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 2376 to 2400 of 4456 results

2376. The End of Babel

Genesis 11:1-9, Acts 2:1-13

Sermon

Dr. Raymond Bailey

The time of Pentecost was a joyous one in the lives of the Jewish people.In contrast to Passover, where they ate unleavened bread to commemorate the solemn passage out of Egyptian slavery, they baked yeast bread of the first harvest of grain of the new growing season. The feast of Pentecost always occurred on Sunday, fifty days after Passover. Jewish pilgrims came from all over the world to be in the holy city for that celebration. Jesus died during Passover. He, however, came alive, conversed with His ...

2377. The Prodigal Nation

Luke 15:11-32

Sermon

Erskine White

Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son. (Luke 15:21) I once knew a young couple, a husband and wife, who won the grand prize on a TV show called "The One Hundred Thousand Dollar Pyramid." One night, they showed me a videotape of the show and I saw them there on television, jumping up and down and screaming like people do on game shows. They won more money than they had ever imagined, an American dream come true. But winning all that money really ...

2378. The Kingdom of God Is Like… a Joke!

Luke 10:25-37

Sermon

Steven Burt

The story of the good Samaritan is perhaps the most misunderstood of all Jesus’ parables. We’ve lost sight, over the nineteen centuries since Jesus told it, of its real impact. Since we’re not familiar with the original context in which its hearers heard it, we’ve seen it reduced to a good neighbor story, a Boy Scout doing a good deed a day, a driver stopping to help a little old lady change a flat tire. The emphasis is on the good Samaritan, the one who stops to help. Although that’s a wonderful value to ...

2379. Illusion Or Reality?

Sermon

Harold Warlick

Back in the mid 1970s to early 1980s hypnosis was viewed as a major cure for many of society's ills. If you had a problem with being overweight, smoking cigarettes, drinking too much, or being a juvenile delinquent, many professional hypnotists would, for a hefty fee, offer their services to hypnotize your problems away. The church I pastored in Texas at the time contained among its members some overweight women with a passion for improving their bodies. These women had apparently tried everything they ...

2380. What Will He Find ... When He Comes?

Luke 18:1-8

Sermon

Theodore F. Schneider

Every pastor has been touched and troubled when there have been those in the congregation who suddenly have faced unemployment. Like an ambush from two sides, unemployment attacks us with the fear of financial insecurity on the one side and the loss of self-esteem on the other. Job searching can deepen both. In just such a moment I encountered Brian. He is a competent and creative person whose skills and personality cannot be long overlooked. "It will work out, Brian," I said. "God does provide." "I hope ...

2381. A Faith, A Farm And A Family

Ruth 1:1-22

Sermon

John P. Rossing

John Denver wrote a song 20 years ago about wanting to get away from the big city to a place in the country - "somewhere to build me a faith, a farm and a family." The story of Ruth reminds me of that song, because it's about simple people living on the land, and about the strength they draw from faith and family. The story starts by telling us it took place "in the days when the judges ruled." Those were days of dreadful battles between God's people and their enemies, of mighty warriors and great heroes ...

2382. Water Without Price

Revelation 20:1-7

Eulogy

Richard F. Bansemer

Death of a non-church goer The meditation text is Revelation 21:6: "To the thirsty I will give water without price from the fountain of the water of life." The good news of God's gospel seems too good to be true, doesn't it? God says, "To the thirsty I will give water without price." By contrast, the world says, "everything has a price tag."You know how true this is. Order a cup of water in some fast-food restaurants, and they will charge you for it. They say that it's for the container. Everything in life ...

2383. The Spirit and the Truth

John 16:5-16

Sermon

George Bass

"Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty" is one hymn that will never be deleted from our hymnals. Many of us cut our religious and theological "eye teeth" on it after we were weaned from the hymns of Sunday school days and childhood. We may never forget - and may continue to sing, on occasion - those gospel hymns that were so easy to learn and to love. They were so simple and so totally oriented to the Bible stories we learned, but we didn’t always see the connections between the hymns and the stories. How ...

2384. The Two Washings

John 13:1-17

Sermon

Dean Lueking

On this Maundy Thursday let us ponder again the Cross of Christ our Savior and its consequences for us all. One way to approach such a task as this is to direct our thinking to two washings that take place in connection with the passion of Christ. The first one is described by the Evangelist Matthew: So when Pilate saw that he was gaining nothing, but rather that a riot was beginning, he took water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, "I am innocent of this man ‘s blood, see to it yourselves." ( ...

2385. Whose Meal Is It?

Exodus 12:1-30

Sermon

Family meals are important, interesting experiences. They are not only a physical gathering of the persons but a gathering of all that each of those persons is and represents. They are a gathering of beings, ideas, experiences, and memories. It is important to have gatherings of the family around a meal, whether it is your immediate family or the extended family of which you are a part. Family meals make a difference. I love to sit around the table after a meal and hear one after another of the family say ...

2386. Pentecost 4

Psalm 100:1-5, Genesis 25:19-34, Exodus 19:1-25, Romans 5:1-11, Matthew 9:35-38, Matthew 10:1-42

Sermon Aid

THEOLOGICAL CLUE The eschatological stance of the church year continues to throw its theological aura around the assigned readings for the day. It insists that the call to the ministry of the church and the proclamation of the gospel began with the calling and naming of the disciples, and that the church must establish evangelism as its outward thrust and its reach into the world. The church is evangelical by the work and definition accorded it by Jesus Christ; its business is the Word of God, and ...

2387. The Prodigal Prince

2 Samuel 14:1-33

Sermon

Whispering unheeded advice to a Bloomington-bound scholar boarding a Greyhound. Masking a stray tear with mascara as your princess parades down the aisle to Mendelssohn and her prince. Waving farewell to your favorite recruit as he stands among the gaggle of GIs clustered in the chill predawn light of an airport runway. AT&T words flying with magic carpet speed as you urge your San Francisco-based son to eat more, spend less, and get to bed on time. You long for a glimpse of your daughter’s baby boy, but ...

2388. Free and Faithful

Matthew 4:1-11

Sermon

Robert Bachelder

Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted ... - Matthew 4:1 In Huxley’s Brave New World, Savage is contending with Mustapha Mond, the world controller. Savage’s sensibility has been shaped by the Bible and Shakespeare, readings no longer allowed to the public. He complains to Mond about the antiseptic quality of life in the new society. The controller says to him: "We prefer to do things comfortably." Savage rejoins: "But I don’t want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want ...

2389. Genuine Imitations

1 Thessalonians 1:1-10

Sermon

Raymond Gibson

In the fantastically successful movie, "The Empire Strikes Back," the viewers are invited to continue their involvement in the adventures of the heroes and villains of the first movie, "Star Wars." Once again we find ourselves engaged with Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Chewbacca, Princess Leia, and the robots Artoo Detoo and See Threepio as they battle Darth Vader and the Dark Empire legions. One of the most fascinating new characters of "The Empire Strikes Back" is a strange little fellow named Yoda, who ...

2390. Chapter V

Exodus 20:1-21

Sermon

Frank H. Seilhamer

"Give weight to your father and your mother that you may live long in the land which the Lord your God is giving you." Exodus 20:12 One of the things about the Commandments is that even though there is only a handful of them they speak to nearly every area of life. Though in some instances they are only a few words or phrases long, they touch virtually every basic relationship that a man has with his fellows, as well as with God. The longer that perceptive and sensitive people study and live with them the ...

2391. Jesus Christ, the Truth

Drama

Curt M. Joseph

Characters: Caiaphas - the High Priest; insistent, thinks he has Pilate where he wants him. Pilate - governor of Judea; an ambitious man, a just man, who struggles between his sense of justice and his political ambitions. Guard - typical Roman soldier. Claudia Procula - wife of Pilate; sensitive, caring, and very supportive of her husband. Ruth - a Jewess who serves as the handmaid of Claudia Procula. The scene opens with Caiaphas standing outside the communion rail, symbolic of his refusal to enter into a ...

2392. An Understated Masterpiece

Mark 1:21-28

Sermon

Thomas Long

Some people are masters of understatement. They are able to communicate the size, power, or importance of something, not by flapping their arms wildly and loudly piling one hyperbolic adjective on top of another, but by the slight arch of a single eyebrow and the deft choice of a muted phrase. Masters of understatement. There are, for example, relatives of mine in the South who still describe the American Civil War, a war of immense destructiveness and tragic proportions, by pursing their lips and speaking ...

2393.

Drama

David E. Ullery

CAST (in order of appearance) Claudia: The wife of Pontius Pilate, Procurator of Palestine. She has been influenced by Jesus. Rachel: A Jewish servant-girl in Pilate’s household. Joanna: Wife of the chief steward in Herod’s household. She is a follower of Jesus. Pilate: Pontius Pilate, the strong-willed Procurator, symbol of the hated Roman conquerors. Sergius: A Roman soldier, personal body-guard of Pontius Pilate. Caiaphas: Chief Priest and leader of the Jewish Sanhedrin, an evil and crafty man - a ...

2394. "Weird People" Everywhere

1 Corinthians 12:1-11

Sermon

King Duncan

A member of the British Parliament appeared one day at the Gates of Heaven and demanded entry. "Sorry, sir," said the Admitting Angel, "but sexism is a sin, and our records show you to be a Male Chauvinist Pig. There is no room for you here." "Humph," said the MP, "I suppose you got that nonsense from Maggie Thatcher! I see her over there, gloating at me." "More bad news, I'm afraid," said the Angel. "That's not Mrs. Thatcher. That's God." (1) Susan B. Anthony called on editor Horace Greeley one day in ...

2395. Have You Checked On Your Investments Lately?

John 6:1-15

Sermon

King Duncan

Approaching 40, Bill yearned for a boat. Frugality won out until the day he came across the obituary of an old high-school classmate named Ted. Ted had been the same age as Bill and now he was dead. Bill was certain this was a sign that life was too short. So he went out and purchased a boat that very weekend. Days later, a former classmate called Bill. "Sure was a sad thing, wasn't it?" the classmate said. "You know, Ted's boating accident and all." (1) Experts tell us that the baby boom generation is ...

2396. Who Will Be Crying At Your Funeral

Luke 12:22-34

Sermon

King Duncan

Who will be crying at your funeral? That is a question that writer Patrick Morley, author of THE MAN IN THE MIRROR, has many people asking. Morley and his wife were successful in their business. Their schedules were filled with business and civic responsibilities. Meanwhile they had young children at home who needed their attention. One evening, as they reviewed their timeconsuming responsibilities, the thought came, "Why not prioritize everything we do on the basis of who will be crying at our funeral?" ...

2397. Aging Is Mandatory; Maturity Is Optional

Mark 9:33-37

Sermon

King Duncan

Have you ever noticed that grown men can act like little children at times? Every woman in the house is nodding her head. Notice our lesson from the Gospel for today. It begins with some words with which we have become familiar: "They went on from there and passed through Galilee. [Jesus] did not want anyone to know it . . ." There it is again. The stealth Messiah, quietly going about his business, trying to stay out of the public eye. This time Mark provides us with an explanation: ". . . for he was ...

2398. A Father Pleased With His Son

Mark 1:9-13

Sermon

King Duncan

Is there any son or daughter in this world who is not thrilled by this little declaration of praise from a parent, "I'm proud of you?" When baseball great Henry Aaron hit his 715th home run breaking Babe Ruth's remarkable record, that is what he said: "I don't' remember the noise, or the two kids that ran on the field. My teammates at home plate, I remember seeing them. I remember my mother out there and she hugging me. that's what I'll remember more than anything about that home run when I think back on ...

2399. A Word For Christian Fathers

2 Corinthians 5:11--6:2

Sermon

King Duncan

You are familiar with the great Russian writer Leo Tolstoy. Tolstoy's marriage was a saga of bitterness. His wife carped and complained and clung to her grudges until he could not bear the sight of her. When they had been married almost a half a century, sometimes she would implore him to read to her the exquisite, poignant love passages that he had written about her in his diary forty-eight years previously, when they were both madly in love with each other. As he read of the happy days that were now gone ...

2400. Why Shepherds?

Luke 2:8-20

Sermon

King Duncan

Welcome to this celebration of Christmas Day. I want to begin with a story. It’s not a Christmas story. But it involves an incident that occurred on the day after Christmas 2004. One day last December, seventeen-year-old Max Loeb was home from school. He had been suspended that day for some reason, nothing serious. His family, though, is grateful that this one time Max got in trouble. Why? Because that particular day his father also happened to be home, and his father, Hamilton Loeb, suffered a massive ...

Showing results