Sermon and Worship Resources

Synonyms: take action, take steps, take measures, take the initiative, move, make a move, react, do something, proceed, go ahead, behave, function, perform, operate, work, take effect, serve, be efficacious, play, play a part, take part, be an actor, be an actress, be one of the cast, appear, pretend, play-act, sham, fake, feign, put it on, bluff, pose, posture, masquerade, dissemble, dissimulate, deed, action, gesture, feat, exploit, performance, undertaking, maneuver, stunt, operation, venture, effort, enterprise, achievement, accomplishment, law, decree, statute, bill, Act of Parliament, edict, fiat, dictum, dictate, enactment, resolution, ruling, rule, judgement, canon, ordinance, proclamation, command, commandment, mandate, measure, stipulation, direction, requirement, division, section, subsection, portion, part, segment, component, bit, turn, routine, number, item, piece, sketch, skit, playlet, dance, song, pretense, false display, show, front, facade, charade, guise, affectation, appearance

Antonyms: do nothing

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1. Perceiving the Presence of God

Luke 1:26-38

Sermon

Richard Gribble

... the wrath of Herod who feared the newborn "King of the Jews" would threaten his power. Years later, Mary continued in sorrow when Jesus was lost for three days in Jerusalem only to be found conversing with the scholars in the temple. Mary's fiat brought four additional sorrows at the time of Jesus' passion and death: her meeting Jesus on the via dolorosa, the crucifixion, his deposition from the cross and burial. Mary had sufficient faith and vision to take the road less traveled, the more difficult road ...

2. Broadband Discipleship

Luke 17:1-10

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... all, the church told the Jesus story for at least forty years without texts. What broadband disciples are pointing people towards with our lives is not more points, but a relationship with . . . Jesus. God’s first fiat? Let there be light. Every time we conceive, we bring beauty to life, we are recreating that first fiat: “Let there be light.” We are conceiving the Light of the World. When we conceive Jesus, and bringing him to life in the world, we are conceiving The Light of the World The Bread of ...

3. Feast Days During Lent

Sermon

Richard Gribble

... with the Scriptures, the reality of the angel's greeting could have been nothing other than a shock. What was Mary's response to this unbelievable invitation? Mary said, "I am the maidservant of the Lord. Let it be done to me as you say." Mary's fiat, her "yes" to God, was total and unconditional. Like the children in the kindergarten classroom, Mary had no idea what her yes would mean and where it would lead. But that was not of ultimate importance to her. Mary had complete confidence and trust in God that ...

4. Country Songs and Easter Hymns

Luke 24:36-49

Sermon

Thomas Long

... go home. The petition was flatly denied. "We brought you to the city for an experience," they replied, "and you're not leaving until you've had it." Brought to the city for an experience and forbidden to leave until we'd had it. Since that faculty fiat, I have always had great sympathy for the disciples as they are described in the Gospel of Luke. Luke's picture of them is different from the other gospels. In Luke, the emphasis falls upon the disciples' connection to the city. By contrast, in Mark, part of ...

5. Returning to Genuine Religion

Jeremiah 30:1--31:40

Sermon

Donald Macleod

... and one of their own kin would rule them. "There is hope for the future, says the Lord" (v. 17). Blessings would be the new lot of Israel and they would become a blessing to others. All these things, however, were not to occur or become theirs by mere fiat. True, God had declared his readiness to establish a new covenant with his people (v. 31). But, as you and I know, a covenant requires the commitment of two parties. God’s promise must be met by the honest avowal of every individual and not merely as a ...

6. Focused Light

Acts 10:23b-48

Sermon

William F. Dunkle

... translation of the word epiphany) which guided the first Gentiles, magi astrologers from the East, to Bethlehem’s manger is the "true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world." It manifests the God who began all creation by the fiat "Let there be light, and there was light." God’s intention is light, not darkness. The Christian mission is the spreading of that light. Observe this, clearly focused, in The Acts account of Saint Peter’s first baptisms: the whole household of Cornelius ...

7. The Children of Promise

Jeremiah 30:1--31:40

Sermon

Harry N. Huxhold

... wondered why his people could not get a better break. In those moments he was not disgusted with the civil or ecclesiastical leaders or the people. At those times he was disgusted and discouraged that God could not make the situation right with some kind of fiat. He had believed that God’s word would be effective among the people, but he just could not see the good results. God Does Save Jeremiah’s bitterness resulted from his feeling of being deceived by God. He had thought that when he accepted the ...

8. Good Friday

1 Corinthians 1:18--2:5

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... the endeavor (of these strange stories) is to show that God does not stand, as it were, outside the drama that is being played out, but Himself takes part in it, and attains his purpose by internal, not external means; he overcomes evil, not by an almighty fiat, but by putting in something of His own, through Divine self-oblation.” (CHRISTUS VICTOR, London: SPCK, 1953, p. 70) Thus, the cross is not something done by God to Christ, the cross is something which we have done to God. In one of Elie Wiesel’s ...

9. Together, But Not Enmeshed

John 15:1-17

Sermon

Robert Noblett

... world of difference between a husband who sees himself as a loving helpmate to a wife who is his co-equal, and a husband who sees himself as the lord and master of his home and, by implication, his wife as a subordinate. A manager who moves by fiat and intimidation is a very different cat from a manager who builds consensus and is secure in her authority. A teacher who sees her classroom as a garden is very different from a teacher who views his classroom as an assembly line. To whom do you warm: a minister ...

10. Death Leads to Life

Isaiah 52:13--53:12

Sermon

Richard Gribble

... degree, is required. Mary, the Sorrowful Mother, who kept vigil beneath the cross of her Son, can be a great model for us. She unhesitatingly said yes when invited by God, through the words of the Angel Gabriel, to become the mother of Jesus. Her great fiat would over the course of Jesus' life bring her much pain and suffering and many situations that she probably never fully understood. Yet, she was willing to endure the pain and walk the road with Jesus. We too must walk the Via Dolorosa and be willing ...

11. In The Kingdom Now

Philippians 3:12-4:1

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

Twenty years after Israel had been given a homeland in 1948 by a kind of political fiat, there were still some 300,000 refugees in camps, driven from their homes. Children born in those camps were now 16, 18, 20 years old, and had never known anything but the life of a refugee. It is a monumental problem. The Cubans who fled to our country from Castro, ...

12. Letting Go and New Beginnings

Mark 9:2-9

Sermon

Richard Gribble

... in many ways. But then, in almost the time to wink one's eye, she received the invitation that would change her life and bring salvation history to its apex. Mary willingly said, "Yes," to God's invitation, extended by the Angel Gabriel. Her great fiat necessitated a total change in direction. Whatever Mary had planned had to be canceled and an uncertain future journey initiated. Mary accepted God's invitation, confident that if she would place her trust in him things would be fine. The past was left behind ...

13. Turning Potholes into Mud Puddles on the Bethlehem Road

Luke 3:1-20

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... to hear the good fruit of repentance will be cut down (a familiar image from Isaiah 10:33 and later used by Jesus himself in Luke 13:6-9). Layering and mixing judgment metaphors John also proclaims that “fire” will be part of the final fiat of God, recalling the prophecies of Malachi 4:1 which promised that the conflagration on the day of the Lord would leave “neither root nor branch” of the evildoers. John knew there was nothing like the immediacy of a promised “hot foot” to get people moving ...

14. Humvee Holiness and Humble Holiness

Matthew 23:1-39

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... what else the individual is wearing. In sum, they subtly “advertise” the wearer’s faithfulness. Jesus’ criticism is not about wearing phylacteries or fringes. It is about wearing Humvee-sized phylacteries and Ferrari fringes while living a Fiat-sized faith. Both phylacteries and fringes were traditions that had been established as signs of humility and faithfulness. But they had been “souped-up” and “super-sized” by some of the most auspicious and revered religious authorities, transforming ...

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