Sermon and Worship Resources

Synonyms: captured, trapped, catch, took, arrested, grabbed, taken, seized, stuck, apprehended, picked up, entangled, nabbed, jammed, abducted, acquired, got, bagged, gotten, netted, cornered, appropriated, tangled, snared, ensnared

Antonyms: free, freed, unconfined, loose, unrestrained, set free, uncuffed, emancipated, enfranchised, released, ambiguous, flaccid, let go, discharged, unbound, uncaged, unchained, unfettered, unleashed, unshackled, untied, avoided, discounted, disregarded, missed

Showing 201 to 225 of 2233 results

201. The Yestermorrow Eclipse

John 10:1-21

Sermon

... bit more money or a little bit more ability would make all the difference in the world. And an even more deadly implication is that somehow dollar bills or ten more points on an IQ scale will bring abundant life. It’s a product-line feature all of us get caught up in to some extent - the feeling that abundant life is out there awaiting us $10,000, or $20,000, or maybe $30,000 down the road; and once we get there we can really live. Much of the road to Yestermorrow is paved with blacktop from this "If only ...

202. Repent Your Way To A Merry Christmas

Matthew 3:1-12

Sermon

Brett Blair

... minimized, if not altogether eliminated. For many the word repentance is a word that belongs to yesterday. It is equated with sackcloth and ashes and mourners benches. Some see repentance as something that we do only if we get caught. But repentance is far more than simply blurting out "I'm Sorry" if we get caught cheating on the IRS or our wife. Nor is repentance merely turning over a new leaf. I will have to admit that one of my favorite times of the week is Sunday after the evening worship service. The ...

203. Naming the Divine Baby

Matthew 1:18-25

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... , really one of us. He was not a divine superman disguised as a human. He had no x-ray eyes or knowledge of computer technology. He was as human as you or I. He experienced loneliness, illness, and anger. He laughed, played, swam, got spankings, caught fish, built tables, and attended parties. He was tempted. He wept and felt despair. Why is that important? Because if Jesus really experienced our humanness, then he can understand us thoroughly. Bishop Earl Hunt recalls that as a boy of about ten, he had an ...

204. A Tale to be Told

Matthew 23:1-39

Sermon

George Bass

... in Jesus Christ? Luke’s story makes it quite clear that Stephen was something of a sacrificial lamb in the dynamics of the tensions between the two groups of Jews. Even if he had done no miracles nor had not witnessed to Christ, he might have been caught in the middle and been persecuted just the same. Once he had been accused of blasphemy before the council and the high priest and asked by the priest, "Is this so?" Stephen got himself into more trouble. He not only preached a long sermon spelling out and ...

205. Sowing to the Flesh

Romans 8:1-17

Sermon

Dennis Kastens

... living and the dead (something they confess in the Creed almost every time they appear in church). And so they slip away into a few more hours of Sunday morning sleep, or into the backyard, or piously putter around the house under the guise of getting caught up, or maybe at some resort spot where they won’t even so much as have devotions with their family over an entire weekend, or listen to a religious radio broadcast which brings them the gospel they so desperately need. Yes, not only the nonchurched ...

206. Whatever Became of Sin?

Romans 5:12-21

Sermon

Robert G. Tuttle

... hate it and desperately want God’s help to change it, this is repentance and change does come. A Colorado football team was caught in a runaway bus in the Rockies. The brakes had gone. The driver had broken off the gear lever in his attempt to ... reached the bottom, but something was different. One of the players had flung away a dirty sex book he was reading. "I didn’t want to be caught dead with it." he said. In the crisis of facing God, the vulgar book didn’t seem to fit. But it’s not as easy as ...

207. Life - The Womb of the Eternal

Romans 8:18-27

Sermon

Robert G. Tuttle

... I don’t want to be one. I want to stop drinking I know it’s going to be hard. I know you can help me, Jesus. Amen." That kind of prayer opens the door to birth. Jesus found two different kinds of persons in one home. Martha was caught up in and strangled by the burdens of life; Mary was having her mind transformed by catching the spirit of Christ. Martha, made bitter by the burden of having to prepare the meal alone, called out to Jesus, "Master, make her help me." "Martha," Jesus replied, "you are too ...

208. The Call to Obedience

Luke 22:42 · Romans 1:17 · John 15:10

Sermon

Robert G. Tuttle

... authority that I have as a minister or that you have as parents. Only as we listen to the authority of God can we speak with the authority of truth and life to others. There is a story that Kierkegaard tells of the little clown in the circus. The tent caught on fire when it was packed and jammed with humanity. They sent the clown to warn the people. He cried out again and again, "Run for your lives; the tent is on fire. Run for your lives." They slapped their legs and laughed and laughed. The more he cried ...

209. I Knew You’d Come

John 6:16-24

Sermon

Richard Hoefler

... went into the army together. While they were on the battlefield engaged in combat with the enemy, a shell exploded near them. When the smoke cleared away, the one young man saw his buddy some distance from him lying motionless on the muddy ground. Suddenly some soldiers caught hold of his arms and started dragging the young man back to the safety and shelter of the trenches. But the young man cried out, "Let me go! Can’t you see I must get there and help my buddy?" The soldiers pointed out to him that ...

210. In Debt Forever!

Romans 13:8-14

Sermon

Raymond Gibson

... (1 John 5:3) - and Paul agrees when he says, "Therefore love is the fulfilling of the law." If we honestly want to pay our debt of love to God, we love to obey God in all possible ways. We will not steal, not because we are afraid of getting caught, but because we love God too much ever to wound his fatherly heart. We will not commit adultery, not because we are worried about our reputations in the community, but because we love God too much to ever cause him to question the wedding vows we made to him and ...

211. The Therapy of Song

1 Samuel 16:14-23, Exodus 15:1-21, Psalm 5:1-12

Sermon

Robert Noblett

... our spiritual life at its lowest ebb, music can revive us. It can be a veritable channel of grace. One of the earliest records of song that we have in the Bible is found after the children of Israel have successfully crossed the Red Sea, their enemies having been caught in a deluge. In happiness they sing out - I will sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously; the horse and the rider he has thrown into the sea. The Lord is my strength and my song, and he has become my salvation; this is my God, and ...

212. Nicodemus

John 3:1-21

Sermon

... there today that are not looking for more theories--they are looking for what John Wesley called the religion of the warmed heart. Jesus said: Nicodemus, you must be born again. You see friends, it is easy to get caught up in the form of religion and lose touch with the reality of God. We can get so caught up in doing church work, that we fail to be the church. Our intellectual comprehension of the creeds can take precedence over our living the creeds. We can Learn about the Bible and failed to be shaped by ...

213. This Grace In Which We Stand by Dr. Gene E. Bartlett

Romans 5:1-11

Sermon

Leonard Mann

... striving more than we who have never lived under the law Paul knew! What’s the matter with us, then? Haven’t we in fact a law of our own, the secular law, the principle we have been schooled to live by, namely, the law of self-sufficiency? We are caught in the anxiety of a law which says, you ought to be self-sufficient and if you work hard enough you can be. My word, how much suffering that has caused. The one recurring problem I deal with as a pastor is the crisis which finally comes when one like ...

214. To Be Perfectly One

John 17:20-26

Sermon

Allan J. Weenink

... a day die of starvation. Perfect oneness congeals in the depth of our compassion. Even as the compassionate Christ prayed the Father that his love would be evident through the bonds of unity, he implies that expressive action will be the demonstration of how evident it is. St. James caught it in his succinct remarks when he wrote: "What use is it, my brothers, for a man to say he has faith, if his actions do not correspond to it? Could that sort of faith save anyone’s soul? If a fellow man or woman has no ...

215. Family Reunion

Ephesians 2:11-22

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... that side of the Atlantic. It was most uncomfortable to land on a different continent as an absolute stranger, knowing that I would be there a year, for better or worse. The feeling was so bad that had it not been for pride and lack of funds, I might have caught the next plane back. But God was with me. After just a few days I had some new friends. But what really made me feel at home was becoming part of a local Presbyterian church. They even let me preach once in a while, though they regarded my accent as ...

216. Honoring Parents

Exodus 20:1-21, Matthew 15:1-20

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... elderly relatives. Make it a point to say things like this: "Dad, I remember some of my earliest fishing trips with you. You knew I couldn't keep quiet and that I would rock the boat, but you took me anyway. And you let me reel in the fish you caught." "Mom, you remember that time I knocked a baseball through the neighbor's garage window. I ran and hid. But you found me and went with me to the neighbor's house. That was uncomfortable and cost me my allowance for a while, but it taught me something about ...

217. "Almost" Is A Sad Word

Matthew 19:16-30

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... That false god must be de-throned in order for you to experience the glory of God. Verse 22 is one of the saddest statements in scripture: "When the young man heard this, he went away sorrowful; for he had great possessions." The young man had caught a glimpse of a magnificent God-centered way of life. Something in the eyes and spirit of Jesus sent shivers of excitement down his spine. It was as if his whole life had been preparation for his magnificent invitation from Jesus. Instinctively he knew that this ...

218. The Waiting Game

Sermon

James Bjorge

... again. The five wise maidens were sleeping when the bridegroom’s coming was announced with a cry in the night. Why shouldn’t they be? They were ready and waiting. Panic should only belong to the unprepared. God demands only faithfulness from his people. The psalmist caught the mood of relaxation in waiting as he wrote: "it is vain that you rise up early, to go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved in sleep" (Psalm 127:2). So away with the ruinous thinking that ...

219. Chapter VII

Exodus 20:1-21

Sermon

Frank H. Seilhamer

... to share sexual relations only when, and with the partner with whom, they are ready to take full responsibility for the lives they touch as well as those lives that they may bring into the world. Unlike a dog who will chase anything in heat, and when he has caught it, and finished with it, go off on his merry way, God made us to be like himself. That means that we must be prepared to care for those that we love as well as create. So often when sexual relations occur outside of marriage neither that love ...

220. Judgement Day Is Coming

Matthew 13:24-30, Matthew 13:36-43, Matthew 13:47-52

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... say, "You, brother or sister, are going to hell" is judgmental and presumptuous. Jesus warned, "Judge not, lest you also be judged." A FOURTH TRUTH IS THIS: WE MUST FISH WITH A BIG NET. Notice in verse 47 that the net Jesus talked about in his fishing parable caught fish of every kind. If we ever decide in advance that somebody is unreachable for Christ, we have ceased to be a church. We are then a club, not worthy of the name of ChriSt. Listen to the types of people who became Christians and joined the New ...

221. The Snake: A Slick Salesman

Genesis 3:1-24

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... . Don't worry about that warning label on cigarette packages; it won't happen to you." The Evil One whispers, "Some people are dumb enough to pay all taxes due, but you are way too smart for that, and no one will ever find out." "Some people get caught having a little extra-marital fling, but if one is really shrewd, no one will ever know." The devil is an ingenious salesman. Just as he once enticed Adam and Eve with forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden, he still entices us. Seldom does the devil challenge ...

222. A Large Fish Story

Jonah 1:1-17, Jonah 3:1-10

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... this person to tell you his net financial worth, he would tell the truth. If asked to describe his wife he would do so objectively, noting her strengths and weaknesses. But for the life of him he cannot give an honest, accurate description of a fish he caught. When showing you the length of the fish, he cannot restrain his hands. And it's even worse when he describes the fish that got away. I would like to have heard the prophet Jonah describe the fish that swallowed him somewhere in the broad expanse of ...

223. 'Nevertheless': A Word of Faith

Luke 5:1-11

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... . During the night is the time to catch fish. Goodness knows, we tried hard all last night without luck. But here in the morning with the sun dazzling across the water, you can't catch fish. The net will spook them. Besides that, we are dog-tired. I caught myself nodding quite a bit while you were teaching this morning. I need a nap something awful. Master, with all due respect, you know a lot about God and scripture and sin and salvation, but you don't know dip about fishing. I am a professional fisherman ...

224. Judgment Day is Coming (Adapted)

Matthew 13:24-30, Matthew 13:36-43, Matthew 13:47-52

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... in the process. Let the weeds alone. At harvest time we will separate the two." The second story has to do with fishing. Commercial fisherman on the Sea of Galilee used a large square-shaped dragnet or seine net. They pulled it behind a boat, trawling. They caught all kinds of fish. Remember, the Jews were forbidden to eat anything from the water unless it had fins and scales. By the way, I nominate as the bravest person who ever lived the one who first ate an oyster. I can just imagine some cave-woman ...

225. Fear

Matthew 14:22-36

Sermon

Brett Blair

... sustain us. Even in the midst of the storm, when there is nothing but uncertainty. He will take care of you. But I want you to know that faith is a risk taking enterprise. It does not come in a perfect package. I often find myself caught midway between faith and doubt. Peter gets caught between Christ and the crests of the waves. He doubts his walk. He fears the storm. And he falls beneath the waves. This is a great tale of what the church can accomplish if we put our faith in Christ but it’s also a story ...

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