Sermon and Worship Resources

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Showing 2201 to 2225 of 4963 results

2201. A Faith-Life To Emulate John W. Cobb

Genesis 12:1-8

Sermon

... to try to understand his place in salvation history. Abraham was decisive. Scripture does not reveal to us the circumstances surrounding the cause of the migration of Terah’s family from Ur of the Chaldees toward Canaan but for some reason the caravan stopped at Haran, remaining there until the death of Terah. Did the patriarch become ill? Was there need for a period of organization? For whatever cause the caravan halted. The father died. Now, a decision had to be made, as is so many times the need in the ...

2202. Jacob’s Dream - A Dream Come True W. Dexter Moser

Genesis 27:1-40

Sermon

... be to me?" They, the Hittite women, had made life bitter for Isaac and Rebekah. (Genesis 26:34) Jacob’s mind reeled and flashed, and another vision out of his memory came to mind as he shifted his position on the firm ground at Bethel as the rock pillow remained in place. It would be most difficult for anyone of us to erase the memory of the real struggle he seemed to have with his mother, prior to Isaac’s blessing being given to him. After hearing Rebekah’s plea to send him off to Uncle Laban, he ...

2203. A Noble Patriotism John D. Mauney, Jr.

Exodus 2:11-25

Sermon

... would carry an extremely heavy penalty. But his motives were good and his heart was true. He merely needed a discipline to prepare himself further for his mission; discipline he would develop in forty years of wilderness wanderings as he and his people remained in prolonged exile. Now we are beginning to understand something of the character of Moses, who was to become the Lawgiver of Israel. These verses illustrate his passion for justice, his impatience with wrong, his hot temper (of which there will be ...

2204. When God Provides, It’s a Manna Miracle James G. Cobb

Exodus 16:1-36

Sermon

... to tell someone ‘thank you’ and share the joy." The woman left and, by the way, her entry had been with conditions: she wouldn’t tell me her name or her school and she made no promises about church or anything else and so, to this day, she remains an anonymous visitor. I believe she was directing her thanks to God for a life-line, for a blessing, for a rescue and for saving of her life! In light of the Exodus text, real life continues to produce God’s gracious provisions for our salvation. To this ...

2205. A Taste of God's Tomorrow

Matthew 14:13-21

Sermon

Glenn L. Borreson

... and there had been tempted to turn stones into bread to dull the gnawing pains in his stomach. In today's Gospel he is pursued by crowds of people who invade his privacy, receive his ministry of healing, and then - as if that's not sufficient - remain on the doorstep of life hungry. One more need to be met. Always something more: one more blind man, one more cripple, one more beggar, one more, one more - enough to make a person scream for a moment's peace. Amazingly, however, Jesus screams not for ...

2206. The Choice

Matthew 16:13-20

Sermon

... the living God," his very destiny changed. On my recent trip to the Holy Land, we made a stop at Caesarea Philippi. There is no city there now, only a busy national park. But in that park, carved into the red and brown rock walls, there remain religious shrines from the time of Jesus. Places had been hammered out of the rock so that religious figurines could be positioned there and worshiped. As a person walked around that locale, you realized that there must have been a god for every religious preference ...

2207. An Easier Way?

Matthew 16:21-28

Sermon

... that doesn't make the way of Christ easier, a society in which a late night talk show host reports on the Pope's recent visit to America by saying, "The Pope's gone. Let's sin!" Such remarks are good for laughs, but nothing more. All our old ways remain firmly imbedded within us. So how does God create new people? In our dying and in our rising, in our "letting go and letting God," in our going the way of the cross. The human beings you and I become take their shape by the crosses we have borne. I ...

2208. Fifth Sunday of Easter

John 14:1-14, Acts 7:55-60, 1 Peter 2:2-10

Bulletin Aid

... your church renewed growth in our society. We pray through Christ. Amen. Hymns "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God" "Faith Of Our Fathers" Second Lesson: 1 Peter 2:2-10 Theme: Rid yourselves of evil and be God's people Call to Worship Pastor: Consider the sins that remain a part of your life-style, and get rid of them! People: We have experienced the Lord's kindness, and need to grow in Christian living. Pastor: Let God use you to establish his kingdom on earth, that others who do not know God's mercy may receive ...

2209. Weightlifting

Matthew 11:25-30

Sermon

... reading the assigned text again, I began to wonder why the rest that Jesus offers has to be connected to a yoke. Why, in Weatherhead's story, didn't Jesus tell the farmer to let the ox go free? It had done its work. Why not let it finish its remaining days in rest? Why did it need a yoke at all? My problem, of course, is not with oxen. It is with people. Why does our promise of rest have to be coupled with bearing a yoke? Why couldn't Jesus simply say, "I will take from you all burdens ...

2210. Invincible Harvest

Matthew 13:1-23

Sermon

... my own concerns. I think I know what the other person is going to say even before the first word is spoken. I am suspicious that nothing new will be said; I begin to listen with the feeling that "I've heard all this before." I am content to remain passive, putting the whole burden of communication on the speaker. It is a difficult thing to listen well. Perhaps this is also why preachers tend to focus on the soils in Jesus' parable of the sower. Preachers are no different than the rest of us and they know it ...

2211. A Renewed Call

Isaiah 49:1-7

Sermon

... then we see Elijah fleeing for his life to Horeb and a cave because Ahab's Queen Jezebel has threatened to kill Elijah the prophet. Elijah tells Yahweh of the worthlessness of his life, his mission, his work. He claims to be the solitary faithful Israelite remaining alive. What's the use, Lord? Jeremiah of Anathoth was also called by Yahweh God from his birth to be a prophet of the Lord. Jeremiah undertook the mission to speak the Word of the Lord to the people of Judah. But Jeremiah found himself without ...

2212. Dog: Man's Best Friend?

Exodus 12:1-30

Sermon

... and the Lamb." Henry H. M. Nouwen, in his book, The Way of the Heart, tells of three fathers who used to go and visit blessed Anthony every year; two of them used to discuss their thoughts and the salvation of their souls with him, but the third always remained silent and did not ask Anthony anything. After a long time, Abba Anthony said to him, "You often come to see me, but you never ask me anything." The other replied, "It is enough to see you, Father." Our Lamb is sufficient, he is enough - we need no ...

2213. Communion Is Refreshment

Mark 14:12-26

Sermon

... and soothe his parched throat. In Palestine during the afternoon, a warm and oftentimes a scorchingly hot wind blows in from the desert. The heat it generates can wither vegetation when it is at its worst. It always sent people running for shade and cover ... no one remained in the open with no protection - unless of course it was a tragic figure slumped on a cross on a shadeless hill. As you remember, Jesus was pinned to that cross in the morning hours of Good Friday. Before that, he had been beaten with a ...

2214. Mi Casa, Su Casa

Matthew 21:33-46

Sermon

Mark Radecke

... buy the paint, provide the labor and, before they moved, return the room to its original hue. The landlord, wearied by the unkept promises of former tenants and therefore wary of this proposal, refused. And so the color of the room remains symbolic of their relationship: off-white, colorless, cautious, dull. Landlords and tenants engage in a symbiotic relationship: the landlord’s real interest is in investment. Tenants are a necessary risk inherent in the investment. The tenants’ real interest is in a ...

2215. "He Who Commands Is He Who Fulfills"

Matthew 22:34-40

Sermon

... is called for, some pious - or perhaps impious - platitudes are mouthed. And the heart of God is grieved, for the scribes and Pharisees are with us still, and the love command is honored more in the breach than in the keeping. By evangelical insight, there remains another problem. Love God, love your neighbor may be the great and only commands, but they are still and yet precisely that: commands. And if it is doubtful that one can command people to kneel reverently, how much more in doubt is it that one ...

2216. If the Son Makes You Free

John 8:31-41

Sermon

... awe and wonder; to fascinate; to add a note of grace to this world’s dreary song." "Oh, how very poetic of you," said the second. "And also very naive. There’s death and danger all about us, every moment. It’s all we can do to remain inconspicuous and look unappetizing without having to worry about inspiring and fascinating others." "Oh, I’m not worried about it at all," said the first. "If only we do what we’re created and gifted to do, the inspiration and the fascination will follow." "I don’t ...

2217. The Gift That Claims Our Response

Matthew 22:1-14

Sermon

... the church’s calling. Being on the ship, being a member, being inside the banquet hall is not sufficient. In fact, it’s only the first step, an important step, but only the first of many yet to come. The real issue for us has to do with remaining open to the continuing change and growth which God expects in return for the gift of salvation. Richard Carl Hoefler has put it succinctly this way, "Salvation is not a product we possess but a process in which we participate." (Ibid., p. 120) It’s a process ...

2218. Who is Greatest Among You ...

Matthew 23:1-39

Sermon

... in the curriculum. Students would sometimes sign up for one of his religious courses two or three semesters in advance just to be assured of a place in the class. If his classes were often closed because they were filled to capacity, his home remained opened, and students were always welcome there. He could call almost anyone in any of his classes by his or her first name - no small feat since his students numbered six or seven hundred per semester. Although this professor lived within easy walking distance ...

2219. An Intimate Conversation and an Exclusive Covenant

Exodus 19:1-25

Sermon

... sleep to the clacking of train wheels on steel rails after an encounter with a workman in a burning city dump (from his The Unexpected Universe). The man had lifted up a pitchfork from which dangled, not a dead infant as Eiseley first thought, but the remains of an old radio, its insides dangling toward the ground. "What has happened to all of the messages, all the communications? Have they been stopped permanently?" This much we know: The voice of God will go out to the ends of the earth, and people will ...

2220. The Penalty for Betraying God’s Trust

Numbers 27:12-23

Sermon

... , and in all ways, they can. The Christians of China are a living example for the rest of us of keeping God’s trust. When their churches were closed, when they were forbidden to gather for worship or do anything else in the name of their God, they remained faithful to God in the face of persecution and all sorts of hardships. They knew that God was sustaining them and blessing their efforts to keep the faith. The result is that the Christian church is stronger in China now than it was before the cultural ...

2221. Judgment and Justice

Amos 5:18-27

Sermon

... since the cultural revoluation in 1966. There were about 400,000 Protestants in 1949; today there are at least four million and possibly as many as seven million Protestants. The Roman Catholic population, which underwent extremely severe persecution, has remained about the same. The Christians continued to worship and they made an impact upon other people by their humility and genuine interest in the welfare of others which continues today. Thousands of people continue to be attracted to Christianity ...

2222. What the End Will Be Like

Zephaniah 1:4-13

Sermon

... said, "I felt more poignantly than even the human mystery." He explains, I lean against a fountain. Old women come up to draw water: of their drama I shall know nothing but these gestures of farm servants. A child, his head against a wall, weeps in silence: there will remain of him in my memory only a beautiful child forever inconsolable. I am a stranger. I do not enter into their empires. Man in the presence of man is as solitary as in the face of a wide winter sky in which there sweeps, never to be tamed ...

2223. The Shepherd King

Revelation 7:9-17

Sermon

... together again. The bridge was put back together successfully, but they had to use nails and bolts to achieve this result. The mystery of how the building of the bridge was originally accomplished, like that of the resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ, remains to this day, and will probably always be, a mystery. In both cases, the best people can do is affirm and accept by faith the mysteries they represent. Our chancel painting of the Christ in Glory commands, "Believe! Believe!" But it says nothing ...

2224. The City Unshakeable

Psalm 46:1-11, Hebrews 12:25-29

Sermon

... other. We will probably find at least some of those behind the crime and may even, in the long run, be able to make terrorism so costly to perpetrators that it will diminish. I certainly hope so. But whatever comes, if we trust God, our citizenship in the city unshakeable remains secure, and that helps us live in this world with hope, and courage, and even joy.

2225. Story of the Lord's Day

Acts 11:19-30

Illustration

Staff

... experience was less and less satisfying to them. Gradually, as their Saturday worship diminished in its importance to them, the importance of their Sunday experience increased immensely. At last, instead of having two days of worship, they had only one, the only remaining one, Sunday - and they called it the Lord's Day. On this day each week they arranged to meet in small groups somewhere - in their homes, in caves or catacombs - wherever they could. In Antioch they were first called Christ Followers, or ...

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