Synonyms: renounce, relinquish, dispense with, forswear, disclaim, disown, disavow, discard, wash one's hands of, give up, stop, cease, drop, forgo, desist from, have done with, abjure, abstain from, discontinue, break off, refrain from, set/lay aside, desert, leave, leave high and dry, turn one's back on, cast aside, break (up) with, vacate, quit, evacuate, withdraw from, surrender, cede, yield, indulge in, give way to, give oneself up to, yield to, lose oneself to/in, uninhibitedness, recklessness, lack of restraint, lack of inhibition, unruliness, wildness, impulsiveness, impetuosity, immoderation, wantonness
Antonyms: keep, claim, continue, stick by, self-control, power through, achieve, defend, bear, hope, acquire, quick visit, adopt, continue along, adhere, remain, pursue, support, take up, keep up, reuse, advocate, stay, persevere, cherish, keep going, carry on
Showing 1 to 25 of 266 results
1. God’s Judgment of Babylon Calls for Celebration
Revelation 19:1-10, Revelation 18:1-24
Teach the Text
J. Scott Duvall
... distorted what marriage is, understanding it as a legal coupling of convenience that allows people to qualify for certain benefits or formalize an already-existing living arrangement. It’s no wonder that many young people are delaying marriage or dispensing with it altogether. Yet the Bible portrays a much fuller picture of marriage—a union of deep and enduring intimacy, a relationship that involves lifelong commitment lived out in faithfulness and filled with mutual joy, self-giving love, sacrificial ...
2. Keeper of the Springs
Proverbs 31:10-31
Sermon
Peter Marshall
... Springs. Said the Keeper of the Purse: “Why should we pay this romance ranger? We never see him; he is not necessary to our town’s work life. If we build a reservoir just above the town, we can dispense with his services and save his salary.” Therefore, the City Council voted to dispense with the unnecessary cost of a Keeper of the Springs, and to build a cement reservoir. So the Keeper of the Springs no longer visited the brown pools but watched from the heights while they built the reservoir. When ...
3. Ingredients of Good Government
Illustration
Michael P. Green
... ingredients of good government. His answer: “Sufficient food, sufficient weapons, and the confidence of the common people.” “But,” asked the disciple, “suppose you had no choice but to dispense with one of those three, which would you forego?” “Weapons,” said Confucius. His disciple persisted: “Suppose you were then forced to dispense with one of the two that are left, which would you forego?” Replied Confucius, “Food. For from of old, hunger has been the lot of all men, but a people ...
Sermon
Wayne Brouwer
... suggestion of helping someone by beginning with prayer be greeted with laughter? And why should even he, an ordained minister of the gospel and a Christian ethics professor, initially wave off the suggestion of prayer as simply a polite formality to be dispensed with before the real business of helping began? Why should prayer seem so insignificant and powerless? Does Prayer Work? Jesus’ prayer is powerful, of course, isn’t it? I have always loved John 17, and this great prayer Jesus voiced. Over the ...
Sermon
Louis H. Valbracht
... disproves his whole fundamental thesis. If humans know one thing, we know that we are responsible to someone or something else than ourselves. Our morality, our sense of guilt, our need to love and to be loved, things like this cannot be dispensed with just by calling them "cultural taboos," or "evolving herd customs." The scientist can't explain his own instinctive, dynamic imperative to search for truth in that way. Humans must worship, because we are human and because we feel ourselves responsible to ...
6. Israel's Unbelief
Romans 9:30--10:21
Understanding Series
James R. Edwards
... can mean either the completion or culmination of a process (e.g., the end of the birth process), or the termination or annulment of something. The first idea means that Jesus Christ is the goal or completion of the law (so Matt. 5:17); the second that he dispenses with the law (so 2 Cor. 3:13–14; Heb. 8:13). Reference to the Greek only complicates the matter, for telos (NIV, end) carries at least four different meanings in the NT. The meaning of the phrase in 10:4 has been the subject of long debates and ...
Sermon
Jerry L. Schmalemberger
... in what others say, which may be all very well as a beginning, but something that has happened to us -- only then does our belief grow vital. Yet Christ tells us here that there is a bigger faith even than that, a faith that can dispense with tangible proofs and visible evidence, that believes heroically even when there is no obvious and immediate confirmation, building unafraid and confident on God’s naked word.”2 It’s something to have the witness of a person like that, that Jesus was alive! No fly ...
Sermon
I'm going to dispense with the niceties and cut to the chase. Everywhere I turned this week commentators on this gospel told me that it is the most difficult of all the parables of Jesus. They told me how it has caused incredible problems for the church for 2,000 years now. Some said that ...
Sermon
King Duncan
... which the church has termed the Magnificat. Then Luke tells about Christ’s birth with the angels praising God in the heavens and the shepherds hurrying to Bethlehem to worship the newborn babe. The Gospel of John, written much later than the other Gospels, dispenses with the genealogies and the birth narratives altogether. Instead John goes back all the way to the beginning of time to let us know that Christ was present at creation: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word ...
Sermon
Barbara Brokhoff
... not cut the ends off of other people’s logs," and they got the point! (Of course, that preacher had to move to another church, but they got the point!) When we rid ourselves of being embarrassed, of apology, of unnecessary theological jargon, when we dispense with irrelevant concepts, when we have made truth plain, then we must be direct in calling for a decision, a choice, a call to repentance. People are dying for a clear word from God. We must not make them wade through a veritable morass of trappings ...
11. Epiphany 5
Psalm 112:1-10, Isaiah 58:1-14, 1 Corinthians 2:6-16, Matthew 5:13-16, Matthew 5:17-20
Sermon Aid
Marion L. Soards, Thomas B. Dozeman, Kendall McCabe
... in v. 19 Jesus can say only "Law," but he is still concerned with the same items named in v. 18. The teaching of Jesus concerning the Law steers a middle course between the extremes of legalism and libertinism. He does not speak as an iconoclast, advocating that we dispense with the Law as we freely live a life of faith, and he does not insist that we slavishly follow the Law as if it were a rule book for faithful living. Jesus says instead that he came to "fulfill" the Law. In brief, he means that his life ...
12. Message to Pergamum
Revelation 2:12-17
Teach the Text
J. Scott Duvall
... center, the healing cult of Asclepius, the altar of Zeus, and above all, the imperial cult greatly increased the pressure on Christians. The pressure to conform was intense. The likely identification of Satan’s throne with the imperial cult helps us dispense with a caricature of Satan and come to a more biblical understanding of this diabolical figure, including the fact that his influence is more deeply felt in some places (and perhaps at certain times) compared to others. Antipas, perhaps a leader in ...
13. Lent 5
John 7:45--8:11, Luke 20:9-19, John 12:1-11, Philippians 3:12-4:1, Philippians 3:1-11, Isaiah 43:14-28
Sermon Aid
John R. Brokhoff
... among church folk. Jesus attacks legalism and hard-heartedness in a risky and sensational way in this story which may have proved too uncomfortable for some (it doesn't appear in some Bibles). 1. People are more important than law codes. a. Jesus was unwilling to dispense with this woman's life merely to satisfy a legal requirement. b. Laws, within and without the church, can kill both people and the spirit of life, love and creativity among us. c. Laws are made for God's people, not people for God's laws ...
14. Lent 5
Jn 8:1-11; 12:1-8 · Lk 20:9-19 · Isa 43:16-21 · Php 3:8-14
Sermon Aid
John R. Brokhoff
... among church folk. Jesus attacks legalism and hard-heartedness in a risky and sensational way in this story which may have proved too uncomfortable for some (it doesn't appear in some Bibles). A. People are more important than law codes 1. Jesus was unwilling to dispense with this woman's life merely to satisfy a legal requirement. 2. Laws, within and without the church, can kill both people and the spirit oflife, love and creativity among us. 3. Laws are made for God's people, not people for God's laws. B ...
Sermon
Arley K. Fadness
... it. They are guilty men confronted with the outrageous evil against their own brother. In the modern era we live in a culture in which guilt is considered bad. It's as though guilt is the enemy of a happy and carefree life. It is important to dismiss and dispense with guilt as quickly as possible. It is popular to hear comments like, "Don't lay a guilt trip on me," "Stop trying to make me feel guilty," or "Guilt is a poor motivation for change." It's time for a good word about good guilt -- yes, plain old ...
Sermon
Richard Hasler
... the town council meeting someone questioned the sum of money paid the keeper of the spring. No one seemed to know who he was, or even if he was still on the job high up in the mountains. Before the evening was over, the council decided to dispense with the old man’s services. Weeks went by and nothing seemed to change. Once autumn came, however, the trees began to shed their leaves. Branches broke off and fell into the pools high up in the mountains. Down below the villagers began to notice the water had ...
Sermon
Harold Warlick
... the church acceptable, Constantine replaced the requirement of open, personal disclosure with private confession to a priest. Finally, in the thirteenth century, the church made private confession to a priest at least once a year an obligation. Martin Luther, of course, dispensed with closed confession.1 Verbal acknowledgment of one's failures and short-comings, whether to God in prayer or to one's brother and sister in Christ, is vital to emotional stability. We in the church are coming to a realization of ...
Sermon
Robert S. Crilley
... servants. Only a few verses earlier, he had also witnessed a large crowd of people, and as if employed by some celestial census bureau, had reported them as being 144,000 from every tribe of Israel. This time, though, he can dispense with the clipboard and calculator, for heaven's gates have been suddenly thrown wide open -- the massive assembly swelling to astonishing proportions, and spilling beyond the borders of even imagination's canvas. Indeed, what was once specifically defined now defies description ...
Sermon
Robert A. Hausman
... contributed out of their abundance; but she, out of her poverty, has put in everything she had, all she had to live on" (Mark 12:43-44). Most of us know what abundance is. We have disposable income, money not needed for necessities, which we dispense with easily. How affluent we are is obvious from our language. Watch how the word "luxury" has become a key selling point: luxury condominiums; the luxury hotel, with all the amenities; the car with all the add-ons. Then there are the private storage bins for ...
Sermon
Donald B. Strobe
... at death it returns to God just as the raindrop returns to the ocean. The doctrine of immortality emphasizes the idea that there is a quality in all of us which is so powerful that it simply cannot die. We might even say that the idea of immortality dispenses with God. We do not need God, for we are immortal all by ourselves. The Bible, on the other hand, insists that only God is immortal. (See I Timothy 6:16.) If God chooses to share that immortality with us, it is not because of something within us that ...
Sermon
Paul E. Robinson
... , was primarily God's business. Do you know what I'm talking about? The author of the first letter of John is trying with all his might to bridge that chasm between him and his readers. You can see some of that in the fact that he dispenses with the usual salutation at the beginning of his letter and plunges right in immediately: That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched with our hands, concerning the word of life -- the ...
22. The King Of Hearts
Ezekiel 34:1-31
Sermon
Robert S. Crilley
... 's ministry now embarks in an entirely new direction. Perhaps the compounded grief of these coinciding events serves to soften the prophet's stern tone. Or maybe, inasmuch as most of his prophesies have already come true, Ezekiel simply decides to dispense with the angry rhetoric, concluding that to preach doom-and-gloom under the current conditions would only add insult to injury. Whatever the reason, his message suddenly moves from Yahweh's condemnation of the people to Yahweh's compassion for them. If ...
Understanding Series
Leslie C. Allen
... , presenting the royal documents at the capital of each of the provinces that made up the satrapy. He noted with grim satisfaction that the letters were backed by the imposing presence of an imperial escort. Ezra, it will be remembered, had dispensed with one because of special spiritual convictions (Ezra 8:21–23). Nehemiah found no reason to break with normal practice. Undoubtedly he would have regarded it as further evidence of divine favor displayed through earthly means (see v. 18). With hindsight ...
24. An Easier Way?
Matthew 16:21-28
Sermon
... spending my life trying to escape God's purposes for me would be missing life itself. It's hard to learn that life is the gift received by dying and living in faith, but it's true. If I only were to wear a cross (as I am wearing now), dispensing with it as I please, it really is not my cross. It is mere decoration. If the real cross I bear, however, is the way of God's leading, then it is ultimately an instrument of life itself. Who would have believed that I, Peter, would have become a leader in ...
Understanding Series
David J. Williams
... had taken place (cf. 9:37). However, there were exceptions to the rule of allowing the dead to lie for a time, and in this case, if the church believed that the death was an act of divine judgment, they may have felt that the usual formalities should be dispensed with. Or the explanation may be that it was a rule at that time that the dead should not lie overnight in Jerusalem. This could explain the statement that they carried him out. And if the body had to be moved, a tomb would have been as good a place ...
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