Sermon and Worship Resources

Showing 1 to 25 of 47 results

Mark 9:33-37

Sermon

King Duncan

... is probably an understatement. She says there is a story she repeatedly heard from LBJ himself that helps explains his drive to be number one. Lyndon Johnson said his father would come into Lyndon’s room at five o’clock every morning, tweak his toes, and shout, “Getup, Lyndon. Every other boy in town has a head start on you.” (1) That explains a lot about Lyndon Johnson. Jesus and his disciples were coming to the town of Capernaum. As they entered the house where they would be staying, he asked his ...

2. Welcoming Christ

Romans 14:1--15:13

Sermon

Frank Luchsinger

... the clerk my check-out tape and says quietly, "Come with me, sir. I will help you over here." We hear the voice which says, "No Room," and with Mary and Joseph are escorted to the place out back where the animals live. When he was in college Lyndon Johnson fell in love with a tall, blond 21-year-old with dark blue eyes. Carol Davis played the violin and wrote poetry, loved the out-of-doors, and liked politics. They dreamed together on summer evenings of the future and began to talk of marriage. Sensing that ...

3. Landslide Lyndon

Illustration

... it has ever been. It's easy to pull off too but there are dark consequences down the road, even if you think you've gotten away with it. In 1948 during a Texas runoff of a Senate primary fight with then Governor Coke Stevenson, early indications were that Lyndon Johnson had lost. Six days later, however, Precinct 13 in the border town of Alice, Texas, showed a very interesting result. Exactly 203 people had voted at the last minute in the order they were listed on the tax rolls and 202 of them had voted for ...

4. Speaking Truth to Power: The Ministry of Nathan

2 Samuel 11:1-27

Sermon

Robert Noblett

... a cruel thing, he must pay back four times as much as he took.” (2 Samuel 12:6 TEV) The Connectional Confrontation You may remember that back in 1967 Lyndon Johnson met Alexei Kosygin (one of the reigning triumvirate that replaced Nikita Khrushchev as head of the USSR) in Glassboro, New Jersey, for a summit meeting. Hugh Sidey has said that Lyndon Johnson devised an elaborate form of body language in order to convince the Soviet leader that he was dealing with a tough Texas hombre. He gave him one of his ...

5. Dark Shadows

Exodus 17:1-7

Sermon

King Duncan

... cross serves the same function as Moses' rod. The cross is our symbol: that when we are in the wilderness--when the dark shadows close in upon us--God is with us. Lyndon Johnson, while President, used to have a re-occurring nightmare. He shared it with his biographer, Doris Kearns Goodwin. In this nightmare, Johnson appeared to himself as Lyndon Johnson lying in a bed with his own head but with the body of Woodrow Wilson who had been partially paralyzed by a stroke in the last years of his presidency. While ...

6. Behold The Man Who Turned Toward Jerusalem

Mark 10:32-34

Sermon

Thomas A. Pilgrim

... any other way. To travel the road Jesus chose is not easy. But, the important things never are easy. There is always a burden to bear. When John F. Kennedy was President he often became so discouraged he wanted to give the job to Lyndon Johnson. When Lyndon Johnson finally got the job he often wanted to give it to Hubert Humphrey. Hubert Humphrey said his greatest honor was being nominated for President by his party, and his greatest disappointment was losing the race. The Christian life is not a life of ...

7. Do Not Disturb

Illustration

... Our Times, illustrates the devotion of Emily Gloria Wilson, his family's housekeeper: It had been a wearying day, and I asked Emily to hold all telephone calls while I had a nap. Shortly thereafter the phone rang. Lyndon Johnson was calling from the White House. "Get me Ken Galbraith. This is Lyndon Johnson." "He is sleeping, Mr. President. He said not to disturb him." "Well, wake him up. I want to talk to him." "No, Mr. President. I work for him, not you. When I called the President back, he could scarcely ...

8. Light from the Word

Nehemiah 7:73b--8:18

Sermon

Harry N. Huxhold

... in communication. The words can be ever so clear, but do people get the message? Jeff Shesol deals with this problem in his book Mutual Contempt, a study of the tensions between President Lyndon Johnson and the Attorney General Robert Kennedy. The problems began with Kennedy’s questioning the advisability of bringing Johnson along as a vice-presidential candidate with his brother Jack as presidential candidate. The jockeying for position and efforts to find common ground led Robert Kennedy to believe that ...

9. Freedom Can Be Frightening

Leviticus 25:8-55

Sermon

Louis H. Valbracht

... broke their tradition of declining to endorse political candidates, because they believed that the cause of peace itself was at stake in the contest between President Johnson and Senator Goldwater. The endorsement of President Johnson by the "Christian Century" was a costly act. It cost them their tax-exempt status for several years. In endorsing Lyndon Johnson, the "Christian Century" honestly believed him to be a man committed more to peace than to a military victory. But neither the "Century" nor the ...

10. For Those Who Can't Pray

Genesis 32:22-31

Sermon

Mark Trotter

... there is a class of Bostonians who would not be surprised if prayers were addressed to them. But prayer is supposed to be addressed to God. There is that famous anecdote about Bill Moyers when he worked for Lyndon Johnson. Johnson asked Moyers to pray before a meeting, which Moyers did. Johnson interrupted him, saying, "Speak louder. I can't hear you." Moyers replied, "With all due respect Mr. President, the prayer is addressed to God, not to you." It may be possible to make your prayer beautiful, polished ...

11. Reexamining Our Basic Assumptions

Mark 1:14-20

Illustration

Brett Blair

In Merle Miller's biography of Lyndon Johnson, he quotes President Johnson saying in 1969, after he had left office, "I never felt I had the luxury of re-examining my basic assumptions. Once the decision to commit military force was made, all our energies were turned to vindicating that choice and finding a way somehow to make it work." And, of course, it was that failure to reexamine the basic assumption that formed the tragedy of the Johnson administration – at the expense of tens of thousands of lives ...

12. Just a Little Faith Will Do

Luke 17:1-10

Sermon

King Duncan

... , a former quarterback for Oklahoma State University. Randy is a nephew of the late President Lyndon Johnson. It had not been a good year for Randy Johnson or the Oklahoma State team. And, to top it off, for the last game of the year, they faced the mighty Oklahoma Sooners. The game with the Sooners was almost over. The Cowboys of Oklahoma State were behind by six points. They had the ball, but there was time for ...

13. Who's The Boss?

Psalm 50:1-23

Sermon

David E. Leininger

... significant portion of their god. Those who tithe make a very tangible affirmation of who is boss - they quite literally put their money where their mouth is. I read recently that on the wall of Lyndon Johnson's White House office hung a framed letter written more than 100 years earlier by General Sam Houston to Johnson's great-grandfather Baines. Sam Houston's signature makes the letter valuable, but the story behind it is much more significant. You see, Mr. Baines is the man who led Sam Houston to Christ ...

14. Passing The Test!

Genesis 3:1-24

Sermon

Eric Ritz

... where the external temptation may overcome our internal defenses. In a campaign for the Democratic nomination for President many years ago, John Kennedy's brother, Robert, suggested that they make a deal with Lyndon Johnson, the other leading contender, prior to the vote for the presidential nomination in order to eliminate Johnson as an opponent. John Kennedy disagreed. He told his brother, “Let's defeat him, then deal with him." That's the attitude we need to take with the tempter. We do not even ...

15. They Lied and They Died

Acts 5:1-11

Sermon

James Merritt

... He did. III. The Discipline of the Spirit I am sure that when Ananias went to church that day, this was one sheep that thought he would pull the wool over the shepherd's eyes; but he was in for a deadly surprise. I am reminded of the story of Lyndon Johnson when he was President of the United States. He went to church one Sunday accompanied by the Secret Service and Motorcycle Police. After church, as he was walking out the door, a little boy came up to him and said, "Mister, are you the guy who came in a ...

16. Seen The Doctor Lately?

Romans 12:9-21

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... us. It all begins with God. We don't tithe because we have to. We tithe because God is first and we want to remind ourselves that God comes first. Is your wallet baptized? On the wall of President Lyndon Johnson's White House office hung a framed letter written by General Sam Houston to Johnson's great-grandfather Baines more than a hundred years earlier. Sam Houston's signature makes the letter valuable, but the story behind it is much more significant. Baines was the man who had led Sam Houston to Christ ...

17. The Lord's Nominee

Humor

... had had. This was during the 1960 Presidential elections, and Kennedy had dreamed that the Lord had chosen him as a nominee for his party. Kennedy's friend laughed at him and claimed that he had been chosen by the Lord in a dream also. The two Senators approached Senator Lyndon Johnson to ask his opinion of the dreams. After he had heard an explanation of the dreams, Johnson said, "That's funny. I can't remember tapping either of you for the job."

18. Proper 18

Psalm 139:1-24, Philemon 1:8-25, Philemon 1:1-7, Jeremiah 18:1--19:15, Luke 14:25-35

Sermon Aid

William E. Keeney

The Price Of Discipleship In the mid-1960s President Lyndon Johnson introduced a so-called war on poverty. At about the same time he got involved in escalating the American participation in the Vietnam war. It soon began to cost about two billion dollars per month. He was unwilling to raise taxes. The attempt to wage the wars on two fronts, ...

19. A Good Picture of Bad People

Luke 16:1-15

Sermon

... Son of Light is a source of strength. How clearly and powerfully this imagery must have spoken to those who heard the parable. Our nation’s governors had gathered in Los Angeles, California, in 1966 for their third annual conference when President Lyndon Johnson, eager to gather support for his Vietnam War policy, sent a "truth squad" to enlist the governors’ support. This was needed to show our nation and the world that we were totally and completely committed to the Vietnam effort. This same support ...

20. Who Needs a Shepherd These Days?

John 10:1-21

Sermon

Charles L. Koester

... anywhere. Mr. Kennedy challenged science to go to the moon. The seemingly impossible target was hit within a decade. Everybody made money in the stock market. Great times. Good goals were achieved including far-reaching Civil Rights legislation later passed under Lyndon Johnson’s administration, along with the promise of our times to be "The Great Society." Those were the days. An age when the brilliant minds of our nation were stretching, perhaps as never before. From Cape Canaveral in Florida, to the ...

21. Why Prophets Get Under Our Skin

Luke 3:1-20

Sermon

Maurice A. Fetty

... to ruin. Or think of Haiti and its struggle to get out from under military rule, or the Soviet Union, which hastened its collapse due in part to over-expenditure on the military, or our own enormous national debt, fueled in part by Lyndon Johnson's "guns and butter" policy during Vietnam and Ronald Reagan's lower taxes but increased military expenditures. Over and over again the prophets warn against putting too much trust in military might, in investing too much confidence in national military muscle. In ...

22. Get Out Of That Boat!

Matthew 14:22-36

Sermon

King Duncan

... At one time or another superstar coaches such as Bobby Knight of Indiana and the late Bear Bryant of Alabama have had this ability of being able to walk on water attributed to them. Various Washington politicians with big egos such as Henry Kissinger and Lyndon Johnson have also been described this way. Where was the President last night? He was out taking a stroll on the Potomac. Gen. George Patton's soldiers were in awe of him. A member of Gen. Marshall's staff once asked a second lieutenant under Patton ...

23. Dad: The Head of a Godly Family

Joshua 24:15

Sermon

James Merritt

... will be born out of wedlock.2 Liberals, Hollywood, ivory tower politicians, and the intellectual elite, are shrugging their shoulders and saying, "So what?" Let me quote Daniel Patrick Moynihan, now a Senator from New York, but in 1965 a young aide to Lyndon Johnson. Thirty years ago he penned these words: From the wild Irish slums of the 19th Century Eastern Seaboard to the riot-torn suburbs of Los Angeles, there is one unmistakable lesson in American history: a community that allows a large number of ...

24. It's Everybody's Business

John 1:35-51

Sermon

Billy D. Strayhorn

... she was younger, my Mom was very politically active. She campaign hard for the Governor of Missouri, Warren Hearnes. I have a photo of my Mom with Governor Hearnes and his wife sitting in our living room. Mom was also very active in campaigning for Lyndon Johnson and Hubert Humphrey. So much so, that she and Dad received an invitation to their Inauguration in WashingtonD.C. If it hadn't been too pretentious, she probably would have framed it. We all like getting invitations to various events, don't we. Even ...

25. Valuing Life Without Playing God

John 10:10-15

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... answers to them which, in my opinion, we'll never find politically. All I can do is just mention them this morning. A. When it comes to the question of abortion, life is difficult. On January 22, 1973, three things made the evening news. Former President Lyndon Johnson died. A peace treaty of sorts was announced in Vietnam. And the Supreme Court of the United States handed down the Roe vs. Wade decision opening the door for millions of abortions to happen in all 50 of our states. It also sets forth a debate ...

Showing results