Sermon and Worship Resources

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John 14:15-31

Sermon

King Duncan

... church to his Berlin office to berate them for insufficiently supporting his programs. Pastor Martin Niemoller explained that he was concerned only for the welfare of the church and of the German people. Hitler snapped, "You confine yourself ... the officer was breathing into his ear the words of Proverbs 18.10: "The Lord is a mighty tower where his people can run for safety." Niemoller's fear fell away, and the power of that verse sustained him through his trial and his years in Nazi concentration camps. (5) "The Lord is ...

2. Bearing Fruit

John 15:1-17

Sermon

King Duncan

... as his Lord had. Matthias was beheaded. Only John escaped a torturous death, and he died a lonely man in exile. Such heroics, however, are not limited to first-century Christianity. There have been Christians in our own time that stood tall in the time of testing. One example is Martin Niemoller, a German pastor who would not give in to Adolph Hitler, and therefore spent much of World War II in a Nazi concentration camp. It is reported that the commander of that camp was determined to break Christ's hold on ...

3. Then They Came For Me

John 18:33-37

Illustration

James R. Gorman

In difficult times, loyalty to Christ as King requires an unusual courage. In Nazi Germany, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Martin Niemoller stand out as church leaders and pastors who insisted that Christ is King and not Adolph Hitler. Niemoller understood that truth transcends Hitler's gifted political rhetoric and it also transcends his own particular condition. Reflecting on the war years in Germany, Martin Niemoller confessed his own hesitancy to be obedient to the Truth and the King of Kings by saying: They ...

4. Building Bridges While Getting Shot at from Both Shores

Revelation 22:1-6

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... , to heal the afflicted, to preach and practice love and non-violence, there is the moral obligation of violence. Ask Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who when confronted by Hitler argued not for pacifism but for the courage of meeting violence with violence. Or ask Martin Niemoller, one of the most influential Protestant leaders in Germany who opposed Hitler through the formation of the "Pastors' Emergency League" and the "Six Articles of Barmen," which led to his arrest on 1 July 1937. He spent most of the war in ...

5. Sleep With the Lions Without Being Eaten

Daniel 6:1-28

Sermon

James Merritt

... not save Daniel from the lions' den, He saved him in the lions' den and brought him through the lions' den. Don't think it's strange if you are thrown into the lions' den. Friend, in these days you ought to think it's strange if you are not. Martin Niemoller was a great German pastor who stood up to the Nazis and stood up for the Jewish people. Finally, they threw him into prison. As he was sitting in his jail cell, the prison chaplain came to visit him, and sat down and said, "Brother, why are you in this ...

6. The Man With Two Umbrellas

1 Samuel 3:1--4:1

Sermon

William L. Self

... life upon another is powerful. We are all tremendously affected by what other people do or say. There is an invisible pull of one life upon another. For example, in a Nazi concentration camp where Martin Niemoller was imprisoned, a Nazi agent was placed in a cell next to that of Dr. Niemoller in the hope of converting the Christian minister to totalitarianism. After some days of observing God's prisoner (as he was called), his habit of devotion, his unfettered faith in the ultimate triumph of righteousness ...

7. How Many Times Should We Forgive?

Matthew 18:21-35

Sermon

King Duncan

... understand that? Big people forget and forgive? Only little people carry around resentments from the past. III. Even more important, forgiving is life lived in the image of Christ. This is the principle reason we forgive: that is what Christ would have us do. Martin Niemoller, a Lutheran pastor, was a Nazi prisoner of war. He learned the meaning of forgiveness from his prison experience. Through his cell window, he could see those being put to death, day by day. He began to ask himself what he would say and ...

8. Joy In the Midst of Sorrow?

John 15:1-17

Sermon

Edward Inabinet

... face of illness, pain and death we can rejoice. PART OF THAT JOY ALSO COMES FROM THE KNOWLEDGE THAT IMMANUEL HAS COME. Immanuel, "God with us." We rejoice, knowing that sorrow is temporary. We rejoice in the strength He gives us to bear it. The late pastor Martin Niemoller, a Jewish Christian, was one of few who survived Hitler''s Dachau Prison in World War II. To his last day he was tormented by the sights he had seen of men and women trudging to their death and the smell of burning flesh. Years after his ...

9. The Privilege and the Price

Matthew 5:13-16

Sermon

Phil Thrailkill

... , “Upon our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount,” Discourse IV: Matthew 5:13-16, in Albert C. Outler & Richard D. Heitzenrater, editors, John Wesley’s Sermons: An Anthology (Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1991), 193-206; Martin Niemoller, “Christians Must Be A Light To The World,” www.abcog.org/niemoll.html. 2. James Hannabam, Vibe, Nov. 1999, 121 3. See the appended editorial at the end of this manuscript. 4. Edited from Lorne Sanny, "The Key to World Evangelism," Discipleship Journal, Jan.- Feb, 1982. 5 ...

10. Valley of Weakness (Series: Peace in the Valley)

Luke 6:17-26

Sermon

J. Howard Olds

... , it is not enough to know that someone sympathizes with us. It is not enough to know that someone cares. We need to know that someone has been there. For if they can pass through the waters without drowning, stand the heat without collapsing, maybe I can too. Martin Niemoller was a German pastor during the Second World War. His resistance to the Nazi’s got him thrown into the concentration camp at Dachau. The gallows from which many of his fellow prisoners were hanged stood right outside his cell ...

11. Cameos of Conscience

1 Samuel 22:1-5

Sermon

... he was not in rebellion against Saul. The truth was that, because of his kindness to David, he had to die in the murderous grip of a tyrant. Because he bandaged the wounded John Wilkes Booth, an innocent Dr. Samuel Mudd served long years of imprisonment. Because Martin Niemoller had the audacity to stand up in the most prestigious Lutheran pulpit in Berlin and shout to the rafters, "Not you, Adolf Hitler, but Jesus Christ is my Fuhrer," this Iron Cross hero of World War I had to bear a cross of suffering in ...

12. Jesus and the IRS

Mark 12:13-17

Sermon

Donald B. Strobe

... the status quo...but there is a another story - largely unwritten - of the ways in which many Christians in Germany became part of what was called the “Confessing Church” and resisted the totalitarianism which was sweeping their nation. The names of Martin Niemoller, Karl Barth, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer come most readily to mind. In May, 1934, they gathered together to issue a statement of faith which has come to be known as the “Barmen Declaration.” In summary, it says: The State has many valuable ...

13. I Believe In Jesus Christ

Colossians 1:15-23

Sermon

Bill Bouknight

... Christians said, “Jesus is Lord,” their fellow citizens thought they were crazy, dangerous subversives, for if Jesus is Lord, Caesar is not. There can be only one Lord in a person’s life. In pre-World War II Germany, the great Lutheran pastor Martin Niemoller preached a sermon entitled, “Christ is my Fuhrer,” and Hitler jailed him because of it. (2) Just think what you are saying when you affirm in the Creed that Jesus is Lord! You are saying that Jesus is your towering truth, your dominating ...

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