World Missions News & Information

Sermon Starters: Achievement - Jesus (pages 1 of 3)

Go to Sermon Starters Page 2 Laughter - Mothers

Go to Sermon Starters Page 3 Pentecost - Worship

Achievement

• Nothing splendid has ever been achieved except by those who dared believe that something inside them was superior to circumstances.
  - Bruce Barton Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• You cannot control the length of your life, but you can control its breath, depth and height.
  - Unknown

Aging

• An older pastor who had seen success in his many years of pastoring recently commented during a message, "During the past four years of my ministry, I've brought in more money for my ministries and seen more souls saved through my ministry, than the previous 43 years combined."
  - Unknown

• Maybe we're getting older but, through the grace of God, and keeping our hand to the plow, we can get better.
  - Unknown

Altar

• Evangelist Kenneth Schmidt once told me, "I have never gone into a service without planning for the altar and what I want to see accomplished in that service. So if it isn't accomplished, I know I missed it." I've never forgotten that, and from time to time over my years of ministry I've had to refocus and know the difference between what I was wanting to accomplish and what God was wanting to accomplish.
  - Thomas E. Trask, Assemblies of God general superintendent 1993-2007, and David A. Womack, Back to the Altar

• The church has not had church till they've had an altar service.
  - Unknown

Anxiety

• I am no longer anxious about anything, as I realize that the Lord is able to carry out His will, and His will is mine. It makes no matter where He places me, or how. That is rather for Him to consider than for me; for in the easiest positions He must give me His grace, and in the most difficult His grace is sufficient.
  - J. Hudson Taylor, 19th century English missionary to China

Attitude

• Whether you think you can, or can't - you're right.
  - Henry Ford

Behavior

• As I grow older, I pay less attention to what men say. I just watch what they do.
  - Andrew Carnegie, 19th century entrepreneur and philanthropist

Bible

• I never knew all there was in the Bible until I spent those years in jail. I was constantly finding new treasures.
  - John Bunyon, Pilgrim's Progress

• America's first textbook (The New England Primer, 1690) relied heavily upon the Bible and was used in American classrooms until the 1930s. The first English-language Bible in America was printed in 1782 by the Continental Congress as an "edition of the Holy Scriptures for the use in our schools."
  - David Barton, Today's Pentecostal Evangel
  
  
• Some people are bothered by Scriptures they don't understand. I am bothered by the ones I do understand.
  - Mark Twain
  
  
• The Bible is a missionary book, and the source of its missionary zeal lies in the heart of God himself. Jesus Christ is God's Missionary to a lost and dying world, and the entire sacred canon is a description of God reaching down and reaching out toward sinful man for the purpose of redeeming him.
  - Harold Lindsell, former editor of Christianity Today, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• The study of God's Word, for the purpose of discovering God's will, is the secret discipline which has formed the greatest characters.
  - James W. Alexander, 19th century American minister and writer

Body Ministry

• Surround yourself with people who can hold your arms up when you can't do it yourself. When you go on your life's adventure you will get wounded, so have those around you who can support you and hold you accountable if needed. It's when we get alone and by ourselves that the devil can pick us off. There is strength in numbers.
  - Mart Green, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Calling

• God isn't looking for people of great faith, but for individuals ready to follow Him.
  - J. Hudson Taylor, 19th century English missionary to China

• God never calls us to a task that we are capable of doing apart from Him. God wants us to stretch ourselves for His help.
  - T.F. Zimmerman, Assemblies of God general superintendent 1959 - 1985

• The Christian is not obedient unless he is doing all in his power to send the gospel to the heathen world.
  - A.B. Simpson, founder of the Christian and Missionary Alliance

• If Jesus Christ be God and died for me, then no sacrifice can be too great for me to make for Him.
  - C.T. Studd, 19th & 20th century missionary

• He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.
  - Jim Elliot, missionary martyr who lost his life in 1956 trying the reach the Auca Indians in Ecuador

Children

• Anyone who works with small children has the same opportunity as has a foreign missionary - to tell someone about the gospel for the first time.
  - Unknown

• To teach a child is to touch a life forever.
  - Unknown

• D.L. Moody once reported "two and a half conversions." His host inquired, "Two adults and a child, I suppose?" The evangelist replied, "No, two children and an adult. The children gave their whole lives. The adult had only half of his life left to give."
  - Unknown

Choice

• As missionary-explorer David Livingston's body was being carried through the streets of London's vast throngs, an elderly man wept. He said: "I knew him as a boy. I ridiculed his decision to go to Africa. I was ambitious. I cared for my own special interests. Now, with a misspent life behind me, I acknowledge that Livingstone made a wise choice when he answered and obeyed God's call. I put emphasis on the wrong world."
  - Unknown

• Choose now whom you will serve, and that choice is going to affect the next generation.
  - Unknown

Christ

• Jesus didn't take the people out of the slums; He took the slums out of the people. Jesus did not minister to groups; He ministered to individuals.
  - Tom Anderson

• There is only one recorded case when men thrown into a fiery furnace survived. The Son of God walked with them. If you are passing through a fiery furnace or trial, remember only Jesus can deliver you.
  - Unknown

• Nature forms - sin deforms - school informs - Christ transforms!
  - Unknown

• Very seldom do you see a picture of Christ laughing or smiling. I like to think of Him as [someone] who got people to listen to Him by leaving them laughing and chuckling with one another.
  - Bil Keane, creator of the Family Circus comic strip, to Religion News Service

Christianity

• The main thing the Lord would have me do is live for him on a daily, personal basis. Whether or not I ever said so in public would not mean as much to him as my being sold out to him on the inside, at home, alone, when the chips are down and there is no audience.
  - B.J. Thomas

Christmas

• It takes more than a MasterCard with a high credit limit to ensure a meaningful Christmas. The heart of Christmas should be delighting in the Savior himself and appreciating His greatness.
  - Arlene Allen, national Women's Ministries director, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• It is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a Child himself.
  - Charles Dickens, 19th century English author

Church

• We were raised up to be a praying church. We were raised up to be a missions church. We were raised up to be a church that introduces people to Jesus Christ ... a witnessing church. We were raised up to be a church of compassion - not just sending in offerings but also going where people are hurting and ministering to them. I see God calling us back to those basics across our Fellowship.
  - Thomas E. Trask, Assemblies of God general superintendent 1993 - 2007, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• You need to have the expertise and the guidance of someone else. You cannot train yourself. ... The church is the gym of the soul.
  - Actor Sylvester Stallone on spiritual fitness, in a teleconference with pastors, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• The mission of the church is missions.
  - Oswald J. Smith, 20th century Canadian missionary statesman

• The average pastor views his church as a local church with a missions program. Instead, he should view his congregation as a global church with a missions purpose.
  - Unknown

• The true greatness of any church is not how many it seats but how many it sends.
  - Unknown

• Any church that is not seriously involved in helping fulfill the Great Commission has forfeited its biblical right to exist.
  - Oswald J. Smith, 20th century Canadian missionary statesman

• A church that does not pray does not grow.
  - Unknown

• Church planting is central to the Great Commission. It is not just a good idea; it is a biblical command. The commands of the Great Commission (make disciples, baptize, teach, etc.) are all church functions and they were lived out in early churches. Church planting is the most effective evangelistic methodology we have. New churches reach and baptize more people and are more focused on reaching the lost.
  - Ed Stetzer, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• If your church is passing through a difficult season, here is what you can do to honor the Lord and keep hope alive:
  1. Do your part - pray, witness and remain faithful.
  2. Do not become divisive or cynical.
  3. Be an encourager, especially to the pastor and his family.
  4. Do not give up. Hold onto hope that this season will pass.
  5. Believe God for the miraculous.
  - Hal Donaldson, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• Only as the church fulfills her missionary obligation does she justify her existence.
  - Unknown

Church Growth

• Membership in Assemblies of God churches outside the United States surpassed 50 million last year (60 million in 2008). This number increases as a rate of about 35,000 people each week.
  - Randy Hurst, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• In recent years, it has been the churches that demand the most of people - tithing, bowing to firm doctrines, observing strict rules of conduct - that have grown the fastest.
  - Wall Street Journal Deputy Editor Naomi Schaefer Riley, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Christmas

• Did you know that poinsettias came from Mexico? They are called Nochebuenas which in Spanish is synonymous with Christmas Eve.
  - Ed and Jeanette McCallie, AGWM missionaries to Mexico

Commitment

• Either live for something, die for nothing - it's your choice.
  - Actor Sylvester Stallone, Springfield News-Leader

Compassion Ministry

• Let us touch the dying, the poor, the lonely and the unwanted according to the graces we have received.
  - Mother Theresa

Depression

• God can mend a broken heart, but we have to give Him all the pieces. See Psalm 34:18.
  - Unknown

Discipleship

• Words from a Chinese classic written hundreds of year ago by one of the old scholars: "If you are going to plant for one year, sow grain; if you are going to plant for 10 years, put in trees; if you are going to plant for 100 years, grow men." That presents the whole genius of the missionary enterprise.
  - Unknown

Disobedience

• Delayed obedience is disobedience; and disobedience is sin.
  - Don Hillis, Building Missions Support by Paul Brannan

Education

• From the beginning, our Movement recognized the need to prepare the next generation, should Jesus tarry, for Christian service. The late Ralph Riggs, former general superintendent, made this poignant comment back in the mid-1940s regarding the college-age young people of the Assemblies of God: "If they are lost, we are to blame."
  
  My plea is for a new passion for the future - that the prayer of Jesus for His own will be our pray for the junior and senior high young people in our churches today: I have not lost one of those you gave me (John 18,9, NIV).
  - George O. Wood, Assemblies of God general superintendent, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Eternity

• The bright hope of everlasting life for those who believe is shadowed by those perishing in darkness.
  - Randy Hurst

• We are fortunate that God's Spirit has dwelt so long and richly blessed so many Americans. Material things are fleeting; that which is spiritual stays with us and is immortal.
  - Former President Gerald R. Ford, in a 90th birthday interview with World Tribune.com. Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Evangelism

• Christ alone can save the world, but Christ cannot save the world alone.
  - Author unknown

• Christ came to save the lost, the last and the least.
  - Author unknown

• The greatest thing on earth that a Christian can do is to win a soul to Christ, and it's a work that every real Christian is doing.
  - Nathanael Olson, Advance

• We Christians are debtors to all men at all times in all places, but we are so smug to the lostness of men. We've been "living in Laodicea" (Revelation 3:14-22), lax, loose, lustful and lazy. Why is there this criminal indifference to the lostness of men? Our condemnation is that we know how to live better than we are living.
  - Leonard Ravenhill, 20th century English preacher

• It is no marvel that the devil does not love field preaching! Neither do I; I love a commodious room, a soft cushion, a handsome pulpit. But where is my zeal if I do not trample all these underfoot in order to save one more soul?
  - John Wesley, 18th century English minister

• One would think that when the Son of God was born, the news would have spread like wildfire throughout the whole area. But it didn't. God had to send His angels to make the announcement to a group of sleepy shepherds on a hillside.
  
  Incidentally, this is the only occasion when God allowed angels to be the evangels. From that time on it has become the obligation of His followers to tell of Christ's birth, life, death and resurrection.
  - J. Philip Hogan, AGWM executive director, 1960 - 1989, Advance

• Dwight L. Moody was greatly impressed by a picture of one being saved as he came up out of the stormy waves by clinging to the cross. However this first picture lost all its appeal when he saw another picture. The rescued man clung to the cross with only one hand and was rescuing another drowning companion with the other hand.
  
  
• Perhaps the most outstanding thing about Andrew, one of Jesus' disciples, is that in every place where he is mentioned in the Bible, he is pointing someone to Jesus.

Faith

• Faith is to believe what we do not see; and the reward of this faith is to see what we believe.
  - St. Augustine, 5th century Algerian bishop

• Belief in and dependence on God is absolutely essential.
  - Ronald Reagan

Family

• God never intended us to face family challenges alone. Galatians 6:2 says, Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ"(NIV). We must not allow pride, embarrassment or unrealistic expectations to rob us of the prayers and support from our church family. When we enlist others to pray for our family members, we fortify the hedge of protection around them and declare to the enemy he is not welcome in our house.
  - Hal Donaldson, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• The more often families eat together, the less likely kids are to smoke, drink, do drugs, get depressed, develop eating disorders and consider suicide, and the more likely they are to do well in school and delay having sex.
  - Time writer Nancy Gibbs, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Fasting

• Fasting is a powerful tool. Whatever you are facing today, consider fasting as part of your response. As you subject yourself to that discipline, you may feel weak. But God's strength becomes even more evident in that weakness.
  - Dave Williams, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Forgiveness

• Forty years ministering as a Christian therapist has taught me there is nothing more healing for the emotions than forgiveness.
  - Richard D. Dobbins, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it. See Ephesians 4:32.
  - Unknown

Giving

• The Bible teaches that it's more blessed to give than to receive (Acts 20:35). While there are many rewards to giving, longevity may be a nice bonus.
  
  According to a study conducted by the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research, those who help others tend to live longer. ... Amazingly, volunteering was found to be an even greater predictor of longevity than exercise.
  - Christina Quick, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• God has given us two hands - one to receive with and the other to give with. We are not cisterns made for hoarding; we are channels made for sharing. If we fail to fulfill this divine duty and privilege, we have missed the meaning of Christianity.
  - Billy Graham, Advance

• You can give without loving. But you cannot love without giving.
  - Amy Carmichael, 20th century missionary to India

• We believe [our church is] debt-free because we give - not just to missions, but to BGMC, Light for the Lost and other ministries."
  - Robert Jimenez, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• A person who goes to church every week ... will give, on average, 100 times more money to charity each year than a person who never attends a house of worship.
  - Arthur C. Brooks, author of Who Really Cares: America's Charity Divide, in World. Today's Pentecostal Evangel

• In the spirit of caretaking and giving, there is a lot of service the faith-based community can do. ... You can do so many things because you have credibility.
  - Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Julie Gerberding in a speech to Springfield, Missouri, church leaders, in the Springfield News-Leader, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Goals

• The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that our aim is too low and we reach it.
  - Unknown

• I have four things to learn in life:
  o To think clearly without hurry or confusion
  o To love everybody sincerely
  o To act in everything with the highest motives
  o To trust in God unhesitatingly
  - Helen Keller

• One person with a dream is equal to 99 who only have an interest!
  - Unknown

God

• The question isn't: "Do you believe in God." The question is: "Do you believe God?"
  - Unknown

• Be assured, if you walk with Him and look to Him and expect help from Him, He will never fail you.
  - George Mueller, 19th century evangelist and coordinator of orphanages
  
  
• We have recognized that, underlying every other need in life - the need for food, for warmth, for human love, for a dream to follow - is the most pressing need of all: the need for God.
  - Lawrence Welk

• Have courage for the great sorrows of life and patience for the small ones; and when you have laboriously accomplished your daily task, go to sleep in peace. God is awake.
  - Victor Hugo, 19th century French writer

• Our coins, our national motto all say: "In God We Trust." All right then, let's do it.
  - Lawrence Welk

God, power of

• Isn't it wonderful to get into trouble, into disappointment, into a tight place? You would never know God's power if you didn't.
  - Unknown

God, working for

• We have all eternity to celebrate the victories, but only a few hours before sunset to win them.
  - Amy Carmichael, 20th century Irish missionary to Japan and India

• Between the great things that we can't do, and the little things that we won't do, the danger is that we shall do nothing at all.
  - Selected

• I really don't know what direction my life is going from here: I just know I'm on the track. Whatever He's got planned for me, I'm ready to listen. I'm ready to try to follow.
  - Johnny Cash

• Never take on more work than you have time to pray about. See Isaiah 30:15.
  - Unknown

• It is amazing how much God can accomplish through an imperfect person who has put all his imperfections completely at God's disposal.
  - Unknown

Gospel

• There are two things to do about the gospel; believe it and behave it.
  - Susannah Wesley, mother of John and Charles Wesley, Treasury of Women's Quotations

• The gospel is only good news if it gets there on time.
  - Carl F.H. Henry, 20th century theologian and first editor-in-chief of Christianity Today, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Great Commission

• The Great Commission is not an option to be considered; it is a command to be obeyed.
  - J. Hudson Taylor, 19th century English missionary to China

Happiness

• It is not how much we have, but how much we enjoy, that makes happiness.
  - Charles H. Spurgeon, 19th century English preacher

Health

• People who pray, read the Bible and are involved in a religious community are mentally and physically healthier, less depressed and less anxious. They have better immune function that we can actually measure, they don't use as many health services and they live longer.
  - Dr. Harold G. Koenig, co-director and founder of Duke University's Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Heathen

• We must remember that, even in America, those who claim to be Christians but do not personally know Christ are as lost as any who fit the stereotype of "heathens." A person doesn't have to be heathen to go to hell.
  - Randy Hurst, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Holy Spirit

• The authentic empowerment for life and ministry can only come when we embrace the power which God birthed into the Church by the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. You can point to no other dynamic in the Bible that so profoundly speaks of the way God makes Christ real. Through the baptism in and the gifts of the Holy Spirit, God expresses himself continually in believers and the Church.
  - Keith Heermann, Developing Dynamic Disciple

• The baptism in the Holy Spirit and the fruit the Spirit provides make it possible for the believer to live a life of constant victory over sin. Accordingly, every Christian should seek earnestly the fullness of the Spirit in his life.
  - Charles Harris, Power Encounter

• Why be filled with the Holy Spirit? Because it's a biblical experience.
  Without the baptism in the Holy Spirit, we are too ordinary and too weak to handle the responsibility of the Great Commission.
  - Loren O. Triplett, AGWM executive director 1990 - 1997

• The message of Jesus does not change [in spite of new technology], nor does our essential need for the empowerment of the Holy Spirit. Without the message of salvation and touch of God's Spirit on our efforts, our work will make no eternal difference - no matter how state-of-the-art our tools and capabilities are.
  - L. John Bueno, AGWM executive director

• Missions is the special work of the Holy Spirit. No one may expect to be filled with the Spirit if he is not willing to be used for missions. No one who wishes to work or pray for missions need fear his feebleness or poverty - the Holy Spirit is the power that can fit him to take his divinely-appointed place in the work. Let everyone who prays for missions and longs for more of a missionary spirit in the church, pray first and most that in every believer personally, and in the church and all its work and worship, the power of the indwelling Spirit may have full sway.
  - Andrew Murray, 20th Scottish missionary to South Africa

• I have a passion to move every Christian to the free exercise of tongues, not as a proof of spirituality but as a privilege for worship and intercession.
  - International Church of the Foursquare Gospel President Jack W. Hayford, in Christianity Today, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Jesus

• "Who is Jesus?" That is the most profound, far-reaching, and important question you will ever ask. The consequences of a wrong answer cannot be calculated. Among them is a lifetime of spiritual lostness, deception and bondage. Beyond this life lies an eternity without God. On the other hand, the consequences of the right answer and a proper response mean a lifetime of truth and freedom and an eternity in God's presence.
  - Charles T. Crabtree, Assemblies of God assistant general superintendent 1993 - 2007, Today's Pentecostal Evangel

Go to Sermon Starters page 2 Laughter - Mother

Go to Sermon Starters page 3 Pentecost - Worship