Sermon and Worship Resources

Synonyms: humiliation, mortification, chagrin, ignominy, loss of face, shamefacedness, embarrassment, indignity, abashment, discomfort, discomfiture, discomposure, guilt, remorse, contrition, compunction, disgrace, dishonour, discredit, degradation, disrepute, ill-repute, infamy, scandal, odium, opprobrium, obloquy, condemnation, contempt, pity, misfortune, crying shame, cause for regret, source of regret, sad thing, unfortunate thing, discredit to, disgrace to, stain on, blemish on, blot on, blot on the escutcheon of, slur on, reproach to, bad reflection on, bring into disrepute, degrade, debase, defame, stigmatize, taint, sully, tarnish, besmirch, stain, blacken, drag through the mud/mire, give a bad name to, put in a bad light, humiliate, mortify, make someone feel ashamed, embarrass, abash, chasten, humble, put someone in their place, take down a peg or two, cut down to size, show up

Antonyms: honor, pride, respect, glory, praise, dignity, honor, esteem, glorification, laud, compliment, regard, credit, elevate, acclaim, pleasure, favor, kudos, recognition, flatter, admiration, greatness, happiness, self-confidence, reverence

Showing 1 to 25 of 130 results

1. Tears And Ointment

Luke 7:36-50

Sermon

Larry Powell

... prominent here as is determination, perhaps even desperation. When one's mind is locked-in on a single thought and the will is riveted to the pursuit of that thought, social niceties and topical etiquette are not always observed. Just because the woman was of ill repute is no sign that she did not know how to be civil. Apparently, she had only one thing on her mind: getting to Jesus. Why? It is rather commonly held among commentators that the fact the woman came "prepared" to anoint Jesus indicates that the ...

2. Gomer, God's "Yet"

Hosea 1:1-2:1

Sermon

Richard L. Sheffield

... 've been a better story if it had been named for Hosea's wife and I was hoping, but our church member, Martha Evans, a lifelong resident of Gomer set me straight. Hosea's wife, Gomer, was not nice. I'm trying to be nice. She was a woman of "ill-repute," of bad reputation. And she continued as such even after she got married to Hosea. In the part of the story we read from the Book of Hosea, we hear of the birth of three children to Gomer: a son, Jezreel; a daughter, Lo-ruhamah; a son, Lo-ammi. They ...

3. Shaping People's Lives Through Forgiveness

Luke 7:36-50

Sermon

Brett Blair

... ? This is one of the qualities that separate the great men from the ordinary. In our story this morning (in Luke 7) certain insights are being expressed. A gathering of men at a diner party has just witnessed a woman, who they all know to be a woman of ill repute, walk into the room with an alabaster jar of expensive perfume. She walks up behind Jesus and kneels. She is crying. As she weeps her tears fall onto his feet. She uses her hair as a towel to dry his feet and then she pours the expensive perfume on ...

4. The Ministry Of Making Many Rich

1 Timothy 6:11-21

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... circumstances. Look at verses six through eight: “By purity, knowledge, forbearance, kindness, the Holy Spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness, for the right hand and for the left; in honor and dishonor, in ill repute and good repute.” All of this, he was saying, was the witness of their faith — witness to who they were — servants of God. What a beautiful word that tenth verse is — as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many ...

5. A Christian's Resumé

2 Corinthians 6:3-13

Sermon

Richard W. Ferris

... the world, as represented in those who do not believe in Jesus' saving grace. And there is the point of view of God, who now judges Paul's life through what Jesus has accomplished. As Paul puts it, he is looked upon "in honor, and in dishonor; in ill repute and good repute." He says that as Christians we are "treated as imposters, and yet are true; as unknown and yet are well known; as dying and see - we are alive; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many ...

6. More Power to You!

Romans 1:1-17

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... has surprised the powerful? · Abraham and Sarah: the oldest, most barren parents of a nation. · Moses: the stuttering, tongue-tied spokesmen for a people. · David: the youngest, scrawniest, dreaming-est choice for king. · Rahab: the woman of ill-repute whose reputation for loyalty still stands tall. · Joseph: the spoiled, useless little brother who fed his people throughout a death-dealing drought. · Jeremiah: the craziest sane voice preaching hope to the hopelessly exiled. · Ruth: who took her own ...

7. When All Is Said and Done

Acts 16:9-15

Sermon

Charley Reeb

... , beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger; by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, holiness of spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left; in honor and dishonor, in ill repute and good repute. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet we are well known; as dying, and see — we are alive; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet ...

8. After Katrina

Song of Songs 8:1-14

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... calamity. That was a line of reasoning which many people were quick to accept, for at least it made some sense of the disaster. However, in Johnstown it met with much amusement because, as anyone who knew his way about could readily see, the houses of ill repute up on Green Hill had not only survived the disaster, but were going stronger than ever. "If punishment was God's purpose," said one survivor, "He sure had bad aim."(2) Not a few ministers chose to talk about the spirit of sympathy that was sweeping ...

9. Seeing The Whole Person

John 4:1-26

Sermon

David Belgum

... harder for a "perfect" or terribly normal and average person to accept deformity and deficiency. Jesus explained it like this in the case of another Samaritan Woman type. The Pharisees noticed quickly that the woman, anointing Jesus' feet at the dinner table, was a woman of ill repute. If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what kind of woman this is who is touching him -- that she is a sinner ... [Jesus replied] she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, [or who has ...

10. The Righteousness Of God

2 Corinthians 5:11--6:2

Sermon

Mark J. Molldrem

"Hardships ... beatings ... imprisonment ... sleepless nights ... hunger ... in dishonor ... in ill repute ... unknown ... sorrowful ... poor." It sounds like a street person being described. Wrong! These are word snapshots of the life of the apostle Paul that picture what a follower of Christ must be ready to bear. Paul was a "street person" of sorts, pounding the pavement in the first century from ...

11. Changing the "Too Much Syndrome"

Luke 2:1-7

Sermon

David M. Oliver

... were the least, the last, and the lost of society. The beloved Son of God had his humble birth announced by angels to a group of shepherds who were tending their flocks of sheep outside of Bethlehem. Ironically, shepherds were held in such ill repute that their testimony was not allowed in a court of law. They were viewed as social outcasts, scoundrels, liars, and cheats. God chose to give those whom society declared as having nothing worthwhile to say the greatest news ever heard by human ears. Through ...

12. Saints With Crooked Haloes

2 Samuel 12:1-31

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... to be the George Washington of Israel, a wanted murderer whose picture was on all the post office walls of Egypt. But that's what God did, and Moses was equal to the task. A saint with a crooked halo. Consider a woman named Rahab. She ran a house of ill-repute in Jericho's red-light district. Yet she was the key inside person in God's plan to overthrow Jericho. And, the gospel writer Matthew lists her as an ancestress of Jesus! Now, that's a saint with a crooked halo! The point is this: God does not use ...

13. Broken Pieces

Matthew 1:3, 5, 6

Sermon

James Merritt

... not going to believe this, but the second woman that is mentioned here, another branch in the family tree of Jesus—a piece of the mosaic, was a prostitute by trade. She was what one Bible scholar called, "The Madame of Jericho." You heard it right - a woman of ill repute is a part of the family tree of the Son of God. Outside of Matthew, every time Rahab is referred to in scripture, she is referred to as "Rahab, the prostitute." It is almost as if God does not want us to forget what she was and who she ...

14. Liberated Women

Luke 7:36-50

Sermon

King Duncan

... liberation was literal. Jesus had liberated her from “seven demons.” We don’t know what that means seven demons. Perhaps Mary suffered from what is known in the modern vernacular as Multiple Personality Disorder. History has labeled Mary as a woman of ill repute before she encountered Jesus. That’s just speculation. Nowhere does the New Testament say that about her. All we know for certain is that Mary had some serious problems before she met Jesus. And Jesus healed her. Jesus can do that. He can ...

15. The Call

Matthew 16:13-20, Mark 1:14-20, Matthew 5:13-16

Sermon

Will Willimon

... lay down your life for a political cause, they call you a ''hero." It all comes down to what you believe to be reasonable. Jesus squats in the dust. He looks around at the assembled ex-IRS' agents, failed fishermen, carpenters, unwed mothers, and women of ill-repute and says, ''I'm going to take over the world. The revolution begins here. And guess who's going to help me? And some, twelve or so, were crazy enough to believe him, defiant enough to go against the world's names for them. Such ''unreason'' is ...

16. Healing And Forgiveness

Luke 5:17-26

Sermon

Let us pray: Gracious and eternal God, we continue our worship during this season of Lent, seeking to understand the gifts of healing which you bring to our lives. Lord, in these moments, may we catch a glimpse of the truth that your spirit can touch and heal us of our afflictions. In the precious name of Jesus we pray, Amen. There is a story about an old Maori woman in the country of New Zealand who had earned a reputation for being an argumentative, combative person, for which she received the nickname ...

17. Seeing God In The Ordinary: Friends

John 11:1-45

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

A Shoebox Greetings card had this message about friends: "You're the kind of friend who wouldn't laugh if we were in a fancy restaurant and I came out of the bathroom with a streamer of toilet paper on my heel." (inside the card) "O.K., you'd laugh, but you wouldn't start singing, "I know something yoooooou don't know" and make me guess till I figured it out." (1) One of the greatest human longings and desires is to be close to someone through the bond of friendship. Friends offer us companionship. Friends ...

18. Embalmed Alive

John 14:5-14

Sermon

Louis H. Valbracht

The words are probably the most plain, the most authoritarian, the most all-inclusive of the great "I am" statements made by Jesus Christ. In Chapter 14 of the Gospel According to St. John, verse 6: "I am the way, the truth, and the life." In unmistakable, explicit words, our Lord is saying that the human being cannot have life without him. I suppose that our culture can be divided into two types of persons - those who say in whatever comfortable and luxurious situations they find themselves in: "This is ...

19. Life Begins at Thirty-Eight

John 5:1-15

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

“When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been there a long time, he said to him, Do you want to be made well?’” (John 5:6) It sounds like a stupid question, doesn’t it? Jesus meets this fellow at the crowded pool, this poor crippled chap who had been coming there for perhaps thirty-eight years waiting to be healed, and asks him point blank, “Do you want to be made well?” We can imagine the look the crippled man must have given Jesus. We can imagine him saying something like, “Do I want to be ...

20. Standing Room Only Religion

Mark 2:1-12

Sermon

Maurice A. Fetty

It is a picturesque story containing drama, suspense, and humor. I have imagined the crowds pressing in upon Jesus in an effort to hear clearly the profound wisdom and good news he was sharing. There was an excitement in the air going along with being in the presence of a celebrity. I also have imagined the delightful scene of the four friends carrying the paralyzed man, trying to press through the crowd into the packed house where Jesus was "preaching the word," as Mark puts it. Frustrated in their ...

21. When Jesus Arrives Late

John 11:1-16, John 11:17-37

Sermon

Thomas Long

It is very easy to move too quickly past the beginning of this story about Jesus and Lazarus. We rush past the beginning because the rest of the story appears, at first glance, to be far more fascinating. Indeed, most of the time it is what Jesus did all the way at the end of the story that galvanizes our attention. There, after all, is the main drama, since it was at the end of the story that Jesus performed his most astonishing miracle: raising Lazarus, deceased four days, from the dead. Jesus had done a ...

22. The Healing Of Simon's Mother-in-Law

Mark 1:29-34

Sermon

James W. Moore

Her name is Jackie Greer. She is without question one of the most amazing persons I have ever known. She is without question one of the most devoted Christians I have ever known. She is without question one of the most influential witnesses for Christ, the Christian faith, and the Christian Church I have ever known. Whoever came up with the idea of the “Energizer Bunny” in those TV commercials must have had Jackie or someone like her in mind. She is so full of life and zest and energy. Her life is filled ...

23. Reflections on a Bumper Sticker

Mark 2:1-12

Sermon

Mark Trotter

When I see a bumper sticker, I like to pull up along side the car and see if the message fits the driver. Sometimes it's a surprise. I saw an off-color bumper sticker on a car. I pulled up along side, and saw a little old lady driving. It makes you wonder what's happening to our world. Jean saw a car with a bumper sticker on it that said, "Honk if you love Jesus." So she pulled up along side and honked, and the man flipped her off. So you never know. I saw a bumper sticker that said, "Life is too short to ...

24. What Excites God

Mark 2:1-12

Sermon

James Merritt

As a pastor I can really relate to the story of a pastor who was candidating at a church, and they told him that they wanted to call him provided he would agree to live by faith. When he asked the six men on the committee what they meant by that, they said, "Well, what we mean by that is, you're not going to have any stated salary, but you're just going to trust God to meet your needs." The man thought about it for a minute, and though it cost him the church, he gave a good response. He said, "I've got a ...

25. Following Summons

Acts 9:32-43

Sermon

Elizabeth Achtemeier

A number of subsidiary themes emerge in this reading from Acts, and we probably should take note of them, although they do not form the main thrust of the text. We have here a brief story of a Hebrew woman given the Aramaic name of Tabitha, which means "gazelle," or called Dorcas in the Greek. This is the only mention that we have of Dorcas in the scripture, but over the centuries, her reputation as a person of good works and charity toward the poor has been preserved. It is now not unusual to find "Dorcas ...

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