Sermon and Worship Resources

Synonyms: thirstiness, dryness, parched, craving, strong desire, longing, yearning, avidity, hunger, voracity, keenness, eagerness, lust, appetite, passion, love, crave, want, covet, desire, hunger for/after, lust for/after, hanker for/after, have one's heart set on

Antonyms: aversion, distaste, apathy, dislike, hatred, antipathy, disgust, disregard, abhorrence, acrimony, wet, animosity, animus, antagonism, bad feeling, bitterness, be averse to, detestation

Showing 2276 to 2300 of 5000 results

2276. Let Go of the Stone

Mark 16:1-8

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... heard of Dead Man Walking. I guess you could say I am Dead Man Rolling as I go here and there in my wheelchair." Things are not always what they sometimes seem to be. Have you discovered that to be true? Such was the case that first Easter so long ago. Very early on the first day of the week, Mary, the mother of Jesus; Mary Magdalene, a devoted follower of Jesus; and Salome, the mother of James and John; make their way to the tomb to finish the embalming rituals left undone in the darkness of Good Friday ...

2277. We Believe in Jesus Christ

John 20:19-31

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... a child I wondered, did God write it there with a magic pen? As an adolescent, I pondered in a rather cynical way, if Christ is the Answerer, then what is the question? As an adult, I look for it every time I travel that road on dark nights. Not long ago, I drove by it. It is still there. Christ is the Answer. To what is Christ the answer? Christ is the answer to our problem with sin. Christ is the answer to our pardon for wrong doing. God sent his Son; they called him Jesus. He came to love ...

2278. Come, Holy Spirit, Come

Psalm 104:24-34

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... the Lord all my life. I will sing praise to my God while I have being" (Psalm 104:33). Are you still singing all the day long? Is there still a joy in your step, a sparkle in your voice and a song in your heart? What has life done to your song? ... ride more merry-go-rounds. I would pick more daises." What has life done to your song? Are you still singing all the day long? When the day of Pentecost came, glory came down and joy filled the hearts of believers. Outside observers accused them of being drunk. But ...

2279. When God Speaks

Psalm 29:1-11

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not be faint. This scripture took on new meaning for me when I learned what an eagle does in a storm. An eagle knows when the storm is approaching long before it breaks. So with that inner awareness, the eagle flies to some high spot and waits for the winds to come. When the wind hits, the eagle sets its wings so the wind will pick it up and lift it above the storm. While the storm rages below ...

2280. Crying Out of the Depths

Psalm 130:1-8

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... determined not to bend an inch, to be tough, to hold his head up high; then one day in solitary confinement, Tracy took a long look at himself in a mirror. The sight of himself shocked Tracy. Tears began to flow. He began to pray. One of the ... lights arise. I look for him to drive away my night, Yea, more than watchmen wait for morning light. I know, some of you have been waiting a long time for a child to come home, a marriage to be better, a break to come at work, a healing to happen. I just want to say: ...

2281. Marching Forward by Faith!

Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... go and leap forward in faith. Come let's take a closer look. I. TO HAVE FAITH IS TO LOOK UP. I will never forget him as long as I live. He came to my home church in his bib overalls every Sunday and Wednesday. He hardly ever missed. Since he was too poor to ... note inside, “This pump was all right the last time I used it. I put a new sucker washer into it which ought to last a good long while, but the washer dries out and the pump has to be primed. Under the white rock I buried a bottle of water. It's out of ...

2282. Come to the Party

Luke 14:15-23

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... us take a closer look. I. THERE IS A PARTY PREPARED. “Come, everything is now ready” (Luke 14:17). It took me a long time to understand that the Bible is more about feasting than fasting, more about grace than guilt, more about delight than duty. Throughout ... You want to ask, Who’s going to be there? To be stuck at a party with people you don’t like makes for a very long evening. So we check it out. Who else is going to this dinner? Will we be in good company? “I have just bought some property and ...

2283. What is the Future of Marriage?

Mark 12:18-27

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... to marry. Among his many reasons was that his fiancée failed to make him completely happy. Finally the friend said to his buddy, —you don’t need a wife, you don’t even need a dog, you need a goldfish—the pretty kind with the long tail that floats around, looks great and doesn’t need a thing in return. In real marriage, wives are not trophies. Husbands are not gold mines. Marriage is the work of two imperfect craftsmen shaping their dream together. They hammer their conflicts into harmony. They ...

2284. The Fundamentals of Family Ties

1 Corinthians 13:1

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... am married to, why am I here?” Smalley is very clear in saying if you keep your conflicts at the issue level, people won’t get hurt. If we can resolve our differences at the issue level, then we are not hurting people. Or as Lincoln said a long time ago: A house divided against itself cannot stand. What are the ties that bind us one to another in the close quarters of family life? They are enduring commitments. We are together on a promise, a simple promise. We are there out of mutual respect. Everybody ...

2285. Follow

Mark 1:14-20

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... phones or text messages forty-two years ago. E-mail and iPods were not even dreamed of. Even land phones were party lines. So, young teenagers in love back then had to find creative ways to communicate. That's where The Cokesbury Hymnal came in. During long sermons in the little church of our childhood, Sandy and I communicated through song titles. For example, I opened the songbook to “I Need Thee Every Hour" and handed it to her. She passed it back opened to “Open My Eyes That I May See." Encouraged ...

2286. The Forgiving Christ

Mark 2:1-12

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... least of these, you did it for Me! To sin is to miss the mark of God's calling upon our lives and sin is serious business. So Jesus says to a paralyzed man in a sudden interrupted sort of way, five words, “Son, your sins are forgiven." In the long run I don't need justice, I need mercy! Our deepest need is not for fairness, but for forgiveness. That brings us to the second three words of this sermon. II. FORGIVENESS IS FREE. In Verse 10 we read, “But that you may know that the Son of Man has ...

2287. Why Am I a Christian?

Mark 1:4-11

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... 'm still not sure I can grasp the wonder of it all. When I first professed faith in Christ as an eleven-year-old kid, living ten miles from the nearest sin, I was more interested in friendship than forgiveness, acceptance than atonement. What I found was a deep, abiding, long lasting understanding of friendship of a divine kind. When I'm scared, I sing. I figure my singing will even cause the devil to run. When I can't remember the words to a song, I just make up my own as I go along. Back in 1997, when I ...

2288. From Laziness to Passion

Psalm 51:1-12

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... , And He's coming by and by, And He'll find me hoeing cotton when He comes. He'll be crowned by saints and angels, They'll be shouting out Hosanna! And I'll kneel among my cotton when He comes. My father used to say "People rust out long before they wear out!" Are you still in the game, the game of life? There is another definition of passion. Passion is from the Latin "passio," meaning 'suffering' or 'to suffer with'. I handle sloth by learning to suffer with another. Think about that for a moment. So we ...

2289. From Pride to Humility

Luke 18:9-14

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... else. “I'm better than," or “I'm worse than," or “I wish I could make up to…". You know what that's like. It lingers in the human soul. C.S. Lewis once said, “A proud man is always looking down on things and people, and of course as long as you are looking down, you cannot find God because God is always above you." The need to compare. Why? Why? I may not be the best person in the world, but I'm better than the hypocrites up at your church." — Pride. Our church preaches the real Gospel, believes ...

2290. From Envy to Gratitude

Matthew 20:1-16

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... brother. He was out on the farm working, as he had done all his life. When he heard the music and saw the dancing, he was angry and refused to go in. So, his father went out to fetch him, but to no avail. All the father heard was one long outburst of anger about how the son had slaved all these years and never even had a goat for a feast with his friends. Jealousy — envy — hatred — resentment. It runs in the family. It runs in the Christian family. Grace is a wonderful idea until you try to put it ...

2291. Love

John 15:9-17

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... are about to desert Him; Jesus says, “I do not call you servants any longer; the servant does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends" (John: 15). A friend is that unique person who asks “How are you?" and then stays around long enough to hear the answer. A friend is that rare person who comes in when the rest of the world is going out. St. Augustine said, “A friend is someone who knows everything about you and loves you anyway." A Gallop poll revealed that about 94% of Americans ...

2292. Loving Our Enemies, Christian or Crazy?

Matthew 5:43-47

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... to explore and define the breadth and width of neighborliness. What Jews struggle to understand and Eastern religions long to believe, Jesus commanded. The pinnacle of all Christian values lies here. Was Jesus an impractical idealist or ... us. Regrets, I have had a few. How about you? Sometimes I slip and fall, give in to some temptation and people get hurt. For a long time I used bombs to settle conflicts when BB guns would have been sufficient. Ambition can blind me to the needs of others. While I ...

2293. Sexual Ethics for the 21st Century

John 8:1-11

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... and I rejoice in it. B. Fidelity in marriage and celibacy in singleness is grounded in relationship. A banner hanging in a college dorm expressed it like this: “All we want is love and all we get is sex." What we really long for is love and understanding, consideration and compassion, loyalty and constancy, integrity and trustworthiness. That is why commitment is so essential to a meaningful sexual relationship. Over 5.5 million people are living together these days outside the bonds of marriage. They ...

2294. Keeping Company with the Weary

Matthew 11:25-30

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... You will find rest for your souls." This is not an invitation to take a nap in church. I had a youth minister once who made a habit of sleeping through my sermons while sitting beside me in the chancel. Needless to say, he didn't work for me very long. Many will get away this weekend and come back more stressed and tired than when they left. The invitation is not ‘Come, let Me tuck you in bed, hold your hand and sing you to sleep.' That is not what Jesus is saying. There are too many sleeping Christians ...

2295. Loosening Up for Better Production

Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... said there are people like that. They look good on the surface, but they have no roots. They are a mile wide and an inch deep. As long as things are going great, they are fine, but let a drought hit, or a heart break, or a pain strike, and they go to pieces. ... our hearts." There is a rock of greed over there, Father; I can't budge it and that tree of guilt near the fence, its roots are long and deep. And may I show you some dry soil, too crusty for seed? God's seeds grow better if the soil of the heart is ...

2296. Conversion or Credentialing?

Acts 9:1-5, 10-12, 17-19

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... GIFTED BY BIRTH. He was born in Tarsus, one of the three great intellectual centers of his time. It was a cosmopolitan city offering Paul a plethora of cultural experiences as a child. His parents raised him in the Jewish faith, even though they lived a long way from Jerusalem. Because of some connection of his well-to-do father with the Roman world, Paul became a Roman citizen, something that saved his life years later. In a Hank Ketchum cartoon, Dennis the Menace in trouble again laments, “I didn't ask ...

2297. The Resurrection and Life

John 11:32-44

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... is the real center of your universe? Some might respond: it is my home and family—that is a noble thing to say. Those of us wedded to our work will certainly say, my work, take that away and everything is gone. I used to say my health—as long as I have my health I am content. This is that one great thing I know today — Jesus Christ is the resurrection and the life, those who believe in Christ will live, even though they die. And whosoever lives and believes in Christ will never die. To believe that ...

2298. Living on the Easter Side of Life

Colossians 3:1-4

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... leaders. Maybe most of us are. Parents, teachers and employers help us understand who we are, or sometimes put thoughts in our minds that take a long time to get rid of. My parents never thought I would amount to much. I was the only kid around a crowd of adults so ... t such an imposition And I went three times that year I lost my dad. Well, I finally read the Good Book, And I took a good long hard look, At what I'd do if I could do it all again And I loved deeper, and I spoke sweeter, and I gave forgiveness I ...

2299. Dancing with the Saints

Colossians 1:1-14

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... as they gamely give themselves over to the music (and their professional dancing partner), we find ourselves rooting for them . . . at least I do… hoping they can pull it off and find that dancing muse that guides the feet of all two-year olds. Secretly, we all long to dance among the “stars.” Even if you know nothing about the roots of jazz, or have never listened to a Dixie-land band, it’s a safe bet that you know one old standard, “When the Saints Go Marching In.” And you hear Louis Armstrong ...

2300. Mary, Martha, and the Martha Stewart Church

Luke 10:38-42

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... spiritual needs. Our soul needs only “one thing.” No matter what your denomination. No matter if your spiritual temperament is exuberant, reserved, flamboyant, or meditative. Whether your soul craves cathedrals, or soars under the blue dome, it is all the same as long as we have that “one thing.” That “one thing” is Jesus. In today’s gospel text Martha, the mistress of the house, rushes around trying to make sure everything is perfect. Martha is like some first century Martha Stewart. She is ...

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