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HomeIllustrations

10,079 Illustrations

Browse Sermon Illustrations

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Top Rated Newest Oldest|All Sources Biblical Illustrator Spurgeon Maclaren

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Sermon Illustration

The Rancher Who Went Out in the Storm

In February 2019, a polar vortex drove temperatures across the Midwest to forty below zero. Most ranchers in western Nebraska hunkered down and waited it...

Ezekiel 34:11-16, 20-24Universal

233 words

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Sermon Illustration

Finding Music in Everyday Moments

Music has an extraordinary power to shape our lives, transcending barriers and binding us together in shared experience. Imagine walking through a bustling city street, where the cacophony of honking cars and chattering pedestrians suddenly gives way to a street...

Acts 2:42-47Reformed

284 words

Sermon Illustration

Science Illustration: Stewardship of Scientific Influence

In a small town, there lived an elderly scientist named Dr. Mendez. His entire life had been devoted to studying the stars, and he often said that each twinkle held a secret waiting to be uncovered. One clear night, he...

Revelation 21:1-5Universal

254 words

Sermon Illustration

The Coach Who Emptied the Bus

In 2019, a high school cross-country coach in rural Oregon named Dave Turnbow was loading his team onto the bus after a meet in Bend...

Luke 15:3-7Universal

236 words

Sermon Illustration

The First Crack Only a Mentor Could Name

In a small roastery in Portland, Oregon, twenty-three-year-old Mateo Reyes stood over a drum roaster for the first time, overwhelmed by heat and noise. His...

1 Samuel 3:1-10Universal

229 words

Sermon Illustration

The Chef Who Forgot Their Records

In 2015, Dallas chef Chad Houser opened Cafe Momentum, a restaurant staffed almost entirely by teenagers coming out of juvenile detention. Most of these kids...

Psalm 25:1-10Universal

240 words

Sermon Illustration

The House on Briar Creek Lane

In 2019, a young couple in Houston fell in love with a house on Briar Creek Lane. Fresh paint, gorgeous hardwood floors, a kitchen that...

Luke 6:39-49Universal

234 words

Sermon Illustration

The Rain That Satisfies Mown Grass

In 2015, when floodwaters devastated Richland County, South Carolina, the national cameras pointed at collapsed highways and submerged neighborhoods. But County Councilwoman Dalhi Myers drove...

Psalm 72:1-7, 10-14Universal

219 words

Sermon Illustration

Betsie ten Boom's Vision Beyond the Barracks

In the winter of 1944, Betsie ten Boom lay dying on a thin mattress in Ravensbruck concentration camp. Her body was skeletal, ravaged by forced...

Revelation 21:1-4Universal

246 words

Sermon Illustration

The Phone That Always Answers

Margaret Chen's son David stopped calling regularly after college. He moved to Portland, found new friends, built a life that didn't seem to include her....

Psalm 78:1-2, 34-38Universal

237 words

Sermon Illustration

The Seamstress of Calais

In 2015, when thousands of refugees huddled in the mud of the Calais "Jungle" camp in northern France, local churches organized prayer vigils. They sang...

Isaiah 58:1-12Universal

243 words

Sermon Illustration

The Smoke Detector Nobody Wanted to Hear

In 2018, a family in Sacramento gathered for Thanksgiving dinner when the smoke detector began shrieking from the hallway ceiling. The turkey was fine. The...

Luke 12:49-56Universal

249 words

Sermon Illustration

The Keystone That Holds the Arch

In the hill towns of central Italy, Roman aqueducts still stand after two thousand years. Engineers in Segovia, Spain, walk beneath arches built before the...

Proverbs 16:3Universal

242 words

Sermon Illustration

The Empty Breakfast Table on Ashley Down

In 1861, George Müller stood before three hundred orphan children seated at long wooden tables in his Bristol, England orphanage on Ashley Down. The plates...

Psalm 33:4-6, 9, 18-20, 22Universal

256 words

Sermon Illustration

Eighty-Six Years of Refuge

When Roman authorities dragged the elderly bishop Polycarp before the proconsul in Smyrna around 155 AD, they offered him a simple bargain: curse Christ and...

Psalm 71:1-6Universal

238 words

Sermon Illustration

The Woman Who Lit Newgate Prison

In 1817, Elizabeth Fry stepped through the iron gates of London's Newgate Prison and into a scene that made seasoned guards flinch. Three hundred women...

Matthew 5:13-20Universal

229 words

Sermon Illustration

The Sailor Who Kept Forgetting

On March 21, 1748, a violent storm nearly sank the merchant vessel Greyhound in the North Atlantic. John Newton, a twenty-two-year-old sailor who had mocked...

Psalm 78:1-2, 34-38Universal

232 words

Sermon Illustration

Rembrandt's Final Homecoming

In 1668, a bankrupt and grieving Rembrandt van Rijn picked up his brush to paint what would become his final masterpiece: *The Return of the...

Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32Universal

253 words

Sermon Illustration

The Avalanche That Stripped the Mountain Bare

In February 2019, a backcountry guide named Erik Holsen was leading a group near Rogers Pass in British Columbia when they heard what he later...

Psalm 29Universal

236 words

Sermon Illustration

Modern Examples of Fear

Fear can feel like a heavy fog, wrapping around us, making it difficult to see the way forward. It creeps into our lives, whether it's the fear of losing a job, the uncertainty of a diagnosis, or the anxiety of...

Acts 1:8Traditional

302 words

Sermon Illustration

The Farmer's Market on Maple Street

Every Saturday morning, Rosa Gutierrez set up her stand at the Maple Street farmers' market in Topeka, Kansas. She sold tamales — handmade, wrapped in...

Luke 6:38Universal

229 words

Sermon Illustration

The Count Who Offered Land and Received a Legacy

In 1722, a twenty-one-year-old German nobleman named Count Nikolaus von Zinzendorf made what seemed like a modest gesture. A band of persecuted Moravian Christians needed...

2 Samuel 7:4-5a, 12-14a, 16Universal

231 words

Sermon Illustration

The Coach Who Changed Everything

When Marcus Thompson showed up for his first day at the Midnight Basketball League in Southeast Washington, D.C., he expected drills and wind sprints. Instead,...

Titus 2:11-12Universal

242 words

Sermon Illustration

The Invitation That Changed Everything

In 2018, a young woman named Priya Sharma walked into a community dinner at a church in Leicester, England. She wasn't a member. She wasn't...

Ephesians 3:1-12Universal

234 words