Sermon and Worship Resources

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Acts 2:1-13

Sermon

R. Robert Cueni

... the future of our congregation for granted. Enormous challenges confront Christ's Church today. All around us we see the evidence of the trivializing of religion in general and Christianity in particular in America. In his book, The Culture Of Indifference, Stephen Carter builds an outstanding case for the fact that religious belief and practice are excluded from serious public discourse in America; that we treat religious faith as if it is nothing more than some sort of optional hobby; that, as a nation ...

2. Respect

1 Corinthians 12:12-31

Sermon

Harold Warlick

... could use all the tolerance for other people’s religious gifts they could muster. Paul is after more than tolerance. Way deep down, behind the flowing pen of his composition, is a clarion call for respect. Respect is quite different from tolerance. Stephen Carter in his work, The Culture of Disbelief, has noted, “Tolerance without respect means little.”2 If we tolerate someone’s spiritual gift then it is our forbearance, not our recognition of the equality of that other gift, that allows the person ...

3. Salvation Includes Social Justice

Jeremiah 23:1-8

Sermon

Mark Ellingsen

... Christ be said to reign, unless there is justice, a justice for the poor? In case you are still not sure about the answers to those questions, a prominent African-American Episcopal layman who teaches at Yale University Law School, Stephen Carter, can set you straight. He has noted the positive contributions that religious perspectives offer political life, how indispensable they are. Such perspectives, he says: “... provide approaches to the consideration of ultimate questions that a world yet steeped in ...

4. When to Hold On

II Timothy 3:14-4:5

Sermon

Mark Trotter

... next phase. The result of which will be a sign of our commitment to pass the tradition to the next generation. Stephen Carter in his book, Civility, talks about the cultural crisis in our nation. He defines it as a loss of civility. He says civility is more ... than just good manners. Civility is the way society respects one another. Carter put it in this marvelous phrase: "Civility is a way of loving the stranger." Which is not only a command that has ...

5. Epiphany 2

1 Corinthians 6:12-20, 1 Samuel 3:1--4:1, John 1:35-42, John 1:43-51

Sermon Aid

Russell F. Anderson

... per cent of Americans maintain that religion is losing its influence on American life. Interestingly, 62 percent of these same people hold that religion is gaining influence in their own lives. Apparently, we don't see ourselves as part of the problem. Stephen Carter, author of The Culture of Disbelief, lays blame for our societal decay on the fencing out of religion from our public life. He maintains that we have insisted that the religiously faithful act as if their faith did not matter. On the outside ...

6. Being More than Civil

1 Corinthians 1:1-9, 1 Corinthians 1:10-17

Sermon

Mark Trotter

... of betrayal of the cause. You are not supposed to be civil to the enemy. And you certainly would never compromise if the other side is considered to be the enemy. If that is the case in our society today, then we are indeed a nation in crisis. Stephen Carter makes the distinction between a community and a society. He says a society is where there are large groups of people who are strangers to one another, and yet they have to get along with one another. To do that they must establish rules that will allow ...

7. Stay in the City

Luke 24:44-53

Sermon

Mark Trotter

... in the American South, with the Civil Rights Movement, and in South Africa, with the liberation of blacks from Apartheid. Two permanent revolutions in this world done without violence. It started 2000 years ago with simple acts of love and decency. What Stephen Carter of Harvard calls, "acts of civility." And he says they are no small thing. The most important ingredient for a democracy to work is civility, good manners, treating one another with respect. He recalls that when he was raised in his home ...

8. Show and Listen

Acts 8:26-40

Sermon

Leonard Sweet

... has picked up. Sellers don't know or care if you need their products, want their products, like their products, or hate their products. All they care about is making the sale. No wonder evangelism has a bad name among so many people. No wonder Stephen Carter, in his widely cited book Culture of Disbelief, observes that "The message of contemporary culture seems to be that it's perfectly all right to believe that stuff--we have freedom of conscience, people can believe what they like--but you really ought to ...

9. A Little Theology at Christmas

Titus 2:11-14

Sermon

John N. Brittain

... world. Those of us who struggle every year with the proper way to celebrate Christmas — how much of what is too much, when does Christ really get squeezed out, and so on — know that being impious is not always a conscious choice. The title of Stephen Carter's prescient 1994 book says at lot in this regard: Culture of Disbelief: How American Law and Politics Trivialize Religious Devotion. So impiety is not limited to the village atheist; it is a very real possibility that dogs us all. And what about the ...

10. This Spirit Is Not Spooky

John 14:15-21

Sermon

Robert Leslie Holmes

... pick you up when you are down, and meet you wherever you are and look out for you? You do have someone like that. His power energizes everything good in the church, and in Christians, since Jesus' ascension. His name is Holy Spirit. Stephen Carter, a Yale law professor, in his book The Culture of Disbelief, traces the decline of Christian influence in America and concludes that our future is abysmally ominous. That will surprise no thinking Christian. Long ago Solomon prophesied, "Where there is no prophecy ...

11. Which Kingdom Do We Serve?

Mark 6:14-29

Sermon

David Coffin

... or going on to do mission or ministry elsewhere. This is the kingdom of God we serve on this seventh Sunday after Pentecost. Amen. 1. M. Eugene Boring, New Testament Library: Mark, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006). 2. Stephen Carter, Integrity, (New York: Harper Perennial, 1996). 3. Adela Yarbro Collins, Hermeneia: Mark, (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2007). 4. Morna Hooker, Black’s New Testament Commentaries: The Gospel of St. Mark, (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1991).

12. Dealing with Grief

1 Thessalonians 4:13--5:11

Sermon

King Duncan

... , http://www.holwick.com/sermons/Holwick_2013.html?John1930ItIsFinished.html. 4. “For Lorna Colbert: 'We were the light of her life, and she let us know it ‘til the end', by son Steven Colbert,” Speakola, June 19, 2013 https://speakola.com/eulogy/for-lorna-colbert-by-stephen-colbert-2013. 5. “Mattie Stepanek’s Eulogy,” Presented by President Jimmy Carter, Funeralwise, https://www.funeralwise.com/plan/eulogy/stepanek/. Poem from Just Peace: A Message of Hope by Mattie J.T. Stepanek with Jimmy ...

13. All for Some Dumb Sheep

John 10:11-18

Sermon

King Duncan

... why it had to be done that way, but the result is staggering all the same. There was a time when former President Jimmy Carter was working in the Philippines on a house for the Habitat for Humanity. The house was near where the famous Bataan death march of World War II began. It was a very hot day, and as President ... -faith-learning-more-savior-vineyard-1. 7. “Preaching on the Lessons.” The Clergy Journal, Oct. 2002, p. 37. 8. The Rev. Dr. B. Wiley Stephens, http://day1.org/989-one_life_to_give.

14. He Is Who He Says He Is

Acts 5:17-42

Sermon

King Duncan

... , that people who witnessed their ordeals were often won to their cause. Consider, for example, the effect of the dying Stephen's witness on the chief persecutor of the early Christians, Saul of Tarsus. He is who he says he is, ... have and everything they are they owe to him. I was reading about a man who stopped his car in front of a house that Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter had helped to build for Habitat for Humanity. A little boy was standing in the front yard. He was probably five or six years old. The little ...

15. Adopted! (New)

Ephesians 1:1-14

Sermon

King Duncan

... school year, after the adoption was finalized, Jeremy proudly announced to his principal, "When school started I was nobody. Now I'm a Carter." (2) St. Paul wanted a way to describe to the Christians at Ephesus what it meant to belong to God through Christ, and the ... he had been brought up, that he persecuted fellow Jews when they turned to Christ. He even participated in the death of Stephen, the first Christian martyr. But now he was a new person. His heart had experienced such a radical change that now he ...

16. A Road Straight to Your Heart

Luke 3:1-20

Sermon

King Duncan

... No one knows in advance who will preach the morning sermon; the leader for the day is chosen by lot or by last-minute consensus. Carter asked an Amish bishop how people could prepare a sermon if they didn’t know when they would be called on, and he replied, with ... your heart? 1. http://www.natpresch.org/sermon.php?d=1997-12-14%200000 2. The Rev. Dr. B. Wiley Stephens, http://day1.org/1610-uncluttering. 3. Dr. Daniel Lioy, Tarbell’s Lesson Commentary, September 2004‑ August 2005, (Colorado Springs: Cook ...

17. What Is Success?

Matthew 7:24-29

Sermon

Stephen M. Crotts

... , in living out his calling in relationship to his people. Such things, Jesus taught, are foundational. They make life sturdy. Conclusion Carol, a friend of mine, was a reporter with a Florida television station. She once confided in me, "Stephen, I've interviewed them all. Ford, Carter, Mondale, Reagan. I've talked to judges, athletes, beauty queens, and millionaires. But these aren't the most interesting people. The ones I enjoy most, the most real people, are the store clerks at the little hardware store ...

18. Fools For The Sake Of Christ

1 Corinthians 4:1-21

Sermon

John N. Brittain

April 9, 1996, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia delivered an address in Mississippi on religion and public life, a topic which has gotten a lot of attention the past few years, particularly since the publication of Stephen L. Carter's book The Culture of Disbelief. In the course of that speech Justice Scalia quoted from the apostle Paul's letter to the Corinthians where he says that we Christians are sometimes called to be "fools for Christ's sake" or, in the NRSV, "fools for the sake of Christ." ...

19. Even Our Business Belongs to God!

Jeremiah 32:1-44

Sermon

Mark Ellingsen

... needs. What a great way to do business! When you go against the grain of our current business ethos, and believe that God owns your business, it sets you free really to enjoy your job. 1. For these insights I am indebted to Stephen L. Carter, The Culture of Disbelief (New York: Basic Books, 1993), esp. pp. 3, 8-9. 2. Martin Luther, Heidelberg Disputation (1518), in Luther’s Works, eds. Jaroslav Pelikan and Helmut T. Lehmann (55 vols.; Philadelphia and St. Louis: Fortress Press and Concordia Publishing ...

20. Historic: The Declaration of Independence

Illustration

Staff

... Thornton Massachusetts: John Hancock, Samual Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery Connecticut: Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott New York: William ... Carrollton Virginia: George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton North Carolina: William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn South Carolina: Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas ...

21. Hated, Excluded, Reviled, Defamed — And Leaping For Joy

Luke 6:17-26

Sermon

William G. Carter

In a certain town, a man walked into a bookstore to return a purchase. “It’s a Bible,” he said, handing to the clerk at the cash register. “Was it a gift?” asked the clerk. “No, I bought it for myself,” he said, “and I made a mistake.” “Didn’t you like the translation? Or the format?” “Oh no,” the man said, “the format was clear and the translation was fine. I made a mistake.” The clerk said, “Well, I need to write down a reason for the return.” “In that case,” said the man, “write down that there is a lot ...

22. Can You See Where We're Going

Mark 10:46-52

Sermon

William G. Carter

A cigar-chomping realtor was driving around a young couple to search for their first dream house. After listening to their concerns about mortgage points, maintenance costs, and school systems, he decided to give them a bit of advice. "I've been selling homes for 23 years," he said, "and I've discovered only three things matter when you're buying a home: location, location, location." To prove his point, he drove the couple to see two homes. The paint was peeling on the first house, and the driveway was ...

23. Light of the World

John 1:1-18

Sermon

William G. Carter

One of the striking features of the Gospel of John is the way it depicts the life and ministry of Jesus Christ. The other gospels usually tell us stories about Jesus. Then, like the disciples, we are left to ask, “Who is this, that wind and sea obey him? Who is this who feeds the multitude on a couple of loaves and a few fish?” But in the Gospel of John, there’s never a doubt who Jesus is, because he tells us. Usually he does so with a statement that begins with the words, “I am.” Put him in a situation ...

24. What Is Light?

John 1:1-18

Illustration

William G. Carter

You can sit in physics class and learn a lot of things about light. Ask Stephen Hawking, who holds the Newton chair at Cambridge. He will tell you that light is the ultimate constant in the universe, that it always travels at 186,282 miles per second, that light transmits energy, radiation, and information. Or ask a third-grader to put a sunbeam through a prism and you will see the spectrum of a rainbow. Physics can tell us a great deal about light. But there’s one thing physics has never explained, namely ...

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