Sermon and Worship Resources

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Acts 17:16-34

Sermon

Tony Everett

... Worrying that her dog might jump out of the car window, Martha stopped every few steps, pointed at her car, and commanded “Otto! You stay!” A young man carrying a skateboard observed Martha’s actions in silence. Finally he just had to ask, “Ma’am ... the good news, as Jesus was, is, and will always be. In Jesus, God’s own self became flesh and lived among God’s people (John 1:14). Jesus did not use his carpentry skills to build some sort of shrine near his Nazareth home and then use high pressure ...

2. Let the Son Shine In

John 1:1-18

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... books, no music, no television, little friendly conversation. You went to bed with the chickens, as they used to say. Otto Bettman of the Bettman Archives wrote a book some years ago about life in Victorian times, and titled it: “The ... is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light and in him there is no darkness at all.” (I John 1:5) The night sky was, for the first time, swept clear of frightening shadows. The night itself was robbed of its terrors, for in Jesus Christ ...

3. Ezekiel's Call

Ezekiel 1:1-28, Ezekiel 2:1-3:15, Ezekiel 3:16-27

Understanding Series

Steven Tuell

... a terrifying vision of judgment or a comforting vision of divine presence? In fact, it is both. Religion scholar Rudolph Otto (The Idea of the Holy [trans. J. W. Harvey; New York: Oxford University Press, 1958], pp. 12–19) defined the ... God reveals the plan for the temple and its liturgy to David as a written text (S. Tuell, First and Second Chronicles [IBC; Louisville: John Knox, 2001], pp. 108–9), and Ezra, the great religious leader of the restoration after the exile, is not a prophet, but a scribe ...

4. Collection and Travel Plans

1 Corinthians 16:5-18, 1 Corinthians 16:1-4

Teach the Text

Preben Vang

... never concludes that hostility and opposition equal a closed door (e.g., Phil. 1:12–14, 28; 1 Thess. 2:2; 2 Tim. 3:12; cf. John 15:20), although danger from opponents sometimes could force him to leave a place (Acts 13:50–51; 14:5–6, 19–20; 17:5–10, 13 ... nobleman and the father of all the wretched. Even though Wenceslas was not actually a king in life, the Holy Roman Emperor Otto I posthumously conferred on him the regal dignity and title due to a king. The text of the Christmas hymn describes the ...

5. Blood: Right and Wrong Uses

Leviticus 17:1-16

Teach the Text

Joe M. Sprinkle

... at Megiddo is an image of a predatory eagle-winged creature with a human head falling upon an ibex. Otto Eissfeldt has identified that winged creature with the demon Azazel, who devoured goats.2In Mesopotamian art goats sometimes appear ... one can sell it to a different category of foreigner (Deut. 14:21) not closely identified with Israel and its covenant. Theological Insights John Stott, in a sermon titled “Why Was Blood So Important?,”7 points out that there is a medical condition known as hemophobia, ...

6. Temptation

Luke 4:1-13

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... is not definitive at all. The New Testament sometimes speaks of the devil with human analogies: he is a "ruler" (John 12:31), a "murderer" (John 8:44), "the evil one" (John 17:15), the "enemy" (Matt. 12:39). But we also find animal images - a roaring lion (I Pet. 5:8 ... , Inc, 1988), p. 477 2. Dr. Eugene Brice quoted by Ken Waddell, "Sermonshop 1998 03 01," #21, 2/24/98 3. Mary Otto, "Temptation Science," Knight-Ridder Syndicate, 2/25/98 4. Rob Elder, "Biding His Time," The Clergy Journal, May/June 1997, p. 91 ...

7. Yes! (Easter Sunday)

John 20:1-9

Sermon

King Duncan

... resurrection was really the beginning--the beginning of a new victorious life in Christ. (6) It’s like something that Max Otto once wrote. He says, “Along the upper reaches of the Ohio where the foothills of the Allegheny Mountains hem in one ... an act of God, an act of grace, and a summons to grateful living. The fog has lifted. Now let’s live in the light. 1. John Trent, Ph.D., “How to Give Your Kids . . .” Christian Parenting Today, Sept/Oct 1999, Vol. 12, No. 2, Page 21. 2. Don’t Stop Laughing ...

8. Being a True Disciple

John 8:31-36

Sermon

David G. Rogne

... but may have eternal life." You can still occasionally see a person seated behind the goalposts at a football game holding up a placard saying "John 3:16." Maybe it does some good. Some people may be able to say they have found God by simply saying "I believe." They may ... to Vienna to begin her life as an actress. While auditioning for a play she met a brilliant young German director, Otto Preminger. They fell in love and soon married. They went to America soon thereafter, where he began his career as a ...

9. Life Through the Spirit

Romans 8:1-17

Understanding Series

James R. Edwards

... anticipation of the future and ultimate sin offering of the new covenant, the “Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). And thus the death which had until Christ’s advent been sin’s ally became in Christ’s death sin’s defeat ... Spirit’s leading. The idea is one of direction, not perfection; orientation toward a goal, if not yet attainment of it. Otto Michel correctly notes that the willingness and strength to resist sin is the unmistakable sign of the Spirit. “The claim to ...

10. Fulfilled, Or Just Full?

Sermon

Alex Gondola

... ." Was there happiness in fame and fortune for Somerset Maugham? His own words seem to indicate "No." Or consider the words of Otto Von Bismark, the powerful and successful Chancellor of Germany. Bismark once remarked that if he were to add up all the happy ... with himself. "Do not labor for the food which perishes," he said to the people. "[Labor] for the food which endures to eternal life" (John 6:27, RSV). Then he identified for them and us what that food is. Jesus said, "I am the bread of life; he who ...

11. A Warning Against Hypocrisy

Matthew 23:1-39

Understanding Series

Robert H. Mounce

... Renan’s ‘Amiable Carpenter,’ Tolstoy’s ‘Spiritual Anarchist,’ Schweitzer’s ‘Imminent Cataclysmist,’ Klausner’s ‘Unorthodox Rabbi,’ and Otto’s ‘Charismatic Evangelist’ ” (The Work and Words of Jesus, p. 14). The Old Testament pattern for a series ... of how sketchy our information really is. John was right: if everything Jesus did had been written down, not even the whole world would have room for the books that would be written (John 21:25). The imagery of a bird protecting ...

12. Up And Down The Mountain

Luke 9:28-36

Sermon

Donald Dotterer

... for us to note the context of the meeting between Jesus and his father in heaven. We are told that Jesus took the disciples Peter, John and James with him and "went up on the mountain to pray (9:28)." It was when Jesus was praying that his face was changed, ... wonderful way, the Holy Spirit inspires people to bow down in reverence before God Almighty. This experience of what the scholar Rudolf Otto has called "the idea of the holy" inspires a deep change in the way an individual lives his or her life. It ...

13. The Vulnerable Christ

Philippians 2:1-11

Sermon

Gregory J. Johanson

... reign of God?" And now, at the last moment on the cross, Jesus sees her. And he speaks directly to her: "Woman, behold your Son." And to John: "Son, behold your mother." On his death, she helped take him down from the tree, tended his wounds and put him in a borrowed tomb. We, like ... . He rose again from the dead." We proclaim this as our faith as it was witnessed by his mother. Rudolph Otto speaks of the Holy as the manifestation of the sacred within our everyday lives. Mary his mother, the other women and ...

14. Holy, Holy, Holy

John 16:12-15

Sermon

Arley K. Fadness

... the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you." In our gospel today, John writes, "The Spirit, sent by the Father, reveals God's truth by giving glory to the Son ... making the Son known." The ... create God in our own image, manageable, manipulable, but God is the Divine Other. God is beyond our reason and comprehension. Rudoph Otto in, his ageless book, The Idea of the Holy, calls God the "mysterium tremendum." All believers cannot resist breaking out in ...

15. Abraham Justified by Faith

Romans 4:1-25

Understanding Series

James R. Edwards

... 15:6 at age 70, but he was not circumcised until age 99. Thus, circumcision cannot be a prerequisite for righteousness. Otto Michel correctly notes that Paul’s strategy here is exactly the opposite of that at 3:10–18: there he faced ... old, and consummated by Jesus in the fulness of time. “ ‘I tell you the truth,’ Jesus answered, ‘before Abraham was born, I am!’ ” (John 8:58). Additional Notes 4:1 On the use of “has found,” 1 Mace. 2:52 reads, “Was not Abraham found faithful in temptation ...

16. The Weak and the Strong

Romans 14:1--15:13

Understanding Series

James R. Edwards

... who, having betrayed his Lord and deceived his friends, prayed the simplest of all prayers, “ ‘Lord, you know all things’ ” (John 21:17). We cannot know all things about ourselves, much less about others. The fact that we must all stand naked ... promises made to the patriarchs so that the Gentiles may glorify God for his mercy (cf. 1:16–17). Truth and mercy are, as Otto Michel notes, frequent attributes of God in the OT (Der Brief an die Römer, pp. 358–59). But whereas they were once thought ...

17. Renewal of the New

Jeremiah 30:1--31:40

Sermon

John R. Brokhoff

“What’s new?” is the question we often ask of a person whom we haven’t seen for some time. We seem to have an obsession with the new. We’ll try anything new. We want to be the first to wear new fashions. To sell their wares, merchants advertize the new: a new book, a new look, a new model, a new taste. If it is “new,” we reason, it must also be “improved.” The preacher of Ecclesiastes does not agree. He wrote, “There is nothing new under the sun.” There is an old saying, “The more things change, the more ...

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