Sermon and Worship Resources

Synonyms: touch, feel, sense of touch, tactile sense, tactility, contact, using one's hands, sensation, sense, suspicion, sneaking suspicion, notion, inkling, hunch, fancy, apprehension, presentiment, premonition, foreboding, love, care, affection, fondness, tenderness, warmth, warmness, emotion, sentiment, emotional state, compassion, sympathy, empathy, fellow feeling, understanding, concern, solicitude, solicitousness, tender-heartedness, brotherly love, sensibilities, sensitivities, self-esteem, ego, pride, opinion, belief, view, impression, intuition, instinct, estimation, guess, theory, hypothesis, thought, way of thinking, point of view, atmosphere, ambience, aura, air, mood, climate, character, overtone, undertone, tenor, spirit, quality, flavour, colour, aptitude, knack, flair, bent, talent, gift, skill, art, trick, faculty, ability, propensity, inclination, sensitive, warm, warm-hearted, tender, tender-hearted, caring, soft-hearted, sympathetic, compassionate, empathetic, responsive, receptive, intuitive, thoughtful

Antonyms: bad feeling, acrimony, animosity, animus, antagonism, antipathy, aversion, bitterness, detestation, disgust, dislike, disrelish, enmity, friction, grievances, grudges, hatred, hostility, loathing, malevolence, malice

Showing 1776 to 1800 of 2747 results

1776. Quenching St. Anthony's Fire

Mark 8:27-38

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... God's favor. You, the least, the last, the lost have been called, like Mary, to give birth to the Christ child, to bring Christ to this earth, to make Christ come alive among men and women. There is a popular religious mentality abominating the air today. It says that to find favor with God is to find the perfect boss, the perfect spouse, the perfect child, the perfect colleague, the perfect bishop, or in the case of pastors, the perfect appointment (known in 18th century circles as the "sweet-scented ...

1777. When Too Much Can Be Too Little

Mark 10:17-31

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... , upscaling addresses and automobiles, and clambering up social and economic ladders of "success"? * You don't think it's more than ironic that a culture that finds its greatest security in "things" threatens to destroy the most basic needs of all life on Earth clean air, clean water and enough food for all to eat? * You don't think it's ironic that just when the two-career (or two-job) marriage has become the primary economic form of marriage (even Blondie of comic strip fame has taken an outside job in ...

1778. The World's Fittest Human

Mark 12:28-34

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... strength. Let Jesus coach you as you train in godliness. Love God and neighbor with all your heart, mind, soul and strength. Alternative Sermon Idea In the hit movie, Apollo 13, "the astronauts discover that they are quickly running out of breathable air. The round filter that scrubs their oxygen has reached its capacity, and the only replacement is square in shape. Responding to this crisis at mission control, the director of operations grabs a box of everything that the astronauts have available to them ...

1779. These Are a Few of My Favorite Things

Matthew 10:24-39

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... back; "Old cement sidewalks buckled with tree roots." Some others included "reading garden catalogs with a highlighter"; "James Dickey's poems"; "robins singing early in the morning when you're still half-asleep"; "a first kiss"; "Manhattan, seen from the air by the light of the rising sun"; "waltzing with grandpa"; "dipping sourdough bread in balsamic vinegar"; "having my grown-up daughters as friends"; "company not coming"; "my children saying, 'You know, Dad, you were right after all!'"; "the smell of ...

1780. A Bill of Rights

Matthew 15:(10-20) 21-28

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... of Christ" (NIV). For those who have trouble with "right" and "wrong," how's this for a beginner's "Bill of Rights"? Here are some "absolutes," some "rights" that are "wrongs" when violated: The right to see a clear night sky. The right to breathe clean, fresh air. The right to drink a fresh glass of water. The right to walk along the shore. The right to listen to silence in the night. The right to hear laughter in the morning. Just as we must get the "rights" right, we can no longer hesitate to proclaim ...

1781. The Secret of Living Is Giving

Luke 1:26-38

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... -face kinds of communication. Speeches and sermons are no longer composed to inform and inspire so much as they are sliced and diced into "sound bites" media-designed snack food that too often only sounds good and stays fresh for the three seconds of on-air time their life span is allowed. Postmodern culture does not make it easy to philosophize or theologize about life. What comes easy is a handy slogan we can slap over our unexamined existence so that we feel we are actually headed somewhere. Yet there is ...

1782. Be an Energizer Bunny

1 Corinthians 12:1-11

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... unpredictable, energizing force of the children gathered to listen to it will change it. Everyone else in the congregation feels this tension too and for just a few moments, at least, there is a breath of expectation and of freshness in the air. The kids might say or do something funny, or rude, or horrible, or touching, or beautiful, or truthful and release the energy of that moment, that spirit, over the whole congregation. What could your church do to encourage the appearance of Energizer Bunnies ...

1783. The Lord Needs You

Jeremiah 1:4-10

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... a Rolls Royce? Aren't American dignitaries ferried around in Cadillacs? For Jesus to ride into Jerusalem on a donkey would be the modern-day equivalent of the President of the United States arriving for a state banquet in a 1985 Ford Escort with no air conditioning or radio. G.K. Chesterton's poem called "The Donkey" describes the Lord's chosen mount: With monstrous head and sickening cry And ears like errant wings, The Devil's walking parody On all four-footed things. President Dwight D. Eisenhower told of ...

1784. Stone Testaments

Deuteronomy 26:1-11

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... February 5, 1994, the Markale Market was jammed with Sarajevens. Hundreds of women, children and men came for their weekly outing in search of food and goods. Without warning, a 120 mm mortar shell hit the crowd, exploding in the midst of the open-air market _ tearing heads and limbs from 68 people and spewing blood for yards around. The attack occurred only one block from the infamous May, 1992, bread-line massacre, when 20 women and children were killed in another marketplace assault. It occurred just one ...

1785. Easter Dreams

Luke 24:1-12

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... of its dreamer. Only when the dream is real for one can it become real for all. Not until the dream is real for me can it become real for you. Zippers, Christmas tree lights, quadruple bypass heart surgery, combustion engines, cotton candy, x-rays, air conditioning, flush toilets, matches, eyeglasses, espresso all these things were once dreams in some person's mind. The dreams of others make our lives tasty, pleasant, sometimes even possible. So why is it that we live in a world furnished with the dreams of ...

1786. The S-factor

John 14:23-29

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... every human heart. Jesus offers to banish this emptiness forever. Jesus promised that, through love, he and the Father will "come to" and "make a home in" the hearts of all who love them. Everyone's blood has a clotting factor. In the presence of air, these clotting factors transform your usually liquid blood into a sludgy/solid mass. The basic essence of your blood is completely changed by the clotting factor. Jesus offers a similar life-altering factor to his disciples in the form of the Holy Spirit. This ...

1787. A-wake or A-live

Galatians 2:15-21

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... . One popular, but not terribly effective, scheme was to tuck your own car right up behind any large truck barreling down the highway. The conventional wisdom was that the tremendous draft created by the truck would help "drag" your own vehicle along reducing the air friction on it and thus increasing your own gas mileage. Following in the wake of the truck took some of the effort to move forward off of your own car. For many Christians, following "in Jesus' steps" has become its own kind of spiritual ...

1788. By Faith Living

Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... that first step away from Pharaoh's family and joined his own people and claimed God's promise. The rest was commentary. Where was the victory for Joshua? When he took that first step on his march around Jericho's walls and blew the first blast of air into that trumpet. The rest was commentary. Where was the victory for Nehemiah? When he took that first step and laid down the first new stone on Jerusalem's walls and claimed God's promise. The rest was commentary. Where was the victory for Esther? When she ...

1789. Call the Tribe of Issachar Together

Luke 12:49-56

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... with the violence and indifference that is a constant part of our daily lives. They are, in their own right, "signs of the times." Ignoring the approach of a tornado doesn't offer any protection from its winds. You will fly just as high into the air with your eyes closed as with them open. Few can testify to the power of shifting winds more effectively than those who were ousted from public office in the fall '94 elections. Many politicians suddenly found themselves the latest victims of what I call a ...

1790. Who Are the Encouragers?

Luke 14:1, 7-14

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... word." It's hard for us to imagine such a place. From the moment we flick on the early news to get the traffic report, we are bombarded by "discouraging words" all day long. Crime is up, stocks are down; there is global warming, natural resources are dwindling and the air is the color of the lint under your bed. Your boss blames you, your coworkers resent you; your dog bit you, your spouse is glowering at you and the kids are whining at you. Who wouldn't want to "git along" and be a cowboy? Some of the most ...

1791. Fan the Flames

2 Timothy 1:1-14

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... . The Holy Spirit's continued presence with us acts like a bellows to the flames we tend in our hearts. If we ignore the presence of this "spirit of power," cut ourselves off from the possibility of a living spirit within us, we shut down our own air supply. 2. Love-Perfect Living: It is not enough simply to fan the flames of faithfulness within ourselves. Until we open ourselves up to others and let the warmth of this fire spread though our family, our friends, our church, our community, it is bound to ...

1792. Out of the Box Gifts

Luke 1:26-38

Illustration

Leonard Sweet

Three days before the first big winter storm hit, the phone rang. It was "Odie," the local plumber, volunteering to come over and do some work. He offered to drain out the hot water tanks and outside pipes ahead of the blast of arctic air headed our way. "Odie" wasn't trying to drum up any business for himself. In fact, if all our pipes burst he would make a lot of money repairing the damages. He was simply thinking of others and offering the gift of his unique talents to help out a family ...

1793. 1 Corinthians 12:1-11

1 Corinthians 12:1-11

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... not only are all the various manifestations of the Spirit we experience in the Church God-given. They are for the "common good." How completely annoying it is for the proud and proper mainliners to be told that those enthusiastic, hands-in-the-air, hollering-in-the-aisle charismatics are for their common good. Equally disgruntling to proponents of "the-louder-the-better" pentecostalism is the notion that some stereotypical liberal gadfly is also for the common good. But Paul's words allow us no escape. He ...

1794. John 20:19-31 [Genesis 2:5-24]

John 20:19-31 [Genesis 2:5-24]

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... red earth into human form and then kisses us to life with the divine "breath" - in Hebrew ruach, in Greek pneuma, in Latin spirare. In its first meaning, spirituality is nothing more nor less than coming alive to life. Aliveness is from God. God enspirits us, breathes air into us. God is the breath of life in us, making us alive to life. In Ecclesiastes, for example, Qoheleth writes that "God takes back our ruach and we die." When God withdraws breath, the body deflates like a leaky tire (Ps. 104:29; Job 34 ...

1795. 2 Kings 4:8-17

2 Kings 4:8-17

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... is worthy of her making special efforts on his behalf. Verse 10 elaborates just how genuine these efforts are. It was not uncommon for households to allow visiting friends or family to pitch a temporary tent on the roof. The breeze of the cool night air kept the visitors comfortable until they picked up their tents and moved on. But this situation is not what the Shunammite woman proposes. Her vision is an actual room for her holy guest. This roof chamber is to have "walls," giving it both permanence and ...

1796. Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-19

Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-19

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... God created the world ex nihilo. Today that assumption encompasses a great number of people - even those who wouldn't necessarily define themselves as "faithful." Faith allows us to take for granted the continued working of other "things unseen" - such as gravity, air, time. The lectionary text now skips to verses 8-19, a section that encompasses three distinct units. First, in verses 8-12, the author replays some of the most significant events in the miraculous life of the patriarch Abraham, using each ...

1797. Matthew 2:13-23

Matthew 2:13-18, Matthew 2:19-23

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... then plays a dual purpose itself. First, it adds authenticity to Jesus' later life and ministry by providing evidence that Jesus' messianic identity had been with him since birth. But the voice of the Old Testament speaking through the Matthean narrative also lends an air of authority to the Gospel writer himself. Verses 19-23 conclude Matthew's infancy stories with a final tale of Joseph's obedience. The angel of the Lord finds Joseph yet again. This time the news is good, although it also requires another ...

1798. 1 Corinthians 12:1-11

1 Corinthians 12:1-11

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

1799. John 20:19-31 [Genesis 2:5-24]

John 20:19-31 [Genesis 2:5-24]

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

1800. Revelation 21:10, 22-27

Revelation 21:10, 22-27

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... space designed to enhance God's presence or Christ's rule. It would be as superfluous as our designating certain parts of our cities as having oxygen for us to breathe. By definition planet Earth has an atmosphere that provides oxygen - it is found everywhere there is air. So with the divine presence in the New Jerusalem. Just as the dimensions of the temple's Holy of Holies had been spelled out in 1 Kings 6:16-22, John describes the vast size of this Holy City's dimensions in verses 15-17. Rather than ...

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