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 2426 to 2450 of 4456 results

2426. Finder's Keepers

Luke 15:1-10

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

There's an old, old story, that I think is still funny. The phone rings and a little boy answers in a whisper: "Hello?" The caller says: "Hi, is your Mommy there? "Yes!" "Can I talk to her?" "No!" "Why not?" "She's busy." "What about your Daddy, can I talk to him?" "No! He's busy." "Well, is there anyone else there?" "My little sister." "Is there anyone else there? Another adult?" "Uh, huh. The police." "Can I talk to one of them?" "No, they're busy." "Is there anyone else there?" "Yes, the firemen." "Can ...

2427. There Will Be Singing

Isaiah 35:1-10

Sermon

King Duncan

Our theme for this third Sunday in Advent is music. “When the Messiah comes there will be singing.” I think most of us love the music of Christmas. Of course, I realize that not all of us are musicians. A man and his wife were browsing in a crafts store one day when the man noticed a display of country-style musical instruments. After looking over the flutes, dulcimers and recorders, he picked up a shiny, one-stringed instrument he took to be a mouth harp. He put it to his lips and, much to the amusement ...

2428. Waiting for a Savior

Mark 13:32-37

Sermon

King Duncan

Margaret was all ready for her date. She was wearing her best outfit, her hair was fixed, her makeup was perfect. Imagine her disappointment when her date didn’t show up! After an hour of waiting, Margaret decided that he wasn’t going to come. She changed into her pajamas, washed off her makeup, gathered up a bunch of junk food, and parked herself in front of the television for the evening. As soon as she got involved in her favorite show, there was a knock on the door. She opened it to find her handsome ...

2429. Mary AND Martha, Heart AND Home

Luke 10:38-42

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

On 10 July 2013 someone posted a YouTube video. Three days later it had 5 million hits. Here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uD6wdrVFc0g The one minute clip shows an amazing life-or-death race. It was shot by some Krueger Park tourists on safari in South Africa. Routinely and sternly, visitors to the park are told to stay in their vehicles at all times. But tourists being tourists, you know the rest of the story. The video shows cars parked along the access road with all their windows and doors ...

2430. Skull Hill

John 12:20-36

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

What kid doesn’t love to splash in a mud puddle? Do you remember the squeal of delight as the wet, dirt-filled explosion splattered all over you? For how many of us was our first “culinary” experience creating mud pies — artfully decorated mud balls, frosted and festooned with leaves, grass, and weeds? But for most of us the love of mud quickly fades as we grow up. The biggest “tell” for this dirt aversion have you ever gotten invited by a friend to come and spend an evening at their “pottery class?” Have ...

2431. The Messed Up

John 4:1-26

Sermon

James Merritt

In 2006, Alitalia Airlines, the official airline of Italy, made a slight mistake on its website regarding international airfare from Toronto, Canada, to the island of Cyprus. They advertised business-class seats for $39. It was supposed to be $3900, but somebody left two zeros. Two thousand tickets were immediately snapped up and it cost the airline $7.7 million. Somebody messed up. In 1990, 75 million phone calls across the United States went unanswered after a single switch at one of AT&T’s Switching ...

2432. The Broken

John 8:1-11

Sermon

James Merritt

A mother had been working with her young son trying to teach him to tell time by using a non-digital clock. For several days she kept talking to him about the “small hand” and the “big hand.” One day she heard him walk into the kitchen where there was a clock on the wall with the big hand and the little hand. She called from the other room, “Cameron, what is the little hand on?” He yelled back, “A chocolate-chip cookie!” If you are into legalese there is a legal term known as “Inflagrante Delicto.” ...

2433. I am the Man Who Has Seen Affliction

Lamentations 3:1-66

One Volume

Tremper Longman III

Man of Affliction: Chapter 3 constitutes a new and complete poem. Like the two chapters that precede it, it is marked by a complete acrostic. Unlike the previous chapters where each verse started with a successive letter of the alphabet, in chapter 3 each letter repeats at the start of three verses before going on to the next letter. Thus, there are sixty-six verses, not twenty-two verses. However, since the verses are shorter in chapter 3, the overall length of the chapters is approximately the same. The ...

2434. Don't Just Stand There!

Acts 1:1-11

Sermon

King Duncan

Pastor David Russow tells a delightful story about what he calls one of his “low-lights” as a high school football player. He was a sophomore in high school and in the starting line-up for the very first time. The other team had the ball and it was 4th down. Their punter went back to punt the ball, when Russow knifed through the line and blocked the punt. The ball was bounding toward the 15 yard line, toward the opposing team’s goal line. Potentially this would be an easy score for Russow’s team. Of course ...

2435. The Jewish Leaders as Negative Foil for Jesus’ Followers

Matthew 23:1-39

Teach the Text

Jeannine K. Brown

Big Idea: For Matthew, the Jewish leaders are disobedient to the Torah and pursue the honor of their positions, providing a foil to Jesus’ followers, who are to renounce concern for status and live in community as brothers and sisters. Understanding the Text Matthew concludes his narration of confrontation between Jesus and the Jerusalem leaders with a series of judgment warnings upon the Pharisees and teachers of the law (23:1–36). The chapter begins with a call to Jesus’ followers to avoid the motivation ...

2436. What To Do While Waiting for the Judgment?

Matthew 25:1-13

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

Who hasn’t had the experience of being unready for a long-awaited guest? A thousand things have hindered our preparation. An unexpected phone call kept us late at the office. Traffic on the freeway was tied up by an accident. The super market was crowded and we ended up in the slowest check-out line. The oven won’t heat. The cat has walked down the middle of the table we set this morning, leaving unmistakable, sooty footprints. And our six-year-old knocks over a cup of milk. Then time runs out. The guest ...

2437. How Beautiful are You

Song of Songs 4:1-16

One Volume

Gary M. Burge

4:1–15 · The king’s rehearsal of the maiden’s beauty and his invitations to love constitute this longest single unit in the poem. The first half of the passage is a descriptive song with highly figurative language and is bounded by the inclusio, “How beautiful you are, my darling” (4:1, 7). The descriptive song mixes pastoral, domestic, and urban images common in ancient love poetry (e.g., myrrh, lilies, pomegranates, etc.). The language of the love poem now becomes increasingly erotic and explicit. The ...

2438. You Shall Be My Witness

Acts 1:1-11

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

A picture is worth a thousand words. So let me try to paint the picture, with words. Better, you paint the picture in your mind as I tell the story. An 83-year-old grandmother is standing in the checkout line of a K-Mart store. She chats with a young boy who is very proud of his $5.98 watch he has just purchased. Somewhere in their friendly conversation she asks the boy where he goes to Sunday school. He doesn’t go. “Really? I think you’d like it. Could I call your mother and see if I can pick you up. We ...

2439. In Search of a New Life

Revelation 21:1-5a

Sermon

King Duncan

Do you like stories of buried treasure? Here’s one that you may not have heard. According to a legend from the Wild West, back in the 1870s, notorious outlaw Jesse James and his gang stole millions of dollars worth of gold bullion from a Mexican general. The men proceeded to bury their treasure somewhere in the Wichita Mountains of Oklahoma. Rumor had it that Jesse had scratched a secretly-coded map on an old bucket and left it as a marker. One source says that after Jesse’s death, his brother Frank James ...

2440. A Prayer to a Good, Good Father

Luke 11:1-13

Sermon

King Duncan

Pastor Tom Rietveld tells an interesting true story about prayer. He says that when he was pastoring in Missouri his church needed approximately $10,000 beyond what they were able to give to close out the year. And so, Pastor Rietveld asked the church family and their church leaders to pray for that amount, specifically—$10,000. Unexpectantly, a few weeks before the end of the year, a gift came in the mail. It was for several shares of stock worth $5,000. Pastor Rietveld put out the word that God had ...

2441. Being Neighborly

Luke 10:25-37

Sermon

Robert C. Cochran

As a campus pastor in Kalamazoo, Michigan, I served on a committee that supports the local Lutheran Social Services Ministry foster care program. One Thursday, we heard about a young girl who had run away from home at age fourteen. By the time we heard about her, she was sixteen, and LSSM was trying to get her some help by putting her into an independent care program. She’d lived on her own for two years, so it seemed too late to put her into a foster care family. She would receive money for living ...

2442. The Flock Paradox

2 Samuel 5:1-5, Luke 2:1-7, Luke 2:8-20, Ezekiel 34:1-31, Jeremiah 33:1-26

Sermon

Lori Wagner

Christmas is a time of joy and enjoy, but also a time of unprecedented envy. The great gifts one person receives are inevitably desired by any number of that person’s friends. The gifts one child receives are immediately coveted by their sister or brother. Shopping for a gift for others, we often find things we desire for ourselves as well! We like to have what others have. We like to do what others do. Some call it “keeping up with the Joneses.” Scientists call it the “flock syndrome.” It’s the crowd ...

2443. A New Identity for a New Year

John 1:(1-9), 10-18

Sermon

King Duncan

We all know what it’s like to have a memory lapse when we are tired or stressed. Few things make you feel more idiotic or frustrated than wracking your brain to remember the simplest bit of information. Does the phrase “senior moment” strike a familiar chord with anyone? A woman wrote into a blog called Cafemom.com with a funny story about her father’s memory lapse while on vacation. The father had just driven his five kids to Canada, and he was dead tired. The border agents, as part of their routine ...

2444. Don't Miss Jesus

Luke 2:41-51

Sermon

Derl G. Keefer

Luke is the only gospel writer who gives us a peek into the childhood of Jesus. Luke, the physician, is analytical and an observer of life. Biblical historians believe that Luke had much of his research with first hand observers of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Not being an apostle or having first person knowledge, he relied upon others. One of those was Mary, the mother of Jesus. Someone said that Jesus’ childhood is like a walled garden — the inside of which no one has seen. Luke plucked one ...

2445. For Someone Who Will Be Terribly Missed

Job 19:23-27 · John 12:23-26 · John 14:1-6 · Acts 1:21-26

Eulogy

Richard E. Zajac

The Doctor and His Dog [Tell of what they’d wish for us to do, how we can carry on from where their life had ended.] In one of his books, John Braille tells of an old country Doctor who made his rounds in a horse-drawn carriage. The Doctor’s dog would go along for the ride. One day, the Doctor went to visit a man who was critically ill. “How am I, Doctor?” the man asked. The Doctor replied: “It doesn’t look good!” Both men were quiet for a while. The man then said: “What’s it like to die, Doctor?” As the ...

2446. Advent Of Angels

Malachi 1:6-14

Sermon

Tony Everett

A seminary professor has said that there have been more books about angels produced during the past five years than in the previous 150. In our sometimes chaotic and impersonal society we have a deep yearning to be protected, loved, and guided. When we experience life's uncertainties and challenges we need a messenger from God; we need an angel to help us overcome adversity, to guide us through troubled times, to love us when we are most vulnerable, and to correct us when we stray from God's way. And that' ...

2447. Why Be Good?

Luke 6:37-42

Sermon

Charles H. Bayer

There are a few things religion -- almost any religion -- can be counted on to affirm. There are standards of conduct and piety, differences between right and wrong, obligations and responsibilities which are so clearly stated nothing is left to chance. Religion will always find a way to define what the deity requires, and to cite the rewards and the punishments for right or wrong conduct. The penalties for violating religious commands vary, from a slap on the wrist to eternal damnation. The rewards also ...

2448. All-Surrounding Grace

John 3:14-21

Sermon

Elaine M. Ward

As swimmers dare to lie face to sky and water bears them, as hawks rest upon air and air sustains them, so would I learn to attain freefall, and float into Creator Spirit's deep embrace, knowing no effort earns that all surrounding grace. (Denise Levertov, Oblique Prayer) God so loved the world ... that love, that unconditional love, is the foundation for our faith. John wrote, "God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life ...

2449. Judas, The Obscure

Drama

Peter C. Garrison

Judas' problem is that he doesn't have any excuse for the thing he does; he has reasons, but no excuses. Have you ever acted in a way you yourself couldn't understand? Dostoyevski noted: "All self-examination ends up as self-justification." But does it? Concerning Judas' problem: Is he deceiving himself or is he deceiving God? (Please read Matthew 26:14-25;Luke 22:3-6; John 6:57-71 and 10:14-18) Judas (Judas sits alone in a dark corner.) This is a confession and I tell you that from the first Judas was an ...

2450. Easter 3

Revelation 5:1-14, Acts 9:1-19a, John 21:1-14

Sermon Aid

John R. Brokhoff

COMMENTARY Epistle: Acts 9:1-6 (7-20) The conversion of Paul on the road to Damascus. This is the first of three Lukan accounts of Paul's conversion from hostility to support of Christ and the church. It is a key incident in the life of the early church. The risen Christ stops Paul in his tracks and enlists him as an apostle. It was a dramatic and radical change in Paul's life, from a persecutor to a propagator of the church. Christ comes to him as light which blinds him. He does not see that opposition to ...

Showing results