Sermon and Worship Resources

Synonyms: complain, moan, groan, whine, mutter, grouse, bleat, carp, cavil, protest, rumble, gurgle, murmur, growl, roar, complaint, muttering, grievance, objection, protestation, quibble, criticism, charge, accusation

Showing 1 to 25 of 203 results

1. A Cure for Complainers

Exodus 16:1-36

Sermon

King Duncan

... and appreciate all that we have done for them. Something boils within us when they shrug off our sacrifices as if we really should have done more. That is a human response to a lack of gratitude; it is not God’s response. God heard the people murmuring and He responded graciously, as He always does. In the face of their grumbling, God provides for their needs. He provides manna from heaven. They gathered the manna each morning and when it dried in the sun, they had a sticky solid food which was edible and ...

2. Fresh Every Morning - A Token and a Truth

Exodus 16:1-36

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... I am the Bread which came down from heaven.” Let’s read the scripture from that point. “They said, “Is not this Jesus, the Son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven?” Jesus answered them, ‘Do not murmur among yourselves. No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him... And let’s skip on down to the 47th verse: “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the ...

3. So Soon We Forget!

Exodus 16:1-36

Sermon

... before we had a Savior, before we had someone to care, before we had someone to answer our prayers, before we had a God! Peevish Murmurers There's an old story that comes out of the Missouri Ozarks; it tells of a hound dog sitting in a country store, howling his ... our doubts can touch his heart with pity for us. When we have but feeble faith (doubting faith) when our fears cause us to murmur and complain, even then God will give us what he can so we may learn to trust him and be content. Crazy as it seems ...

4. Grace for a Complaining People

Exodus 16:2-15

Sermon

Arley K. Fadness

... lived in. Immediate needs block out all reason and, like Esau, who was willing to forego his birthright for a pot of food, Israel is willing to make an equal trade. Captain Moses senses mutiny from the "crew" who feel the freedom ship is going nowhere. The people murmur against Moses. "If only we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the fleshpots and ate our fill of bread: for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger" (Exodus 16 ...

5. How To Get Better When You're Bitter

Exodus 15:22-27

Sermon

James Merritt

... and the children of Israel sang this song to the Lord, and spoke, saying: ‘I will sing to the Lord, for He has triumphed gloriously! The horse and its rider He has thrown into the sea!'" (v.1) Now notice three days later, "And the people murmured against Moses, saying, ‘What shall we drink?'" (v.24) Now think about that. Twenty-three hours and fifty-nine minutes they had known sunshine. Now they know one minute of rain and they are griping about the rain. You see, when trials and troubles come, and ...

6. Holy Believing

John 6:25-59

Sermon

Donald Macleod

... Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now say, 'I have come down from heaven'?" Jesus answered them, "Do not murmur among yourselves. No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day. It ... must we do, to be doing the work of God?" (v. 28); "Lord, give us this bread always" (v. 34); and "The Jews murmured at him" (v. 41). There were the activists among them for whom any alliance with God was a matter of "doing." There were ...

7. The Bread Of God

Exodus 16:1-36

Sermon

King Duncan

... most beautiful smiles: from thanksgiving for daily bread; from the joy of sharing; from the knowledge of sins forgiven; from the blessings of God." The manna was not just a test. It was also a disclosure of the depth of God's love for His children. The murmuring of the children of Israel are mentioned four times in this context. On each of these occasions we are told why God gave them the gift of manna. It was His answer to the peevish complaints of their greedy appetites. When they were summoned to come ...

8. Serpents and Other Signs

Numbers 21:4-9

Sermon

Mark Trotter

... menu and give them serpents. Serpents means snakes, we are to assume. Some of the snakes bit the people, and some of the people who were bit by the snakes die. Which leads the people to consider that maybe manna wasn't so bad after all. They repent of their murmuring. God, who was impressed with their repentance, instructs Moses to make a snake out of bronze (after all this is the Bronze Age), and to put it on a stick, and then to lift it high above the people as a sign that he has forgiven them. Now if ...

9. Flesh For Our Life

John 6:25-59

Sermon

George W. Hoyer

... was a human tongue in a human body proclaiming. As we listen anew to some things he said, we can feel for these Jews who murmured, "Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, 'I have come down from ... those people. People on the fringes of our crowd here, even people in the front rows, some of the time even people in the center pews murmur, "Can this all really be true?" Popular wisdom has it that "some things just can't be put into words." God doesn't agree, of ...

10. Preparing The Way

Malachi 2:17--3:5

Sermon

Ron Lavin

... not only prosper, but they test God's patience with their evil deeds and get away with it' (Malachi 3:13-15, TEV)." Murmuring against God may very well be on our Advent preparation lists. Getting ready for God's coming means turning away from self-centered complaints. ... to do what needs to be done to prepare for his coming. If we just appropriate what has already been given, we can see murmuring for what it really is: a sin against our Lord. How is this possible? Malachi says God works like a refiner and a fuller ...

11. What's So Good About Feeling Bad?

Exodus 17:1-7

Sermon

Joann Hary

... ! Oh, this wasn't the first time, though. Just a little earlier God had to send manna because they complained of having nothing to eat. Then they complained about not having meat, so God sent them quail. And in our reading for today they are complaining and murmuring for water. One more time, God proves to them that he is still with them, caring for them and providing for their every need. Of course, we aren't likely to do that, are we? Perhaps we are. As I already said, I did some complaining myself ...

12. When God Provides, It’s a Manna Miracle James G. Cobb

Exodus 16:1-36

Sermon

... was the guide and the leader of their present journey, they easily forgot God as their present help and began to resent this hard pilgrimage. "So, where is God now?" they would cry. "Has God abandoned us and left us? Are we left here to die?" The people murmured and often they did not get what they expected. One evening my wife and I were in the kitchen preparing dinner. Our two-year-old son had liked the taste of newly-discovered soft drinks. We had just poured a dark-colored beverage into small glasses on ...

13. Is the Lord Among Us or Not?

Exodus 17:1-7

Sermon

Tony Everett

... s own life-giving, life-changing love that leads us through any wilderness with a love that never lets us go thirsty. Here in your congregation and in your own lives there will be wilderness times of doubting and despairing, complaining and blaming, moaning and murmuring, grumbling and groaning. That’s normal. That’s even biblical. As the Hebrews did, you will often lose sight of God’s presence with you and God’s promise to you and for you. You will search desperately for a quick fix for your most ...

14. Himself The Real Presence

John 6:25-59

Sermon

George W. Hoyer

... as the first fruits of all of us who are dying and of all those who have died. He will raise up all the dead and give eternal life to all who believe. Are you following this? We -- most of us -- accept all this in faith without a dubious murmur or complaint. And all this is -- what shall we say? -- "unbelievable" stuff. It is "unknowable." Only by divine revelation in scripture and only by inner working of the Holy Spirit, only by faith do we accept all this as true. But we get stuck on "eat my flesh." We ...

15. The Other Ninety-nine

Luke 15:1-7

Sermon

John G. Lynn

... needed God only to control him. Secure in the sheepfold of their own good works, they measured grace, ounce by ounce, as their reward for what they had accomplished. Their own study of the law refreshed them by day and gave them fire by night. To God they murmured, "No thank you, Lord, we'll make our own light in the darkness and our own rainfall when we feel dry. And we will drive from the sheepfold any lambs who feel differently about you." So God abandoned them. He left them to themselves and went after ...

16. Life's Loose Threads and The Tie That Binds

Deuteronomy 34:1-12

Sermon

Robert S. Crilley

... and whispering, "Oh, but it does matter. It matters a great deal." And sharing her son's pain, she too starts to weep. The redeeming God in whom we hope, Muehl concludes, is not a parent who dismisses our lives with a pat on the head, and murmured assurances that all of our unattained goals do not really matter in cosmic terms. Rather, it is the One who falls to the earth beside us, picking up the pieces of our broken dreams, and tenderly whispering, "Oh, but it does matter. It matters eternally." And it ...

17. Whispering The Lyrics

John 14:15-31

Sermon

Thomas Long

... of the land, but Carter the Christian had the Holy Spirit of Jesus Christ whispering in his ear, "Do you love me? The world cannot see or know me, but do you love me? Do you keep my commandments?" The reason we need the Holy Spirit murmuring the gospel in our ears, of course, is that we are notoriously forgetful. As one commentator has pointed out, "an early Christian definition for being lost ... was 'to have amnesia.' "1 We are amnesiacs who cannot keep our calling clearly in mind. Like the great Jimmy ...

18. The Honor Of A Limp

Genesis 32:22-32

Sermon

... But then he set up an inconsolable wail. His father, thinking to minimize the incident and comfort the boy, patted his head and murmured, 'Now that's all right. It really doesn't matter, son. It doesn't matter at all.' "But the child's mother, ... wept with her son."5 Professor Muehl makes the point that God does not dismiss our lives with a pat on the head and a murmured assurance that our lives do not really matter. On the contrary, God gives us this life that we might indeed make something of it. Our ...

19. Holy Believing

John 6:25-59

Sermon

Donald Macleod

... was entwined with strains and threads of nationalism, ambition, religious prejudice, and downright spiritual immaturity. Note the verbs in their questions: "What must we do, to be doing the work of God?" (v. 28); "Lord, give us this bread always" (v. 34); and "The Jews murmured at him" (v. 41). There were the activists among them for whom any alliance with God was a matter of "doing." There were also the takers for whom religion meant give me, i.e., welfare checks, adequate and regular. Then there were the ...

20. The Victory Of Faith

1 John 5:1-12

Sermon

Mark J. Molldrem

... "the Lord is gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger and of great kindness." This was demonstrated in the wilderness. In their discomfort, the people argued, "God, why are you doing this to us? Make it a little easier. Give us a break!" Although the people murmured against the Lord, God did not send them back to Egypt; nor did he obliterate them in a sandstorm. He had freed them; he would not go back on his word. He did, however, discipline them. There was an infestation of snakes in the camp of God ...

21. Whispering The Lyrics (revised)

John 14:15-31

Sermon

Thomas Long

22. When the Sermon Turns Sour

Luke 4:14-30

Sermon

William G. Carter

... as a preacher, I spent a lot of time poking around the pages of Scripture for something unusual. My only objective was to find something that would prompt me to say, “This will get them.” I would find something in the book of Obadiah and preach on it, murmuring, “I’ll bet they have never heard this before.” I was right; they had never heard it before. As a result, it had no power. No authority. No sense of importance or urgency. Once in a while, I would give in and turn to a text that everybody ...

23. Crying On Palm Sunday

Luke 19:28-44

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... ? I have a hunch that, just as Jesus wept over Jerusalem, God weeps over our world. There is a sense in which Jesus is just about the most popular personage in the world. Everybody wants to get onto His bandwagon. Sometimes it seems as though the Pharisees' murmuring about Jesus is still true; "Look, the world has gone after him!" Everybody has good word to say about Jesus. Few seem to want to follow him. And that must bring pain and sorrow to His heart. G.A. Studdert Kennedy was the famous British chaplain ...

24. A Misplaced Holy Day

Matthew 2:1-12

Sermon

King Duncan

... a surgeon at Miraj. Gazing out on the now silent audience, Dr. Chopade stood immobile for a time. Then, putting his palms together in the traditional Indian greeting, this noted Indian surgeon from the untouchables turned again to the manger. Bowing his head, he murmured, "Thank you, thank you, Lord Jesus." (4) And that is our prayer. Thank you, thank you, Lord Jesus. The world may not understand our celebration of this special day. But it gives us one last chance to ponder the blessed memory of Mary and ...

25. Imagine a World

Matthew 18:10-14

Sermon

Mark Trotter

... and the righteous have no dealings with sinners. The world into which Jesus came preaching was that kind of world, divided between the righteous and the sinner. They just assumed that God blesses the righteous, and curses the sinner. So the Pharisees and the scribes were murmuring, "This man receives and sinners and eats with them." So he told them this parable. What man of you having a hundred sheep, if he lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost ...

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