God said, Abraham was credited with righteousness. It wasn't just that Abraham believed "in God" as ...

154. Proper 5, Pentecost 3, Ordinary Time 10

Bulletin Aid

Amy C. Schifrin

Confession And Absolution Leader: Gracious God, you call us to follow you into places that we would rather not go. You call us to follow you where healing is needed. You call us to follow you so that we might be made well. All: We confess our sins to you, trusting that your mercy was intended for us. Silence for self-examination Leader: In the name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, your fait...

155. Proper 5

Bulletin Aid

B. David Hostetter

READINGS Psalter--Psalms 33:1-12 First Lesson--Abram is called out to begin a faith journey that will make of him and Sarai his wife a great nation to bring blessing to all nations favorable to them and their descendants. Genesis 12:1-9 Second Lesson--Paul explains how Abraham is deserving of the title father of the faithful. Romans 4:13-25 Gospel--Jesus is not fussy, like the Pharisees, about the...

156. Second Sunday in Lent

Bulletin Aid

B. David Hostetter

READINGS Psalter—Psalm 22:23-31 First Lesson—Abram’s name is changed to Abraham as God makes a covenant with him to provide a successor/son through Sarah his wife. Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16 Second Lesson—Paul uses the example of Abraham and Sarah as a model of trust in God’s promises of salvation. Romans 4:13-25 Gospel—Jesus rebukes the idea that his mission can be accomplished without suffering and s...

157. Lent 2

Bulletin Aid

Amy C. Schifrin

Confession And Absolution Leader: In the name of the Father, and of the Son, + and of the Holy Spirit. All: Amen. Leader: Gracious God, you call into existence the things that do not exist. You give life to the dead and new life to the living. All: Break open our hearts, that what is in us might be poured out before you. You have come into the world, O Lord, not to condemn us, but that we might be...

158. Lent 2

Bulletin Aid

B. David Hostetter

READINGS Psalter - Psalms 121:1-8 First Lesson - Abraham's response to God's election is readiness to leave the past behind and begin the journey of faith. Genesis 12:1-4a Second Lesson - To be children of Abraham is to know the salvation possible through faith in God's grace, not perfect obedience. Romans 4:1-5, 13-17 Gospel - Rebirth by the Spirit is as mysterious as the source of the winds. Joh...

159. Proper 5

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

Theme: The call. The book of Hosea is one long plea for the people to turn their hearts to God. The Genesis 12 text and the Second Lesson present the call of Abraham. The Gospel lifts up the call of Matthew, a tax collector regarded as a notorious sinner. When criticized for dining with sinners, Jesus responds: "I came not to call the righteous, but sinners." COMMENTARY Lesson 1: Genesis 12:1-9 ...

160. Lent 2

Sermon Aid

George Bass

THEOLOGICAL CLUE Lent is structured so that those who keep it will go through devotional exercises designed to bring about conversion of the penitent to the life in Christ. Lent is really the altar (font) call of the church, at which the believers will find forgiveness of their sins and renewal of the gifts God gives in baptism to those who will have him as their God in Jesus Christ. Sunday is se...

161. Lent 2

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

COMMENTARY Old Testament: Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16 God establishes his covenant with Abraham and his descendants. Like the covenant with Noah, it is an eternal covenant. Unlike that covenant, the beneficiaries of this covenant are Abraham's descendants exclusively. God promises to multiply his progeny so that nations and kings come from his line. As a result of this new relationship, the names of Ab...

162. Enduring the Trials of Faith

Sermon

Richard Gribble

“In the seventh year of his reign, two days before his 65th birthday, in the presence of a full consistory of cardinals, Jean Marie Barette, Pope Gregory XVII signed an instrument of abdication, took off the fisherman’s ring, handed his seal to the Cardinal Camerlengo and made a curt speech of farewell.” So begins the power novel The Clowns of God, the second volume of a trilogy of tales about pop...

163. Lent 2

Sermon Aid

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

OLD TESTAMENT TEXTS The themes of sin and death, which have been central to the Lenten Old Testament lessons up to this point, give way to divine promise of life and blessing in Genesis 12:1-4a . Psalm 122 takes the divine promise of life and blessing into the setting of worship, where it functions both as a song of praise to God for the gift of peace and salvation, and as encouragement to the w...

164. To Cross Over

Sermon

Dr. Ronald Love

British writer Philip Norman completed his third book on the Beatles. This 800 page volume was a biography of Paul McCartney. Before researching the biography Norman thought that McCartney with all his musical talent must be very pleased with himself, only to discover that the opposite was true. Norman said he came to realize that the living rock legend, and I quote, is “also insecure… he’s in his...

165. Knowing, and Known

Sermon

John B. Jamison

He leaned back against the tree and watched the crowds move past. They all looked so young. He smiled a bit as he thought about how young he had been that first time he brought his flocks here to sell. That had been, what, seventy years ago? Maybe eighty? The journey from home to the market hadn’t changed any, but it sure felt like it had. He couldn’t remember ever feeling this tired. He looked do...

166. Faith and Grace

Children's Sermon

Various Authors

Good morning! Today we hear about two words that are popular in church. They are words we use all the time, but we may not know the meaning of them. The two words I’m speaking of are GRACE and FAITH. How many of you have heard those words in church before? (Let them answer.) How many heard the word “grace” already this morning? (Let them answer.) How about the word “faith”? (Let them answer.) To s...

167. Praying the Lectionary: Lent 2

Bulletin Aid

Garth Wehrfritz-Hanson

P: Ancient of days: We praise and thank you that through Abraham and Sarah you were able to give new life, new birth and new hope to them in the old age by making an everlasting covenant with them. We praise and thank you too for giving us new life, new birth, new hope by making your covenant with us through your Son Jesus, our Lord and Savior. God of mercy: C: Hear our prayer. P: Lord God: All th...

168. The Hope Of Peace

Sermon

Sandra Hefter Herrma

Today's epistle lesson shows us Paul's legal training. Throughout his letters to the early Christians, Paul uses the language of the court system to talk about our relationship to God, from seeing Jesus acting as our attorney to this statement -- that we have been justified: that is, acquitted or pronounced innocent. It is not the same word as "virtuous" nor "innocent as a child." It means that, h...

169. Managing Disappointment

Sermon

Clement E. Lewis

Paul wrote to the Romans, "Endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us." (Romans 5:4-5) Of this we can be sure, even though we feel that God has also forgotten us, he hasn't. Some things are not fully understood until we have felt entirely bereft of a...

170. Romans 5: 1-11

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

This week’s epistle text offers the opening salvo in the next section of Paul’s great treatise. After spending the first four chapters establishing the primacy of faith over works, Paul now turns to that which foundationalizes faith: hope. This hope is based upon the founding stories of God’s past acts, as illustrated by the examples of Abraham and Sarah. Their faith in God’s promise of a future, ...

171. The Compleat Christian

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

The profile of a mature Christian is marked by suffering, endurance, character and hope. Paul boldly asserts that we are justified by faith through grace - denying that we can in any manner earn our way toward salvation. He then just as boldly declares that there is a definitive set of virtues, a Christian Complex if you will, that a true disciple should purposefully cultivate and visibly de...

172. Fingerprints of the Soul

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

Unlike "fingerprints," which everyone is born with, we die with soulprints. How deep those soulprints go depends on the depth of our moral character and virtue. Do you know who your patron saint is? Maybe you didn't even know that you were born on the "feast day" of Saint Somebody-or-other. "Feast Day" refers to the death date, not the birth date, of a designated saint. Death dates, rather ...

173. Romans 5:1-5

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

Paul's letter to the Romans immediately conjures up "justification by faith through grace," the catch-phrase of the Reformation, the cornerstone of our postmodern confidence. While it is true that Paul's most eloquent, powerful declarations of this truth are in Romans, that is not the sum total of the letter. In fact, this week's epistle lesson is the transitional point between the two foci of Pau...

174. Romans 5:1-5

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

Although Romans 5:1 clearly starts a new section of Paul's letter, it skillfully builds on all that the apostle has already set forth. The example of Abraham, cited in 4:1-22, surely remains dominant in the minds of Paul's audience as they continue to read about the role endurance, character and hope play in the lives of the faithful. But in 5:1-11, Paul becomes primarily concerned with demonstrat...

175. Romans 5:1-5

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

Showing 151 to 175 of 990 results