Sermon and Worship Resources

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Psalm 4:1-8

Teach the Text

C. Hassell Bullock

... . As you consider your broken relationships, do you recognize your own need for God’s mercy? Forgive and bless. Sports: NBA basketball star Chris Paul had just signed to attend Wake Forest University, and the next day he learned that his grandfather had been murdered. Paul’s grandfather, Nathaniel Jones, was randomly selected and then robbed and beaten to death by five teenagers. Paul was very close to his grandfather, who was well respected in the community, so you would expect him to be bitter. Rather ...

2. Grace The New Fashioned Way

Ephesians 2:1-10

Sermon

King Duncan

... for three reasons. IN THE FIRST PLACE THE GOOD NEWS OF GOD'S GRACE IS A CALL TO HUMILITY. No one can boast says St. Paul in another of his letters about his or her status as a Christian. We are all sinners saved by grace. Reinhold Neibuhr in his ... s play, I Remember Mama, there is a scene about a man named Uncle Chris. Uncle Chris has just died and the relative have gathered to read the will. While most of them have considered Uncle Chris a good for nothing and an embarrassment to them, they did not want ...

3. Strategic Kindness

Ephesians 4:17--5:21

Sermon

King Duncan

... and compassion are for wimps, not for real life." Read the record and you will discover that Jesus was no wimp. Neither was St. Paul. These were men of courage. They knew how to stare both danger and death in the face. Yet they also knew that little is to ... the man my wife and children love, the man God has helped me to be." (5) There are many people who cannot relate to Chris' attitude, his willingness to forgive. But, in the long run of things, it is the only hope this world has. We will never solve ...

4. Did You Ask How Much It Was Going To Cost?

Luke 14:25-35

Sermon

King Duncan

... to commitment. It is a call to make a decision about who Christ is in your life. Let's use a contemporary analogy. When Chris Evert started high school, she deeply wanted to be a cheerleader. No surprise there. Lots of girls want to be cheerleaders. But Evert ... . They become God's frozen people. Jim Burns tells about watching an interview on the evening news with a homeowner named Paul Swanson. There had been horrible mud slides in Swanson's community, a cul-de-sac with fine homes. Swanson's house was ...

5. Hope for People Who Are Angry

Ephesians 4:30-5:2

Sermon

King Duncan

... But we’ve all been in situations when things were so aggravating that we haven’t known what we could do with our fury. Paul addressed this very emotion in our lesson for the day from the Epistle of Ephesians when he wrote: “And do not grieve the Holy ... past. I forgave all those who wronged me and asked forgiveness from those that I have wronged.” Somehow by the grace of God Chris Simpson was able to leave his bitterness, rage and anger behind. One sign of the change that occurred in his life is that he ...

6. An Invitation to Joy

Zephaniah 3:14-20

Sermon

Mary S. Lautensleger

... in the world cannot accumulate sufficient funds to buy peace and joy. Peace and joy are priceless. This season is all about reconciliation of the spirit, and the peace that Paul preaches. May "the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus," our Lord. Amen. 1. Stan Freberg, Green Chri$tma$, available online at http://freberg.8m.com/text/greenchristmas.html [Accessed September 1, 2005]. 2. Harold Kushner, When All You've Ever Wanted Isn't Enough, The Search ...

7. Cross Eyed: Triumph

John 20:1-18

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... their belief in Christ as the Savior. Besides that, it doesn't really match up with what the other Gospel writers and people like Paul and Peter, James and John all have to say as eye witnesses. There are those who would claim that the church has perpetrated some secret ... that with being hopeful." Some hours passed, but then Chris' rooftop message was shown on TV and posted on some web sites. Chris' family began getting phone calls from all over the country telling them Chris was alive. (2) We live in a Good ...

8. Deadly Sins - A Matter Of Sutton's Law

Romans 7:14-25

Sermon

R. Curtis Fussell

... of us; we do things and we can't imagine where they come from. Embarrassed and hurt by these things, we suddenly find ourselves repeating the apostle Paul's words, "I do the things I do not want to do, and don't do the things I want to do; sin dwells within me" (Romans ... health come to us with the confession, "I did the thing I didn't want to do. I'm sorry. I am to blame." Chris Webber, the star basketball player for the University of Michigan, managed to get ahold of the ball with only eleven seconds left in ...

9. The Bride of Jesus

John 2:1-11

Sermon

King Duncan

... she had her eyes closed was that a pickup truck had just crashed into the back of her BMW. She then sideswiped Chris’ Dodge, ricocheted onto the median and headed toward oncoming traffic. When she opened her eyes, Joanna’s car was totaled and she ... present in many of the parables that Jesus taught. We are his beloved. And one day we will join him at the wedding feast. Paul used this imagery in advising couples about their own marriages in Ephesians 5: 25-33. The last words of that passage go like this: “ ...

10. The Freedom in Forgiveness

Matthew 18:21-35

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... it is worth, the phenomenon is not new. Even in the earliest days, church folk had their problems. No doubt that is what prompted Paul to write to the Romans telling them to stop quarreling with one another and criticizing each other's way of observing the faith. He says ... kidnaping of 10-year-old Chris Carrier. When the boy was finally found, he had been burned with cigarettes, stabbed with an ice pick, shot in the head and left for dead. Miraculously, young Chris recovered, the only permanent physical ...

11. How Could We Possibly Forget?

Ephesians 1:15-23

Sermon

King Duncan

... of their church. The first confirmed case of COVID-19 in the state of Tennessee was diagnosed in a man named Chris Baumgartner. Baumgartner and his family dealt with the fear of the virus, and the fear that people would find out that ... evidence that God is for everyone.” (8) "I am evidence that God is for everyone.” The Apostle Paul could have written those very words. That was the secret to Paul’s overflowing, never-ending thankfulness and his joy. If we choose, we can make every day Thanksgiving Day ...

12. CSI: Jerusalem

Luke 24:36-48

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... rolled-away stone, but a carried-away church. Jordan writes: "I've always said the real evidence of the empty tomb was the conversion of Paul. Why would he give up every thing he held dear to preach and be persecuted for a lie?" We have Physical Evidence, Eye Witness accounts ... . But then, the Post Office did something that turned to scales. They delivered bag after bag after bag of letters to Chris in the courtroom. The judge stood up and said, "If the U.S. Post Office, a branch of the Federal Government, ...

13. Close! But No Cigar!

John 3:1-17

Sermon

King Duncan & Angela Akers

... his life. In 1996, a man named David McAllister confessed to the kidnapping and attempted murder of Christopher Carrier. McAllister had been an employee of Chris’ father. When Mr. Carrier caught McAllister drinking on the job, he fired him. The vicious attack on young Christopher was revenge for the firing. McAllister was now ... 6. PBS https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/questionofgod/voices/collins.html. 7. From a sermon by Paul Decker on Matthew 6:5-15 THE LINES OF COMMUNICATION ARE OPEN, www.sermoncentral.com.

14. Do We Live in ‘Why’ or ‘Whynot’

Romans 12:3-8, 16-18

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... If you have seen the movie Pursuit of Happiness, it is based on the true story of Chris Gardner. Chris Gardner's life is falling apart. After a business deal goes bad, he feels that the only ... says the Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: I am the Lord your God, who teaches you for your own good, who leads you in the way you should go." Paul reminds us that "We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us." One of those gifts is Teaching" We can learn from one another how to follow God. ...

15. Scapegoat

John 18:28-40

Children's Sermon

Carl E. Zahrte

... ? Oh, all right, you’re being honest. Suppose, Paul, that you did something wrong - maybe you knocked over one of Mommy’s favorite vases, and it smashed to pieces, and Mommy came in and said, "Who did that?" - and you said, "Chrissie, my sister," and Chrissie stood there and she couldn’t say a thing. Do you think Mommy would punish Chrissie? No, she knows you too well. But suppose that you knocked over the vase, and you ran out of the room. Then Chris came in to see what had happened, Mom came in and ...

16. It's Tough to Be God

Exodus 32:1-33:6

Sermon

Maxie Dunnam

... Relish that thought. Let it warm your heart and stir longings with you – the home of sermons in the heart of God. Paul J. Byarmaster has given a beautiful word-picture of an occasion in heaven, “When all the wind-chimes in heaven begin to ... two young men who were the brunt of Roderick’s wrath but kept loving him. Tim Porter, one of the fine North Carolina ministers. Chris Lane has completed his Master of Divinity degree at Boston Seminary and is staying on for an additional year of training, and will ...

17. God All Along

Acts 9:1-6 (7-20)

Sermon

David J. Kalas

... Not Saul. No, he recognized the Christian claims as dangerous and misleading, and so he set out to silence them. What he did not recognize, however, was that God was behind it all. So, see him traveling along on the road to Damascus. He is a man on a mission, albeit not the sort of mission we commonly associate with him. But the look is familiar, nonetheless. He is purposeful and devout. He is on the road for the Lord. Then, mercifully, the Lord meets him along that road. Paul's experience on the road ...

18. Grow Up!

1 Corinthians 3:1-23

Sermon

Timothy J. Smith

... The danger is when we reach a point in our spiritual lives when we feel we no longer need to grow. That was the point Paul was trying to make to the Corinthians. The people stopped growing and were in effect stuck in infancy for far too long. They should have ... have knitted. “The women are thrilled to do something they love to make a difference,” says one of the organizers, Chris Pokorny. “I enjoy telling them, ‘You’re helping people around the world.’ It’s exciting to see women empowered and ...

19. The Oneness of Twoness

Romans 14:1--15:13

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... as challenging then as it is now to keep peace among those who would be the body of Christ. We read this morning of Paul preaching to riled up Romans wrangling about issues of food and dietary disciplines. Diatribes had been taken to a fever-pitch of insults and harangues ... it possible for all who come to Christ to find a place in the choir. I have a South African friend named Chris Peppler who is President of South African Theological Seminary and a gifted theologian. One day he was reading Psalm 85:10-11 ...

20. 1 Corinthians 7:29-31

1 Corinthians 7:1-40

Sweet

Leonard Sweet

... , their previous connections to the world, including their personal and/or physical relationships, should be abandoned in favor of a purely spiritual lifestyle. Paul rejects this understanding of a Christian life. Instead he writes, "let each of you remain in the condition in which you were called" (7:20). For Paul, whatever status a new Christian inhabits at the time they accept Chris's redemptive gift is basically irrelevant to their future life in Christ. God's work through Christ is the new focus of a ...

21. Eyes Fixed Upon the Goal

Philippians 3:8-14

Sermon

King Duncan

... . Just as the early pioneers were determined to go westward, every person who makes a difference in our world has his or her eyes fixed on a worthy goal. St. Paul was one of the most influential people who ever lived. One of the reasons he was so effective was that his eyes were fixed firmly on a goal that simply ... .com/comptips.htm#. 6. elbourne.org/sermons/index.mv?illustration+3614) 7. Chris Sonksen, https://chrissonksen.wordpress.com/category/success/. (Growing Strong in the Season of Lent, Lent 5)

22. Why Not a Christian Live 8 for the Environment?

Romans 8:18-27

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... Bon Jovi, Dave Matthews Band, and Sarah McLachlan. But behind the Live-8 stage there were the likes of Rick Warren, Chris Tucker, Jars of Clay, Maria Bello, Melissa Fitzgerald and Reverend David Beckman of Bread for the World. From a global vantage ... -8 drama unfold, I thought I was back in the 19th century. Except then it wasn't rock stars like Bono and Paul McCartney leading the way. It was Christian businessmen and clergy. In the hey-day of nineteenth century evangelical activism, voluntary societies were ...

23. Shake It Off!

Matthew 10:1-42

Sermon

Carlyle Fielding Stewart

... confess and repent, which helps us to shake off and get over the sins of our past. The serpent fastening itself to Paul's hand might have been the memory of his past, of how he persecuted Christians and instigated the death of Stephen. After ... a bottle of Harvey's Bristol Cream, he charged into one of the most magnificent Shakespearean elocutions I've ever heard! As my friend, Chris Barnet, and I sat there spellbound, Nigel then lapsed into a teary tirade of how he had killed a seven-year-old girl while ...

24. Because He Lives

1 Corinthians 15:12-34

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... privilege to declare that same Easter Gospel through an interpreter. They even taught me how to say it in Russian-- Christos vos chris--"Christ is risen!" Now, here I am again, a third time in the same year, declaring the Easter good news. Why today? ... deny that is heresy. Here is a second truth from the scripture: IF OUR FAITH IS FOCUSED ON THIS WORLD ONLY, IT IS A PITIFUL FRAUD. Paul writes, "If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied." If I were to plan a two ...

25. Proper 20

Lk 16:1-13 · 1 Tim 2:1-8 · Amos 8:4-7 · Hos 11:1-11

Sermon Aid

... rich persons' oppression of the poor. 1 Timothy 2:1-8 Prayers for all people are acceptable to God who desires all to be saved. Paul urges Timothy to offer prayers for all people, particularly for all rulers. To do so is good and acceptable to God who desires all people ... , we will do the same with large amounts. Moreover, Jesus frankly says we cannot have two masters: God and money. The Chris-tian is master of his finances by putting them in the service of God. THEOLOGICAL REFLECTION Gospel: Luke 16:1-13 ...

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