Sermon and Worship Resources

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1. An Attitude of Mercy

Illustration

John A. Terry

There is a story about Queen Victoria of England. She was a close friend of Principal and Mrs. Tulloch of St. Andrews. Prince Albert died and Queen Victoria was left alone. Just about the same time, Principal Tulloch died and Mrs. Tulloch was left alone. Unannounced, Queen Victoria came to call on Mrs. Tulloch when Mrs. Tulloch was resting on a couch in her room. When the Queen was announced, Mrs....

2. Mystery Of Death

2 Samuel 12:1-31

Eulogy

John A. Terry

Child Lost Through Miscarriage Opening May the grace and peace of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, be with us all. We gather here, in the face of the preciousness of life and of the mystery of death. ____________ and ____________, with the death of your child something has changed irrevocably: anticipation has been thwarted, hope has been dashed, possibility has been ended, a corner has been t...

3. Step Eight - Love

Mt 7:7-14 · 2 Cor 5:16-21 · Ps 19:7-13

Sermon

John A. Terry

Step eight: Made a list of all persons we harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all. I can see the scene now. They are meeting over a three-martini lunch to plan out the advertising strategy. They struggle with what hook they will use to lure people to their product. One of them says, "Think of this? What revives the soul, makes wise the simple, rejoices the heart, enlightens the eyes...

4. Step Eleven - Spirituality

Mt 26:36-46 · 1 Thess 5:12-22 · Ps 25:1-15

Sermon

John A. Terry

This past week I had a new adventure. I did some plumbing work I had never done before. But I got out my handy homeowner's guide, and followed along step by step. It took longer than I thought it would. But at last it was almost complete. Close to the very end came the time when I put on the nuts and bolts that held it all together. As we reach toward the end of this series, we are approaching th...

5. Step Five - Integrity

Jn 4:16-24 · 1 Jo 1:5-10 · Is 6:1-8

Sermon

John A. Terry

Step five: Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being, the exact nature of our wrongs. I have been accused during this sermon series of being too sober - in my preaching. So: joke de jour. A minister, a priest and a rabbi were having lunch one day. They were talking about the spiritual support they gave the members of their congregation: listening to their confessions, saying words...

6. Step Four - Courage

Mt 26:69-75 · Acts 9:1-9 · Ps 139:1-6

Sermon

John A. Terry

Step four: Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. The psalmist talks of the God before whom such a searching and fearless moral inventory is both possible and necessary. Ours is a God who, in traditional language, is omniscience and omnipresent, a God who knows all and is everywhere. This Psalm is sometimes called the Psalm of the unavoidable God. We believe that before our ...

7. Step Nine - Discipline

Mt 5:21-26 · Eph 4:25-32 · Num 5:5-10

Sermon

John A. Terry

Step nine: "Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others." In these passages of Scripture, we have rather specific advice. Let us look first at the Old Testament, the book of Numbers. The bulk of the Law is given in Exodus and Leviticus, and then again in Deuteronomy. This morning's passage is a law of restitution, a special case law, supp...

8. Step One - Honesty

Luke 8:26-39 · Proverbs 23:29-35

Sermon

John A. Terry

This past summer I read an article that caused me to make a significant change from my usual practice of preaching from the lectionary. The article, titled, "Coming to Grips with Drug Abuse," made the point that neither clergy nor parents need to be experts on drug dependency, though we do need to be well informed. We need to understand what it means to describe chemical dependency as a disease. T...

9. Step Seven - Humiltiy

Mt 23:25-36 · 2 Ti 2:20-26 · Ps 51:1-14

Sermon

John A. Terry

Step seven: "Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings." Psalm 51 is basic to the biblical foundation of this step. The introduction to this Psalm sets the context for its writing. Nathan, a prophet of God, went to David, the King of Israel, after David's affair with Bathsheba. David had gained fame and power and wealth. David had not only committed adultery with Bathsheba. When he discovered s...

10. Step Six - Willingness

Jn 5:2-9a · Heb 4:14-16 · Is 1:12-20

Sermon

John A. Terry

Step six: Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character. Here is Isaiah, whom we saw in last week's text being so awed by God's presence, so totally aware of his uncleanness before God. His was a majestic experience of worship. In this morning's text God speaks through Isaiah, questioning the validity of the people's worship. The local Chamber of Commerce recently came ou...

11. Step Ten - Perseverance

Lk 12:35-48 · 1 Cor 10:1-13 · Ps 15:1-5

Sermon

John A. Terry

Step ten: "Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it." The 12 steps are a long journey, and the texts for today are ones that help us continue on the long journey. This passage from Corinthians is one I think should be a history teacher's delight. It is a mode of scriptural interpretation known as "typology." It is a form of historical study. This method se...

12. Step Three - Faith

Mt 8:5-13 · Heb 11:1-7 · Is 55:6-9

Sermon

John A. Terry

Step three: Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to God as we understood him. In seminary I was preparing to take the final exam for my course in Theology 101. In any survey course there is always far more to study than is possible to cover. I tried to study the entire field of theological thought. I reviewed all my class notes. I even resorted to prayer. But neither the study nor ...

13. Step Twelve - Responsibility

Lk 19:1-10 · Gal 6:1-10 · Is 61:1-4

Sermon

John A. Terry

Step 12: "Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to others, and to practice these principles in all our affairs." This is not a step inward in our own journey of life and faith. It is a step outward which we take after we have recognized where God has led us in this journey. It is, in religious language, the call of the missionary. It is the ...

14. Step Two - Hope

Mk 10:46-52 · 2 Cor 12:7-10 · Is 12:1-6

Sermon

John A. Terry

Step two. "Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity." One word sometimes used to summarize this step is the word hope. We are going to look at today's texts as they relate to believing God restores us as we turn our lives over to that Power greater than ourselves. In the Old Testament reading, Isaiah sings a song of deliverance. The words might sound like a c...

15. The Meek

Sermon

John A. Terry

Psalm 37:1-11Matthew 5:1-12 This is not the beatitude of anyone claiming "I am the greatest." In fact, like all the other beatitudes, we have to wonder how practical these words are. What business could survive being meek? This is not a slogan you are likely to find above the door to the Stoc_esermonsk Exchange on Wall Street. Meekness will not win the play-off series between the New York Knic...

16. The Meek

Psalm 37:1-40

Sermon

John A. Terry

This is not the beatitude of anyone claiming "I am the greatest." In fact, like all the other beatitudes, we have to wonder how practical these words are. What business could survive being meek? This is not a slogan you are likely to find above the door to the Stock Exchange on Wall Street. Meekness will not win the play-off series between the New York Knicks and the Chicago Bulls. We tend to thi...

17. The Merciful

Sermon

John A. Terry

Matthew 5:1-12Matthew 18:23-35 The quality of mercy is not strain'd,It droppeth as a gentle rain from heavenUpon the place beneath: it is twice blest;It blesseth him that gives and him that takes:'Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomesThe throned monarch better than his crown.(The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, scene 1) In our practice of "mercy" there is a kind of "I'll scratch your back -- you ...

18. The Merciful

Matthew 18:21-35

Sermon

John A. Terry

The quality of mercy is not strain'd, It droppeth as a gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest; It blesseth him that gives and him that takes: 'Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes The throned monarch better than his crown. (The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, scene 1) In our practice of "mercy" there is a kind of "I'll scratch your back -- you scratch my back" philoso...

19. The Peacemakers

Sermon

John A. Terry

Ephesians 2:14-17Matthew 5:1-12 "With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and orphans, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and a lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations....

20. The Peacemakers

Ephesians 2:11-22

Sermon

John A. Terry

"With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and orphans, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and a lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations." These are words from President...

21. The Persecuted

Sermon

John A. Terry

Matthew 5:1-12John 15:12-27 Jack Cahill, an advertising executive from Kansas City, Missouri, has suggested new marketing techniques which can help to tap the appeal to popular blessings. Beginning with the Roman Catholic Church (24 percent of the U.S. market), he suggests a strategy of market segmentation, a clear positioning of the church identifying specific subgroups within the brand name. Fo...

22. The Persecuted

John 15:18-27

Sermon

John A. Terry

Jack Cahill, an advertising executive from Kansas City, Missouri, has suggested new marketing techniques which can help to tap the appeal to popular blessings. Beginning with the Roman Catholic Church (24 percent of the U.S. market), he suggests a strategy of market segmentation, a clear positioning of the church identifying specific subgroups within the brand name. For the contemporary branch of ...

23. The Poor In Spirit

Sermon

John A. Terry

Matthew 5:1-12 When Jesus spoke these words, he had sat down with his disciples. These are not generic "words to live by" that get published in the Sunday magazine section. These are words Jesus spoke particularly to the disciples. That is why they went up the mountain to be alone. The word translated as "blessed" is commonly translated today as "happy." Robert Schuller wrote a book titled The...

24. The Poor In Spirit

Matthew 5:1-12

Sermon

John A. Terry

When Jesus spoke these words, he had sat down with his disciples. These are not generic "words to live by" that get published in the Sunday magazine section. These are words Jesus spoke particularly to the disciples. That is why they went up the mountain to be alone. The word translated as "blessed" is commonly translated today as "happy." Robert Schuller wrote a book titled The Be Happy Attitudes...

25. The Pure In Heart

Sermon

John A. Terry

Psalm 42Matthew 5:1-12 Purity of heart is a common thead throughout scripture. The first of the Ten Commandments says: "You shall have no other gods before me" (Deuteronomy 5:7). In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other" (Matthew 6:24). "Enter by the narrow ga...

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