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The Immediate Word

TIW Contributors

George Reed
Mary Austin
Dean Feldmeyer
Chris Keating
Tom Willadsen
Katy Stenta
Proper 9 | Ordinary Time 14 - C
Thomas Willadsen
Nazish Naseem
Dean Feldmeyer
Mary Austin
Katy Stenta
George Reed

For July 6, 2025:

Note: This installment is still being edited and assembled. For purposes of immediacy, we are posting this for your use now with the understanding that any errors or omissions will be corrected between now and Tuesday afternoon.

What is The Immediate Word?

The Immediate Word gives a theological perspective on today's headlines and popular culture for your sermon, children’s sermon, and worship service. The Immediate Word gives a theological perspective on today's headlines and popular culture.

Cutting Edge: THE IMMEDIATE WORD gives you the tools to be cutting edge ... to put you in touch with today's most critical issues and to aid you in crafting messages and presentations that will truly help your congregants understand the Gospel in the context of what is current and most important to them.

Collaborative: THE IMMEDIATE WORD is a unique collaboration of some of the sharpest, most contemporary clergy of our day in an Internet-based service that gives you weekly information, inspiration, and presentation materials for your sermon, children’s sermon, and worship service.

Enabling: THE IMMEDIATE WORD will enable you to create high-impact sermons, children’s sermons, sermon outlines, worship services and compose pastoral prayers that help people pray with you, write compelling pastoral columns for your newsletter, arm your Sunday school teachers with meaningful, up-to-the-minute discussion sermon material, speak more constructively during the "Concerns of the Church" portion of your sermon, children's sermon and worship service about matters that worry your parishioners, advertise timely discussion topics to draw people into your church, and more.

Interactive: THE IMMEDIATE WORD is a dynamic, interactive process. First, among the team of clergy that creates it every week. Secondly, with you: you can personally participate in the creation process by providing your input and reactions to the input of others on new sermons, children’s sermons, sermon outlines and worship resources.

Timely: THE IMMEDIATE WORD sends participants the topic of the week on Friday and the final product on Tuesday afternoon, giving you time to digest the sermon and worship service materials and then incorporate them into your preparations for the coming Sunday service to deliver high-impact sermons and worship services.

Satisfaction Guaranteed: THE IMMEDIATE WORD is not only guaranteed to satisfy you, we believe it will actually energize your ministry. We are so confident that you will find THE IMMEDIATE WORD to be such a great value that if you are not completely satisfied with the service we will refund the balance of your subscription payment, no questions asked.
UPCOMING WEEKS
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Proper 8 | OT 13 | Pentecost 3
29 – Sermons
160+ – Illustrations / Stories
27 – Children's Sermons / Resources
20 – Worship Resources
29 – Commentary / Exegesis
4 – Pastor's Devotions
and more...
Proper 9 | OT 14 | Pentecost 4
34 – Sermons
160+ – Illustrations / Stories
32 – Children's Sermons / Resources
26 – Worship Resources
31 – Commentary / Exegesis
4 – Pastor's Devotions
and more...
Plus thousands of non-lectionary, scripture based resources...

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New & Featured This Week

The Immediate Word

Thomas Willadsen
Nazish Naseem
Dean Feldmeyer
Mary Austin
Katy Stenta
George Reed
For July 6, 2025:
  • Who Is My Neighbor? by Tom Willadsen based on 2 Kings 5:1-14, Galatians 6:(1-6) 7-16, Luke 10:1-11, 16-20; Psalm 30.

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John Jamison
Object: This is a role play activity for the children.

Note: You will need an older volunteer to help with this activity. One option would be to find a teenager with some physical ability. If a teen is not available, an adult could be used instead. For simplicity here, I will refer to my older volunteer as “TOM”. You will also need to select three of your younger children to serve as volunteers in the story.

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Emphasis Preaching Journal

Mark Ellingsen
2 Kings 5:1-14
Bill Thomas
Frank Ramirez
Mark Ellingsen
Bonnie Bates
2 Kings 5:1-14, Psalm 30
Naaman seeks healing. He travels hoping healing will come to him when he visits the king of Israel. Yet, healing does not come in that way. Rather healing comes through Elishah. Healing comes from believing and being cleansed in the River Jordan. Healing comes through Naaman’s faithfulness and through God’s grace. Psalm 30 also reminds us to seek healing; to seek God and God will heal and restore us. Do we believe that? Do we believe that God can bring healing?

StoryShare

John E. Sumwalt
But whenever you enter a town and they do not welcome you, go out into its streets and say, ‘Even the dust of your town that clings to our feet, we wipe off in protest against you. Yet know this: the kingdom of God has come near.’ (vv. 10-11)

When I visit your church for the first time, consider the possibility that I might be looking for a church home. I am a good-looking old guy, but I have gray hair and I dress down in the summer, so don’t be put off by my cargo shorts and tank top. Talk to me!

The Village Shepherd

Janice B. Scott
Damien and Ora grinned at each other in excitement. The time had come - at last! They'd been with the Leader for months and months, waiting for this moment. Not that it had felt much like training. They'd simply lived with the Leader, listening to his stories, hearing about the Kingdom, learning to get along really well with all the other people at Mission Headquarters. Now all seventy of them were ready, the spaceship had docked, and the Mission was about to begin. Ora was glad she'd been paired up with Damien again.

SermonStudio

James Evans
Stan Purdum
Carlos Wilton
(See Epiphany 6/Ordinary Time 6, Cycle B, and Easter 3, Cycle C, for alternative approaches.)

Anyone who has ever had the experience of losing a friend because of some conflict or dispute, and then has had the friendship restored because of love and forgiveness, has a unique insight into the meaning of this psalm. Although the poem begins and ends with praise, there is in the middle of the poem a brief moment of confession and contrition that puts the praise portions of the psalm in an entirely different light.

April Yamasaki
A word of encouragement came from an unlikely source the other day in a television interview with Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. The former football player, wrestler, and now actor was asked about a low time in his life when he was very discouraged about his career and future.

"How did you make your way back from that?" he was asked.

The Rock replied, "You have to put yourself out there. You have to get out there and fail, and learn from your failures."

Larry D. Powell
In the summer of 1983, I participated in a ministerial exchange program sponsored by my denomination. My assignment was to a circuit of churches on the Isle of Man, a tiny island located in the Irish Sea. The months preceding the exchange included considerable correspondence with the minister on the island with whom I would exchange pastoral duties for six weeks.
Richard E. Gribble, CSC
A wealthy businessman decided to take a walk and eat his lunch at the same time. He strolled by a park. There he purchased a hot dog and a soft drink. As he walked through the park two different "street people" approached him one by one. Each asked, "Can you help me? I am hungry." Each time the businessman looked straight ahead and kept walking. After finishing his lunch, he stopped and bought a chocolate eclair for dessert. As he was about to take the first bite, he was forced to jump out of the way as a young boy raced by on his skateboard. The eclair went flying and landed on the ground.

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